"Agents from the DOI and EPA raided the offices of QuarterNorth Energy, which has been shirking its cleanup responsibilities, this week."

"It often seems like polluters don’t get nearly enough attention and punishment from the government—but authorities cracked down on one oil and gas producer that had been shirking its cleanup duties this week in the unusual move of raiding its offices.

Agents from the U.S. Department of Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency searched the offices of QuarterNorth Energy LLC in Lafayette, Louisiana this week, Bloomberg reported Thursday, looking for information on an oil spill at one of the company’s wells QuarterNorth Energy is a new company, but it was formed out of the ruins of an older one: Fieldwood Energy LLC, which filed for bankruptcy in 2020.

According to an investigation filed by the DOI, in January of 2021, there was a pressure incident at a gas well owned by Fieldwood off the coast of southern Louisiana, which was not reported to authorities until August 2021 and was still not fixed a year later, causing a larger spill in January of 2022. “Fieldwood’s lack of mitigation, communication, and urgency to address the issues associated with [the well] played a major role in the events leading up to the incident,” the DOI noted in its report."

Molly Taft reports for Earther September 16, 2022. [2]