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bookworm
Social climber
Falls Church, VA
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barry takes charge:
"The American people should know that from the moment this disaster began, the federal government has been in charge of the response effort."
oops:
"Struggling to convey command of the worsening Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the Obama administration is taking steps to distance itself from BP and is dispatching Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to the Gulf Coast to meet with federal and state prosecutors."
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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like so many things it is nice to demand a black-and-white answer the questions that are more subtle... the blame game found here on STForum is just reflection of what is going on elsewhere.
If you do even a cursory search for information on past well blowouts you'd find that the relief well kill is the only solution that works. The blowout preventer technology is supposed to prevent the well blowing out, once that happens, it's months to drill back to the well and stop the flow.
The expertise on well drilling exists, and is a part of the industry that drills for a living... the USG does not, and the expertise on many other things that may be applicable is not at a state that it can be applied to this particular problem.
What is this particular problem? first off, you don't want to make things worse if you can avoid it... so the solutions are "layered" in such a way to maximize the options in the future if the one you're working on now doesn't solve the problem. You don't want to do something that reduces your future options.
This is a fairly complex way to proceed, and one that BP has a huge stake in, since its claim as the preeminent "risk assessor" in this industry is at stake.
There in lays the issue, to what extent should society, in this case the US and its representative: the USG, allow private institutions, in this case BP, to take on risk that can have an adverse effect on that society?
It's a complex question, the oil spill recovery will be mostly paid for by US funds, at some point BP cannot afford the cleanup costs. At that point, BP as an organization, has no value (having failed at the very thing that was central to its existence), and its assets would be sold off at a very reduced price.
It will take months to drill the relief wells, likely not before August, because that's how long it takes for the very amazing technology to snake new wells, 5 miles worth, to within a foot of the existing well, a technological tour-de-force.
The important debate is one on how much regulation should exist governing the assumption of risk on the part of the USG and on private industry. It is obvious the "true cost" of drilling is not fully represented when you fold in the possibility of a well blowout and the subsequent costs of cleanup.
This is not a republican v. democrat issue, as the deregulation of private industry has been happening essentially since the end of the FDR era. Since there is no way to know a priori how much or how little a degree of government regulation is necessary, we explore this as a society by tightening and loosening these constraints.
It would seem time to tighten them in a large number of areas... especially around energy and financial industries, given recent historical events.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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What government should be deciding is whether we should allow drilling off our coasts when drilling a relief well is the only real solution to when a blowout preventer fails. That video I linked above shows that this exact same thing happened in 1979. And the exact same solutions were used and didn't work in 200 feet of water. It was even the same company whose blowout preventer failed. The oil industry compartmentalizes these actions to reduce risk to the main company. BP is only renting the rig. So their exposure is limited.
So are we willing to risk these leaks? Is the oil worth the risk of our oceans? I don't know. When you factor in the true cost of drilling offshore, then perhaps safer energy becomes more cost effective.
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MisterE
Social climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 2, 2010 - 11:10am PT
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The CEO of BP:
"Nobody wants this to end more than I do - I want my life back"
Oh, yeah - that life of no personal responsibility? Back to sitting in the boardroom collecting fat paychecks at the expense of millions?
News for you, Pal -
The whole population of the Gulf of Mexico: fish, fowl and mammal, WANTS THEIR LIFE BACK TOO!
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sandstone conglomerate
climber
sharon conglomerate central
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what a cluster f*#k..what's even more of a cluster f*#k is the way we depend on these mfers for just about every aspect of our lives.
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lostinshanghai
Social climber
someplace
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BP, struggling to maintain its image while taking responsibility for the worst oil disaster in U.S. history, has hired someone new to head its American public relations operation: Anne Womack-Kolton, the former campaign press secretary for Vice President Dick Cheney.
Told you before Fatty: Cheney is in there to get rid of the evidence.
You can actually see and hear BP CEO breaking up and loosing it. This going be lost of fun now that Cheney is back in control.
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lostinshanghai
Social climber
someplace
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“If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything” Mark Twain 1894
Cheney: What weapon of mass destruction, What destruction, Where?
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apogee
climber
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Sarah Palin Blames Environmentalists For Gulf Oil Disaster
First Posted: 06- 3-10 09:38 AM
Updated: 06- 3-10 09:47 AM
In her latest note on Facebook, Sarah Palin is blaming "extreme 'environmentalists'" for causing the gulf oil disaster that has been unfolding for over a month. Her logic is that because environmentalists push for tougher drilling regulations onshore in places like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (also known as ANWR) it forces oil companies to explore deeper offshore drilling which has more risks.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/03/sarah-palin-blames-enviro_n_598977.html
Ummmm.....yeah. OK.
Huh?
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pFranzen
Boulder climber
Portland, OR
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"If you do even a cursory search for information on past well blowouts you'd find that the relief well kill is the only solution that works."
Not quite.
The Russians had a good bit of success with small nuclear bombs:
LLNL/DOE article here: https://e-reports-ext.llnl.gov/pdf/238468.pdf
Video of a successful implementation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpPNQoTlacU
NYT article today discussing the option: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37484693/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times
It would never be allowed today due to politics, but it still remains a tested and effective option. And before everyone starts with the "OMG radiation!!!1!" replies, do some research into the amount of radiation released in underground tests and how that compares to everyday background radiation. A properly designed nuke should keep the ultra-heavy elements to a minimum, and a couple miles worth of clay/sand/mud would ensure that it stays out of the seawater.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Wow!
The Gulf looked a hell of a lot better back when we had Oil Men - instead of an Environmentalist - in the White House.
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apogee
climber
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"The Gulf looked a hell of a lot better back when we had Oil Men - instead of an Environmentalist - in the White House."
Chaz, that statement is just about as clueless as Palin's. The difference is she makes dumbass statements like that to make $....you, on the other hand, make statements like that......why?
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tolman_paul
Trad climber
Anchorage, AK
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Considering BP's push to squeeze their contractors to drastically reduce their costs worldwide, it's no wonder their greed led to decisions that caused this disaster, and them not being equiped to decisively end it.
I'm just about fed up with the oil industry and even though I work in life safety, it's harder and harder to get any satisfaction out of the job when you know the oil co's only concern about safety comes down to how much it costs them to kill people, vs. actually being concerned w/ the life and health of their employees and contractors employees.
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MisterE
Social climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 3, 2010 - 08:29pm PT
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I'm still really pissed at that guy who leaned on the jog-lever for the bit when it was sealed up, moving it 15 feet under full seal, and being ultimately responsible for the annular failure...
I imagine a Homer Simpson-like moment, complete with donut and coffee...
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Dr.Sprock
Boulder climber
Sprocketville
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tar balls, can you smoke those?
i cough up a few every now and again.
who wants to buy some crack?
yeah, call george w. he will fix it in a flash,
he wants to open the panama canal so california can share in the fun.
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BASE104
climber
An Oil Field
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This was caused by a sorry set of human errors and should have never happened.
I don't have time to read 250 posts, but I have spent almost half of my life on drilling rigs or watching streaming data from the rig. Hell, I am half deaf now.
BP will burn in hell over this one.
And Palin is an idiot. She is talking out of the wrong hole again.
I have really noticed one glaring thing: I can watch any of the news networks, Fox, CNN, MSNBC, the big three, and nobody has a clue to the most rudimentary basics of what is going on. And they get these professors on who haven't been on a rig in ages.
I mean, it is really stupid. So it makes me wonder how accurate the media, regardless of any affiliation, is. On any topic that I don't know much about.
I mean, I know a ton about this stuff, and they don't have a clue. I guess a really good documentary will come out that will explain things. Some of it is actually very easy to understand.
I will entertain questions if I log back on. I am busy working right now. The only reason I am playing here is that I have a monster data transfer eating my biggest machines alive right now.
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BASE104
climber
An Oil Field
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And they are going about it in the right way, from my point of view.
What most people don't understand is the enourmous pressure that the well has. It doesn't look like a lot coming out of a 12 inch pipe, but when you start pinching 5000psia down to the size of a quarter, it might as well be a laser beam. And when you have 5000 feet of pipe going down it is like a noodle. Typically on horizontal wells, you can turn from vertical to horizontal in about 500 feet. And that drillpipe is heavy stuff.
And shutting down drilling just puts a ton of people in Louisiana out of work, on top of those affected by other coastal economies.
As for getting a nuke into the well...if they could get any kind of pipe inside the wellhead they could kill it with heavy drilling mud.
A nuke at the seafloor probably wouldn't accomplish much. You would blow the surface of the pipe to hell, and if you didn't seal it completely off with absolutely no fractures, the oil would just migrate up. The reservoir pressure is huge.
The relief well should work. Drilling two is smart.
I am not defending anyone, but this is a huge engineering problem. However the fact that it happened is totally indefensable. Everyone I talk to on a daily basis brings up what is going on and just shakes their head.
We call this "stepping on your dick."
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