WASHINGTON, March 14 (Reuters) - The U.S. government isappealing a federal court ruling that reduced the potentialpenalty BP Plc must pay for the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oilspill by almost $4 billion.
The appeal, which was filed on Friday in U.S. District Courtin New Orleans, challenges a January decision by U.S. DistrictCourt Judge Carl Barbier that set the size of the spill at 3.19million barrels. The appeal did not detail what aspects ofBarbier's ruling it was challenging.
The government had estimated the size of the spill at 4.09million barrels and BP at 3.26 million.
BP could have been fined a maximum of $17.6 billion underthe Clean Water Act but Barbier's ruling on the spill sizelowered the potential figure to $13.7 billion.
BP has incurred more than $42 billion of costs for thespill, including for clean up, fines and compensation forvictims. About 810,000 barrels were collected during the cleanup. (Writing by Bill Trott; Editing by Alison Williams)