Non-governmental organizations, including Greenpeace Mexico and the Mexican Center for Environmental Law (Cemda), they denounced this Thursday a new crude oil spill close to one Pemex platform in the Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of the state of Campechewhich had suffered a fire last Saturday.
In a statement, the NGOs indicated that as of fire and explosion of Pemex’s Akal-B platform, on April 6, “they have detected in satellite images the existence of an oil spill in progress in the same area of the incident.”
The organizations stated that the leak It began around March 22 and would remain active at least until Tuesday, accumulating 18 days of uninterrupted leak.
“The crude oil spill is calculated on an approximate minimum surface area of 390 square kilometers (km2), a size similar to that of the spill reported by several of the signatory organizations in July 2023,” they stated in their report.
In addition, they indicated that once again “it is from an explosion on a Pemex platform that a spill not reported by the authorities was detected.”
Thus, They urged Pemex to provide transparent information, attention, mitigation and non-repetition measures, and a conversation about the company and the safety of its workers.the safety of the communities that coexist with its infrastructure, the future of the oil company and its undeniable responsibility in the face of the climate crisis.
“The repetition of these disasters underlines the urgent need to abandon the extraction and burning of fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal) in Mexico. The April 6 incident cannot be considered a mere accident, but is an inherent consequence of a system that sacrifices the safety of workers, communities and the environment in pursuit of the exploitation of fossil resources,” the statement noted.
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They also specified that the main responsibility for the events that occurred and their mitigation falls on both Pemex and the authorities in charge of guaranteeing safety and environmental preservation in these operations, in particular the Energy and Environment Safety Agency (ASEA).
Last Saturday, a fire on the Pemex marine platform, Akal-B, in the Campeche Sound, southeast of Mexico, caused the death of one person, in addition to nine others being injured.
It’s a statement, Pemex pointed out that the fire occurred in the process center in the area where the pipes that handle fuel gas for the turbomachinery are located.
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The Mexican state oil company, considered the most indebted in the world, said it immediately activated the emergency response plan and controlled the fire in just over an hour.