Science, law make awkward bedfellows in BP oil spill

So at five years after the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, why is it some scientists studying its impact can talk to the media but many can't?

Why have some released their findings in papers published -- 15 so far on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website, hundreds in other arenas -- but many haven't?

Why do some appear to have drawn major conclusions -- such as the dolphins living in heavily oiled Barataria Bay, La., are five times more likely to have moderate to severe lung disease, significant alveolar interstitial syndrome, lung masses and pulmonary consolidation -- but others seem to have uncovered an assortment of facts or a mundane aspect of the spill that doesn't give us the big picture?

It has to do, in part, with the fact that a large portion of the scientific work is being done under the Natural Resource Damage Assessment, a legal process overseen by a team of trustees to be used in a federal case, if it ever goes to court.

So key scientific findings are kept confidential.

Ben Sherman of NOAA said the massive NRDA process in the BP's Deepwater Horizon spill is the most transparent in history, with 53,000 samples and 3.8 million analytical results made public to date.

However, it seems anything but transparent when a scientist at the University of Southern Mississippi's Gulf Coast Research Lab in Ocean Springs says he needs to consult attorneys from NOAA and Louisiana before he can talk about fish toxicity, because his work is being funded under NRDA. Then after the consultation, he decides it might be better not to speak at all.

Sherman said work plans and raw data are made public after they have been quality-control checked and verified as properly collected.

"But not the analysis," he said. "Conclusions are part of the legal case."

As papers are completed, they are published, he said, but only if they're cleared for publication.

NOAA's website links to 15 NRDA papers -- seven on deep-water coral, four on dolphin health and four on fish toxicity.

"For researchers that have not yet published their work, we would prefer that they speak to us first about the data that they may be discussing," he explained in a statement. "We can then provide guidance ... on what is and is not appropriate to discuss publicly so that we can protect the legal case that we are developing on behalf of the American public."

In the science process, there has to be complete transparency on how things are done, one scientist said. In the legal process, there's a completely different set of rules.

And although it is generally accepted that when the legal process is complete, data collected under NRDA will become available to everyone, that's not entirely true. There have already been details considered proprietary to industry that have been embargoed and won't be released.

This story was originally published April 19, 2015 at 11:29 AM with the headline "Science, law make awkward bedfellows in BP oil spill."