Canadian regulators have responded to heightened concerns about an ultra-deepwater drilling project in the Orphan Basin in Atlantic waters off the coast of Newfoundland, insisting that there will be no repeat of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Speaking to Reuters, Max Ruelokke, chief executive of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board, criticised training and procedural standards in the Gulf of Mexico and assured that the blowout which caused the collapse of the Deepwater Horizon rig would not occur again in Canadian waters.

"We would never allow such a thing to happen. Our policy, procedures, training, equipment are such that it will not happen," he told reporters.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster has caused the largest oil spill in US history, at times gushing at a rate of 19,000 barrels a day, according to official estimates.

BP is currently working on a solution that Reuters describes as the "last best hope" to contain the slick, using remotely operated robots to cut through the leaking pipe in order to place a cap over it and capture the escaping oil.

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