Louisiana Berms Ineffective in Capturing Oil From BP Spill: Report

"Louisiana's $360 million plan to build sand berms to capture oil from the BP Macondo well was not effective and was approved in large part because of political pressure from Louisiana elected officials and President Barack Obama, according to a new report from the National Oil Spill Commission.

The report provides the first behind-the-scenes look at how the controversial berms won approval. It concludes that although the berms might be a "significant step forward" for coastal restoration, they were not successful in blocking oil.

While burning, skimming and chemical dispersion captured 890,000 to 1.85 million barrels of oil, even the most generous estimates show only 1,000 barrels or so -- or perhaps one-tenth of 1 percent of the total oil captured -- were captured by berms, the report said.

In part, that's because only 10 percent of the first berm was completed by July 15, when BP capped the Macondo well. The state's own estimate indicates that only 14 of the 25 permitted miles of berm will be completed by Jan. 1."

Mark Schleifstein reports for the New Orleans Times-Picayune December 16, 2010.