BP finally reached a settlement with the Justice Department over federal, state, and local governments waiting for money after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and it is a record-breaker. The company agreed to pay $18.7 billion to state and local authorities in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, and the federal government. That figure includes a $5.5 billion Clean Water Act fine, the largest ever. “If approved by the court,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a statement today, “this settlement would be the largest settlement with a single entity in American history.”
BP is still unsure how much additional money it will have to pay to businesses and individuals who claim damages related to the devastating accident, which dumped nearly 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico — making it the biggest offshore oil spill in U.S. history.
