BP:US Oil Spill Response $1.6B To Date; 51,000 Claims Submitted

14th Jun 2010 09:11

By Selina Williams Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES LONDON (Dow Jones)--U.K. oil major BP PLC (BP.LN) said Monday that the cost of its response to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill so far amounts to $1.6 billion, and more than 51,000 claims have been submitted. The sum includes the costs of the spill response, containment, relief well drilling, grants to U.S. Gulf states, claims paid and federal costs, the company said in a statement. So far, BP has made more than 26,500 payments to claimants, totaling more than $62 million, the company said. However, BP said it was too early to quantify other potential costs and liabilities associated with the incident. One analyst Friday estimated the ultimate figure would be between $3 billion and $6 billion. BP has lost around 40% of its market value as investors, worried by uncertainty about the size of the final cleanup bill, have been dumping the stock. In Monday's statement, BP said it had collected around 7,720 barrels of oil in the first 12 hours of Sunday and 15,000 barrels of oil on Saturday due to a special cap installed over the leaking pipe. The total volume of oil collected by the lower marine riser package cap system is around 127,000 barrels since it began operation. A further approximately 22,000 barrels of oil had previously been collected with the riser insertion tube tool, the company said. Work continues to collect and disperse oil that has reached the surface of the sea and to collect and clean up any oil that has reached shore. Operations to skim oil from the surface of the water have recovered a total of almost 475,000 barrels of oily liquid, BP said. Over the weekend, the Obama administration said it wanted an independently administered fund for reimbursing victims. The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig at BP's Gulf of Mexico oil field exploded and later sank in April, killing 11 workers and unleashing the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history. At 0755 GMT, BP shares were down 2.3%, or 9 pence, at 383 pence. Company Web site: http://www.bp.com -By Selina Williams, Dow Jones Newswires; +44 (0)20 7842 9262; [email protected] (END) Dow Jones Newswires June 14, 2010 04:11 ET (08:11 GMT)