Mr Nansen Saleri CEO of Quantum Reservoir Impact talks with Bloomberg's Mark Crumpton about the outlook for BP Plc and the oil industry.

A person familiar with the investigation said that US Justice Department attorneys conducting a criminal probe of the BP Plc well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico have recommended that a grand jury be convened and BP managers subpoenaed to determine if any laws were broken.

BP Plc plans this week to inject mud down its Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico and begin permanently plugging the source of the largest oil spill in US history.

Mr Thad Allen National Incident Commander told reporters that once mud injected into the well overpowers pressure coming up from the reservoir of oil and gas feeding Macondo, BP may use cement to plug the well from the top. The technique will make it safer to permanently plug the leak later the month, using a shaft drilled to intercept the damaged well about 13,000 feet beneath the ocean floor. BP has started installing steel casing in this so called relief well in preparation for the injection of mud and cement for final plugging.

Mr Allen said that BP will know within hours whether the injection of mud into the top of the well, known in the industry as a static kill, is successful. If the plan works, bringing pressure from Macondo to zero, it will make it easier for BP to permanently plug the well from the bottom with cement.

BP planned to finish plugging Macondo by the middle of this month before Tropical Storm Bonnie, which forced evacuations of drilling vessels on July 22nd 2010 and caused some debris to fall into the relief well drilled to intercept with the damaged shaft.

BP said that it will have 12,000 barrels of GBP 13.2 per gallon mud ready to inject into the well near the site, 40 miles off the Louisiana coast, six times more than the company expects will be needed. Before being sealed last month, Macondo was spewing 35,000 to 60,000 barrels of crude into the Gulf.

Mr Allen said that the government will release a new calculation within a few days for the amount of oil that was leaking into the Gulf, as well as for how much oil has been dispersed. BP used chemicals called dispersants to break up the oil and contain the spill.

(Sourced from www.bloomberg.net)