Spill recovery to take until ’20:

Discovery

Samsu

Sunderland

Clean-up efforts after an oil spill from a well in Indonesia’s Java Sea will take until at least March next year, state energy firm Pertamina said on Thursday as it struggles to plug the underwater leak.

The spill started on July 12 when Pertamina was drilling at its YYA-1 well in the Offshore North West Java (ONWJ) block, about 2 km (1.2 miles) from the coastline in the Karawang district.

The Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) said leaking crude has affected 13 villages and waters north of the capital, Jakarta, threatening the livelihoods and health of at least 7,800 people.

“We’re very sorry to residents affected and we’ve been trying to quell the impact since the incident,” Dharmawan Samsu, Pertamina’s upstream director, told a news conference.

Pertamina is drilling a 9,000 ft (2,700 m) relief well to stop the spill, said Taufik Adityawarman, the incident commander for the project. The well had been drilled to 2,000 feet by Thursday and he expected the leak to be plugged in early October. (RTRS)