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DRILL BABY DRILL!!! -- Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill (21 posts)

  1. JohnA
    Member

    Palin's view on energy studies: We don't need more studies, we need more action!

    DRILL BABY DRILL!!!

    Gulf of Mexico oil spill 2010: The worst-case scenario

    The worst-case scenario for the broken and leaking well gushing oil into the Gulf of Mexico would be the loss of the wellhead currently restricting the flow to 5,000 barrels -- or 210,000 gallons per day.

    If the wellhead is lost, oil could leave the well at a much greater rate, perhaps up to 150,000 barrels -- or more than 6 million gallons per day -- based on government data showing daily production at another deepwater Gulf well.

    By comparison, the Exxon Valdez spill was 11 million gallons total. The Gulf spill could end up dumping the equivalent of 4 Exxon Valdez spills per week.

    SOURCE:

    http://blog.al.com/live/2010/04/gulf_mexico_oil_sp...

    Posted 14 years ago #
  2. christs4sale
    Administrator

    Experts: Oil May Be Leaking at Rate of 25,000 Barrels a Day in Gulf

    WASHINGTON—The Gulf of Mexico oil spill could be leaking at a rate of 25,000 barrels a day, five times the government's current estimate, industry experts say.

    Basing their calculations on government data and standard industry measurement tools, the experts said the Gulf spill may already rival the historic 1969 Santa Barbara, Calif., and 1989 Exxon Valdez disasters.

    Ian MacDonald, professor of oceanography at Florida State University who specializes in tracking ocean oil seeps from satellite imagery, said there may already be more than 9 million gallons of oil floating in the Gulf now, based on his estimate of a 25,000 barrel-a-day leak rate. That's compared to 12 million gallons spilled in the Valdez accident.

    Interior Department officials said it may take 90 days to cap the leaking well. If the 25,000 barrels a day is accurate and it leaks for 90 days, that's 2.25 million barrels or 94.5 million gallons.

    Mr. MacDonald and his colleagues at the Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science Department have worked jointly with National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the past on oil spill tracking, and have shared their estimates with NOAA scientists. He said the NOAA scientists didn't dispute the calculations.

    A NOAA spokeswoman said the government estimate of 5,000 barrels a day leaking from the BP PLC deep sea well was based on collaborative assessments produced by BP, NOAA and the U.S. Coast Guard. NOAA scientists weren't immediately available to comment.

    The 5,000-barrel figure was first announced late Wednesday and marked a five-fold increase from the previous estimate. News of the higher estimate ratcheted up the pressure on officials to take more-aggressive steps to contain the spill and heightened concerns about potential environmental damage and disruption to the Gulf Coast economy.

    NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco said in a White House press conference Thursday, "It's quite likely we will continue to pay close attention to what is on the surface ... and there may be estimates—revised estimates down the road."

    John Amos, a geologist who has worked as a consultant with companies such as BP, ExxonMobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell PLC on tracking and measuring oil spills from satellite data, said NOAA raised its estimates to 5,000 barrels a day after he and his colleagues published calculations that showed the original figures were far too low based on the NOAA data. Amos has also previously participated in a joint industry-NASA study using satellite imagines to detect and track oil slicks.

    Mr. Amos said the 5,000 barrels a day is the "extremely low end" of their estimates. He said, based on NOAA maps, a more realistic figure is 20,000 barrels a day.

    John Curry, a spokesman for BP working from their Gulf coast central command operations, said the 5,000 barrel a day was a "guestimate." "There's a range of uncertainty, and it's very difficult to accurately gauge how much there is," he said.

    http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100014240527487038...

    Posted 14 years ago #
  3. truthmod
    Administrator

    http://blog.al.com/live/2010/05/animation_gulf_of_...

    Animation: Gulf of Mexico oil spill growth and movement

    Posted 14 years ago #
  4. christs4sale
    Administrator

    A confidential government report on the unfolding spill disaster in the Gulf makes clear the Coast Guard now fears the well could become an unchecked gusher shooting millions of gallons of oil per day into the Gulf.

    "The following is not public," reads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Emergency Response document dated April 28. "Two additional release points were found today in the tangled riser. If the riser pipe deteriorates further, the flow could become unchecked resulting in a release volume an order of magnitude higher than previously thought."

    Asked Friday to comment on the document, NOAA spokesman Scott Smullen said that the additional leaks described were reported to the public late Wednesday night. Regarding the possibility of the spill becoming an order of magnitude larger, Smullen said, "I'm letting the document you have speak for itself."

    In scientific circles, an order of magnitude means something is 10 times larger. In this case, an order of magnitude higher would mean the volume of oil coming from the well could be 10 times higher than the 5,000 barrels a day coming out now. That would mean 50,000 barrels a day, or 2.1 million gallons a day. It appears the new leaks mentioned in the Wednesday release are the leaks reported to the public late Wednesday night.

    "There is no official change in the volume released but the USCG is no longer stating that the release rate is 1,000 barrels a day," continues the document, referred to as report No. 12. "Instead they are saying that they are preparing for a worst-case release and bringing all assets to bear."

    The emergency document also states that the spill has grown in size so quickly that only 1 to 2 percent of it has been sprayed with dispersants.

    The Press-Register obtained the emergency report from a government official. The White House, NOAA, the Coast Guard and BP Plc did not immediately return calls for comment made early this morning.

    The worst-case scenario for the broken and leaking well pouring oil into the Gulf of Mexico would be the loss of the wellhead and kinked piping currently restricting the flow to 5,000 barrels -- or 210,000 gallons -- per day.

    LATER REPORT: Video shows federal officials knew quickly of potential for massive oil flow in Gulf spill If the wellhead is lost, oil could leave the well at a much greater rate.

    "Typically, a very good well in the Gulf can produce 30,000 barrels a day, but that's under control. I have no idea what an uncontrolled release could be," said Stephen Sears, chairman of the petroleum engineering department at Louisiana State University.

    On Thursday, federal officials said they were preparing for the worst-case scenario but didn't elaborate.

    Kinks in the piping created as the rig sank to the seafloor may be all that is preventing the Deepwater Horizon well from releasing its maximum flow. BP is now drilling a relief well as the ultimate fix. The company said Thursday that process would take up to 3 months.

    "I'm not sure what's happening down there right now. I have heard there is a kink in what's called the riser. The riser is a long pipe that connects the wellhead to the rig. I really don't know if that kink is a big restriction. Is that really a big restriction? There could be another restriction further down," said LSU's Sears.

    "An analogy would be if you have a kink in a garden hose. You suspect that kink is restricting the flow, but there could be another restriction or kink somewhere else closer to the faucet.

    BP Plc executive Doug Suttles said Thursday the company was worried about "erosion" of the pipe at the wellhead.

    Sand is an integral part of the formations that hold oil under the Gulf. That sand, carried in the oil as it shoots through the piping, is blamed for the ongoing erosion described by BP.

    "The pipe could disintegrate. You've got sand getting into the pipe, it's eroding the pipe all the time, like a sandblaster," said Ron Gouget, a former oil spill response coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

    "When the oil is removed normally, it comes out at a controlled rate. You can still have abrasive particles in that. Well, now, at this well, its coming out at fairly high velocity," Gouget continued. "Any erosive grains are abrading the inside of the pipe and all the steel that comes in contact with the liquid. It's essentially sanding away the pipe."

    Gouget said the loss of a wellhead is totally unprecedented.

    "How bad it could get from that, you will have a tremendous volume of oil that is going to be offgassing on the coast. Depending on how much wind is there, and how those gases build up, that's a significant health concern," he said.

    The formation that was being drilled by Deepwater Horizon when it exploded and sank last week is reported to have tens of millions of barrels of oil. A barrel contains 42 gallons.

    Smullen described the NOAA document as a regular daily briefing. "Your report makes it sound pretty dire. It's a scenario," he said, "It's a regular daily briefing sheet that considered different scenarios much like any first responder would."

    blog.al.com/live/2010/04/deepwater_horizon_secret_memo.html

    Posted 14 years ago #
  5. truthmod
    Administrator

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37171468/ns/us_news-th...

    NEW YORK - Scientists are finding enormous oil plumes in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, including one as large as 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick. The discovery is fresh evidence that the leak from the broken undersea well could be substantially worse than estimates that the government and BP have given.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  6. truthmod
    Administrator

    Nightmare scene as oil smothers Louisiana wetlands
    http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0520/nightmare-scene-o...

    Crude oil spread through fragile US marshlands Thursday, a month after a drilling rig blast released a devastating spill that now threatens Florida, Cuba and even beyond.

    Oil has been pouring into the Gulf of Mexico since the massive April 20 explosion on the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig that killed 11 and ruptured an underwater well pipe.

    While British Petroleum said Thursday that a tube was now siphoning away 3,000 barrels of oil a day from the leak, a nightmare scene was unfolding in Louisiana wetlands.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  7. truthmod
    Administrator

    http://www.technofascismblog.com/2010/05/20/oil-as...

    According to a recent NPR article, Steve Wereley, engineering professor at Purdue University, estimates the oil spill as “now approaching 100,000 barrels a day. And, there’s another leak he has yet to analyze.” That’s 4.2 million gallons per day. By his estimate, 124 million gallons have spilled so far.

    If Prof Wereley is correct, it’s only been a month and the amount of oil spilled has already topped the second largest oil spill in history: the Ixtoc 1 Mexico Oil Spill of 1980. By coincidence, that spill was also in the Gulf of Mexico. Like the BP oil spill, the Ixtoc spill was due to an explosion in an offshore oil rig that caused a leak that couldn’t be capped for a entire year despite attempts to shoot material into the well pipe and drilling nearby relief wells.

    During that year, the Ixtoc spill continuously leaked 30,000 gallons per day. If it also takes a year to cap the BP spill, by that time, over a billion gallons of oil will have spilled into US coastal waters making it the worst oil spill in history. With that much oil carried by the currents of the Gulf Stream, the entire Eastern seaboard of the US and even Europe could be affected.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  8. mark
    Member

    The media coverage of this spill neglects to mention why anyone would drill in a mile of water -- the easier stuff is on its way out and continued use of oil will require deep water, tar sands, polar oil, etc. Yes, oil is toxic and the oil companies are evil, but solar and wind and other alternatives are not as concentrated as fossil fuels, the reason we use oil and coal and natural gas.

    The Democrats cannot admit to Peak Oil, since that would force a change in every budget, especially those related to highway expansion, suburban sprawl, urban sprawl and agriculture, to cite a few impacts. Biggest of all - energy creates money and our "money" is based on debt and interest and the promise there will be more of everything in the future to pay back the loans that created the money. Peak Oil means there will be less, not more, which our economy cannot cope with - the real root cause behind the economic meltdown.

    The only offshore place not currently being drilled in US waters that definitely does have a fair amount of oil is off the coast of Santa Barbara, but there are wealthy Democrats nearby who don't want oil fouling their fancy beaches, so Obama wouldn't dare do that. He probably knows that 99% of the country know almost nothing about oil production and where fields are (and are not) located, so pandering with "Drill Barack Drill" won't look as ridiculous as it is. Earlier this year, the Democrats in the Oregon legislature reaffirmed a previous ban on oil drilling on the Oregon coast -- even though there isn't any oil either offshore or onshore in Oregon (it's the wrong geology) so it doesn't matter whether one supports or opposes drilling, no oil company is going to spend their shareholders money to drill in places that obviously don't have any oil.

    details at

    http://www.oilempire.us/drill.html Offshore Drilling on a Swift Boat: why geology is more important than the politics of blame

    Posted 14 years ago #
  9. mark
    Member

    Der Spiegel in Germany has a good article on offshore drilling that mentions Peak. I haven't found an equivalent story in the US in either the mainstream or "alternative" media, except for websites like Energy Bulletin, The Oil Drum, etc.


    http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/0,151...

    The Risky Hunt for the Last Oil Reserves

    Does Deep Sea Drilling Have a Future?

    By Philip Bethge, Alexander Jung, Nils Klawitter and Renate Nimtz-Koester

    The oil catastrophe afflicting the Gulf of Mexico underscores just how dangerous offshore oil exploration can be. Oil companies are seeking to extract the planet's last remaining barrels by drilling from ever-deeper sites on the ocean floor that wouldn't even have been considered not too many years ago.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  10. truthmod
    Administrator

    This is preposterous!

    Deepwater Horizon survivors allege they were kept in seclusion after rig explosion, coerced into signing legal waivers

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/20100521/sc_ynews/yn...

    According to two surviving crew members of the Deepwater Horizon, oil workers from the rig were held in seclusion on the open water for up to two days after the April 20 explosion, while attorneys attempted to convince them to sign legal documents stating that they were unharmed by the incident. The men claim that they were forbidden from having any contact with concerned loved ones during that time, and were told they would not be able to go home until they signed the documents they were presented with.

    Stephen Davis, a seven-year veteran of drilling-rig work from San Antonio, told The Guardian's Suzanne Goldenberg today that he was held on a boat for 36 to 40 hours after diving into the Gulf from the burning rig and swimming to safety. Once on a crew boat, Davis said, he and the others were denied access to satellite phones or radio to get in touch with their families, many of whom were frantic to find out whether or not they were OK.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  11. truthmod
    Administrator

    http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0510/37740.ht...

    Eighteen Democratic senators have asked the Justice Department to investigate the operator of the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig after the company announced it would dole out $1 billion to shareholders as oil continues to pour into the Gulf of Mexico.

    Transocean, according to the letter from the senators, plans to distribute dividends to its stockholders. And the senators are concerned that the payments might make it harder to collect liability payouts related to the massive oil spill.

    Transocean, according to the letter, also says it will make a $270 million profit on the insurance policy for the rig. And the senators claim the rig was insured for more than it was worth.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  12. JohnA
    Member

    this shit makes me want to cry

    Gulf Oil Spill Now Far Worse Than Exxon Valdez, Worst In U.S. History, Scientists Say

    COVINGTON, La. (AP) -- The Gulf oil spill has surpassed the Exxon Valdez as the worst in U.S. history, according to new estimates released Thursday, but the Coast Guard and BP said an untested procedure to stop it seemed to be working.

    A team of scientists trying to figure out how much oil has been flowing since the offshore rig Deepwater Horizon exploded April 20 and sank two days later found the rate was at least twice and possibly up to five times as high as previously thought.

    Even using the most conservative estimate, that means the leak has grown to nearly 19 million gallons, surpassing the size of the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster, which at about 11 million gallons had been the nation's worst spill. Under the highest estimate, nearly 39 million gallons may have spilled.

    U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt said two different teams of scientists calculated that the well has been spewing between 504,000 and more than 1 million gallons a day.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  13. truthmover
    Administrator

    The following two articles, in addition to those above, raise in my mind the possibility of sabotage. The first one sets my gears turning. It's really heavy with data and implication and basically clarifies that BP had the means and opportunity to commit the crime. What is the motive? Well, that's where we skeptical types tend to make ourselves sound creative. But when I start thinking about the impact that this will have on Obama my Spider senses start to tingle.

    BP worker takes 5th, making prosecution a possibility http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/26/94884/bp-cou...

    [D]espite unusual pressure and fluid readings on the rig — a BP official decided on the day of the explosion to proceed with removing heavy drilling fluid from the well and replacing it with lighter-weight seawater that was unable to prevent gas from surging to the surface and exploding.

    Employees and experts testified that in the hours before the explosion, they witnessed a power struggle over that decision — the kind of argument common among the different parties that lease and run complicated offshore drilling operations, but one that this time, had deadly consequences. ...

    BP, though, had ultimate authority over drilling decisions, and Brown said in sworn testimony Wednesday that the BP official at the meeting stood up and said, "This is how it's going to be."

    The BP official, a "company man" in industry parlance, would have been the top decision-maker on the rig, although his role may have been complicated by having a number of higher-ranking BP officials on hand to celebrate the Deepwater Horizon's safety record.

    Deepwater Horizon Workers Describe Failures That Led To Gulf Oil Spill http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/27/deepwater...

    As the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig burned around him, Chris Pleasant hesitated, waiting for approval from his superiors before activating the emergency disconnect system that was supposed to slam the oil well shut at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

    The delay may have cost critical seconds. When Pleasant and his co-workers at rig owner Transocean finally got the go-ahead to throw the emergency disconnect switch, they realized there was no hydraulic power to operate the machinery.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  14. JohnA
    Member

    but wouldn't the impact be more profoundly felt by the far right - in the long run? the political drill baby drill puppets of the oil industry have all been silenced - and the oil industry itself now faces moratoriums on drilling - tougher regulations - more public anger - more public scrutiny - months of PR damage as tragic photos continue to come rolling in - and BP in particular faces enormous financial liability.

    and while the political damage to Obama is starting to mount - how exactly did they know ahead of time that Obama would not react fast enough? For all they knew this could have been his shining moment. He could have used this to show real leadership.

    i am not ruling out that this disaster was sabotogue - but - the question of cui bono (who benefits) is a really tough one here.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  15. truthmover
    Administrator

    Nothin but the usual coincidence ...

    BP chief Tony Hayward sold shares weeks before oil spill

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/en...

    Posted 14 years ago #
  16. JohnA
    Member

    now you've got my attention

    Posted 14 years ago #
  17. NicholasLevis
    Member

    The thirty years since Carter was laughed off the stage for making his single most principled and reasonable stand are what caused the Gulf disaster.

    http://www.tdbimg.com/files/2010/05/25/img-three-l...

    (As usual I tried markdown and it doesn't work. How do I make the image display? It's a BP cost-benefit memo from five years ago, in which they use the Three Little Piggies as a parable in explaining why it's best to build a "brick" house rather than a "blast-resistant" one.)

    img

    Posted 14 years ago #
  18. Edward
    Member

    I was browsing around the forum and got to this thread , its feels great when People are sharing information with eachother so that others can learn. Keep this going ever.

    Posted 14 years ago #
  19. Edward
    Member

    Valuable information have been shared here! I would like to thank for sharing your thoughts and time into the stuff you post!! Thumbs up

    Posted 14 years ago #
  20. truthmod
    Administrator

    Edward, thanks for your support, but in the future, please post new information and thoughts...

    Posted 14 years ago #
  21. truthmover
    Administrator

    OK. Maybe we're beyond coincidence here... ?

    "Deepwater Horizon Alarm System Was Partly Disabled Prior To Explosion, Technician Tells Congress"

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/23/deepwater...

    Posted 14 years ago #

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