SAN FRANCISCO, March 24 (Xinhua) -- U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp. (ExxonMobil) said Sunday that an oil spill catastrophe 30 years ago was a turning point that has made the company reconsider risk management and the top priority of safety.
Alaskan TV outlet KTVA Thursday quoted Rebecca Arnold, Exxon's corporate media relations advisor, as saying that the company regrets the Exxon Valdez Spill three decades ago, one of the biggest oil spills in U.S. history.
The disaster occurred in Prince William Sound, Alaska, on March 24, 1989, when Exxon Valdez, an Exxon-owned oil tanker carrying 53 million gallons (about 167,000 tons) of North Slope crude oil, hit a reef in the Gulf of Alaska.
More than 11 million gallons (about 35,000 tons), or an equivalent of 17 Olympic-sized swimming pools of oil, leaked into the sea and contaminated nearly 2,000 km of the shoreline of Alaska state, killing thousands of marine animals such as otters, harbor seals, seabirds and fish.
Arnold said the oil spill incident dealt a heavy blow to the U.S. multinational oil and gas corporation headquartered in Irving, Texas.
"While it was a low point in our long history, it also served as a turning point and catalyst that prompted our management to completely reevaluate how the company understands and manages risk," Arnold said in a statement.
"Our management's charge was simple and sweeping: When it comes to people, facilities, and especially the environment, safety would come first," Arnold added.
The ExxonMobil statement came as many in Alaska were reviewing what lessons were learnt and what legacies were left on the 30th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez incident, which fell on Sunday.
Charles Wohlforth, who wrote for Anchorage Daily News as a columnist in the past four years, expressed worries about low investment in environmental protection and the government's reluctance to raise taxes on oil-producing companies.
Wohlforth said the Alaska government was afraid of increasing oil taxes and shied away from discussing the impact of climate change on the environment.
"(Alaska) Gov. Mike Dunleavy would rather shut down the state ferries, close college campuses and lay off hundreds of teachers than talk about oil taxes," he said.
He argued that climate change is ultimately a far greater threat to Alaska's coastal ecosystems than spilled oil.
For his part, Tom Barrett, president of the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company, told KTVA that safety was one of the legacies of the Exxon Valdez spill.
"A culture of safety has evolved today, in which the focus is on prevention," he said.
He noted a spill like the Exxon Valdez would not likely happen anymore as oil tankers have double hulls today, a mandatory requirement enforced under a federal law signed in 1990. Enditem
