Company fined for oil spill in Arkansas | Processing Magazine

Colorado-based Whiting Oil and Gas Corporation has agreed to pay $58,570 to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund for violating the Clean Water Act after an oil spill in Arkansas in September last year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced last week..... Any company that allows such substances to leak in quantities that are potentially harmful to public health or the environment will be treated as an offender and will be expected to pay a penalty. In this particular case, the fine will be deposited into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, which is used to cover the expenses for response activities and to compensate for damages that may have occurred in result of a spill, the EPA stated.

 I wonder if the trust fund is large enough to cover a major spill?   I went to the website for the fund (see link)  I read that :
 
The OSLTF has two major components.

1. The Emergency Fund is available for Federal On-Scene Coordinators (FOSCs) to respond to discharges and for federal trustees to initiate natural resource damage assessments. The Emergency Fund is a recurring $50 million available to the President annually.
2. The remaining Principal Fund balance is used to pay claims and to fund appropriations by Congress to Federal agencies to administer the provisions of OPA and support research and development. 

From the Alaskan Dispatch:

Although we know exactly how to better reduce spill risks, we are continually told that there is not enough money available to do so, particularly with current federal budget problems. The federal government’s Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund (OSLTF), which collects 8 cents/barrel on oil nationwide, is authorized to pay for spill prevention measures, but such requests must first go through a politicized congressional appropriations process. Because of this, the Fund is virtually never used for spill prevention, and almost always just for after-spill response costs – a politically easier lift in Congress. Thus, many necessary prevention measures are either left to be paid from government general funds (e.g. us taxpayers), or are left unfunded altogether. Clearly, this is bad economics, and needs to be fixed. It is high time that industry begins to pay its spill prevention bill in full.


Company fined for oil spill in Arkansas | Processing Magazine