Fidelis E. Satriastanti The Jakarta Globe 20 Dec 10;
The Indonesian government and the company responsible for last year’s oil spill in the Timor Sea have agreed to carry out a joint survey to assess the impact of the disaster on Indonesian fisheries, a company official said on Monday.
The spill was the result of a blowout at the Montara platform off the northwest coast of Australia on Aug. 21, 2009. The well was operated by PTTEP Australasia, a subsidiary of Thailand’s PTT Exploration and Production.
Luechai Wongsirasawad, a spokesman for PTTEP in Bangkok, said the agreement had been reached at a meeting in Singapore last Friday.
“It was agreed by the parties that we will now give urgent priority to resolving the economic and social impacts of the incident regarding the fisheries sector,” he said.
“This will also include a joint survey between the Indonesian government and the company to verify the data, to visit fishing locations which have been identified by the Indonesian government as having been impacted by the oil,” he said.
Luechai added the company had requested to conduct its own survey in Indonesian waters and compare it with the findings made by the government earlier this year.
“We requested to send a team by ourselves, but they said why not go together,” Luechai said.
“My guess is that the government might not do it [run an assessment] again, but just accompany the team,” Luechai said.
He explained that the assessment would take place in the East Nusa Tenggara areas of West Timor, Rote Island and Savu Island, which the government has highlighted as the areas worst affected by the spill.
Despite the decision to carry out the joint exercise, Luechai said both sides were still not seeing eye to eye on the key issue of how much of the slick actually entered Indonesian waters.
“We’ve acknowledged that it entered Indonesian waters, but there are differences on how far it entered or whether it even reached Indonesian shores,” he said.
A recent study conducted by the Australian government and funded by the company said the slick had not reached Australian or Indonesian shorelines.
“Three studies have been published and they are very comprehensive studies, that’s why we are confident about the findings,” Luechai said.
“Secondly, 98 percent of the oil spilled into Australian waters, so only a couple of percent entered Indonesian waters,” Luechai added.
He stressed the company would not discuss any compensation figure until the joint assessment was complete.
Indonesia claims the slick covered 78,000 square kilometers of its waters, and is seeking up to Rp 23 trillion ($2.5 billion) in damages.
