Abstract

This case is about the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and the continuing safety problems at BP, one of the largest oil and gas producers in the world. The British oil giant with a history of repeated safety violations was held responsible for the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The spill was caused by an explosion aboard an offshore drilling rig leased by BP. Eleven workers were feared dead and fifteen injured in the explosion. After the explosion, the rig sank 5,000 feet to the ocean floor and since then at least 210,000 gallons of oil a day had been leaking into the Gulf. The case describes in detail the conse-quences of the oil spill, considered to be the worst ever environmental catastrophe in US history caused by an industrial disaster. According to experts, the oil spill would adversely impact the environment as well as human and marine life in the Gulf region. The case highlights the ethical issues invo-lved in the disaster and examines BP’s response to it. Though the company accepted responsibility for the explosion and was making efforts to manage the oil spill, it re-mained largely unsuccessful in plugging the leak. As efforts to contain the spill continued, critics alleged that BP had put profits before safety and developed an “unhealthy corporate culture” where cost-cutting was given more priority than the safety of the workers.

Learning Objectives

The case is structured to achieve the following Learning Objectives:

• Study the factors that led to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill
• Analyze the responsibilities of BP in the event of the spill
• Understand the importance of the safety culture and process safety management
• Understand the effects of the oil spill on the company in particular and the oil industry in general
• and Examine the approach adopted by BP in managing the spill.

Keywords

Business ethics, Transnational aspect of the ethics debate, Multinationals in transnational accountability, Corporate social responsibility, Corporate accountability, Environmental disaster, Greenwashing, Environmental responsibility, US environmental and safety laws, process failure, cultural failure, management failure, Gulf of Mexico, BP