The Montara : Whose Good Should be Served?

Australia is now heavily reliant on imported oil to fuel industry and for transport, both commercial and private. Local sources of oil are available in the ocean off the north coast of .

Drilling for oil is an expensive and complex engineering endeavour, requiring the huge capital resources of multinational companies. The company developing the oil at the Montara oil platform in the Australia Exclusive Economic

Zone (EEZ) in the Sea is the Thai- http://theconversation.com/first-montara-then-deepwater- horizon-is-australia-protected-from-catastrophic-oil-spills- based company, PTTEP Australasia (PTTEP 996montara-then-deepwater-horizon-is-australia-protected- AA), operating as an Australian- registered from-catastrophic-oil-spills-996 company and subject to Australian regulations. Regulations require procedures to be in place to secure the safety of workers on the oil rig, and measures to deal with the consequences for persons and the environment should there be an accident or an oil spill.

When the explosion at the Montara oil rig occurred on 21 August 2009, PTTEP AA, undertook measures to plug the well head and to disperse the oil slick which followed the explosion. However, despite repeated attempts to seal the leak, oil continued to flow for over two months, until 3 November 2009.

The oil slick in the resulting from the Montara oil spill spread to the waters around West Timor and Rote Ndao, a small island which is off the tip of West Timor. The people of this Indonesian province of rely on fishing and seaweed farming for their livelihood. There have been claims of environmental damage and harm to the health and livelihood of the people of this region. The West Timor Care Foundation, and its spokesperson, Ferdi Tanoni, has been active in pressing the claims of the people of West Timor.

Questions of fact involve the event and its consequences: whether environment damage was caused by the original oil spill and by the chemical dispersants used to break up the oil on the surface of the slick; the extent of the damage caused to the environment, to the health of the people and the loss of earnings as a result of the effects on fishing and seaweed production.

Broader questions that stem from this incident are:

• How are the economic benefits of oil exploration at sea balanced against the possibility of environmental damage and adverse effects on innocent victims, their health and livelihood?

• How have relations between Australia and its neighbour, been affected?

• What harm has been caused to the citizens of Indonesia and the environment?

• How do these environmental disasters caused by man impact on our fellow human beings?

References:

• PTTEP, “Our Response to Montara”, accessed 23 April 2014, http://www.au.pttep.com/our-response-to-montara/the-incident • ABC News, “Oil rig workers feeling compensation frustration” (3 March 2012), accessed 7 April 2014, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-12/montara-oil-rig-workers-seek- compensation/3883396 • “Living in Montara’s shadow: Reported impacts in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia” (August 2013), by Emily Mitchell