Resolving one of the cases on our
2015 watch list, the Texas Supreme Court responded on Friday, February 13 to certified questions from the Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit that arose from an insurance dispute between
BP and Transocean, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig owner and
operator, over coverage for subsurface pollution liabilities
arising from the explosion on the rig in 2010.
The first certified question was whether BP was an
"additional insured" under Transocean's excess
liability policy and if so, whether the coverage afforded under the
policy was limited to the contractual liabilities assumed by
Transocean in its drilling contract with BP. BP contended that the
terms of the excess policy should be considered without reference
to the drilling contract; in other words, that the scope of
coverage should be determined from the "four corners" of
the excess policy. Transocean and its insurers argued that the
excess policy incorporated the drilling contract,
