From Deepwater Horizon to the Blue Economy: Environmental Regulation, Corporate Accountability, and Offshore Risk Governance

The explosion of the Deepwater Horizon on 20 April 2010 marked the biggest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the oil industry, revealing critical weaknesses in offshore risk regulation. This thesis examines the accident as a complex case study at the nexus of corporate legal liability, environmental regulation, and the Blue Economy paradigm. It seeks to explain the catastrophic failure of this technologically sophisticated ultra-deepwater project and how the interplay of institutional design, regulatory discretion, and corporate risk management practices exacerbated systemic risk. By employing institutional and regulatory theory and analyzing documentary evidence from major public reports, legal texts, and policy documents, the thesis recreates the timeline of the accident and identifies the key actors involved, including BP, Transocean, Halliburton, and U.S. regulatory bodies. The thesis will then review the U.S. legal regime governing offshore oil extraction, examining the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, NEPA, Clean Water Act/Clean Air Act, and Oil Pollution Act, as well as international frameworks such as UNCLOS and IMO conventions. The study will critically assess how the division of labor, conflict of interest, reliance on industry norms, and procedural approaches to environmental review have created regulatory blind spots and underpreparedness for extreme events.The results show that the Deepwater Horizon disaster was more than a technical failure; it was a governance failure that occurred within the context of regulatory capture dynamics, normalized deviance in safety culture, and the lack of enforcement capacity. Based on these findings, the thesis examines the post-2010 reforms and contends that any serious transition towards the Blue Economy goals must be underpinned by more robust accountability frameworks, risk and precautionary approaches to regulation, independent auditing, and monitoring systems. Lastly, the thesis outlines policy recommendations for the integration of offshore governance with marine sustainability, focusing on institutional integrity, decision-making, and redirecting innovation and investment towards lower-impact ocean sectors.