Offshore Oil Drilling = Bad Idea?

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Offshore Oil Drilling is a bad idea? I'll just have to wait to hear the results for the cause of the explosion. Terrorist attack? Angry employee? :dunno:
 
Mother nature is Tough! It will take care of it's self for the most part. as one said, more seeping all the time than this amount and as for being worse than the Exon Valdez, Going to take quite a while and I can guarantee that the government will never tell company's what they can do to clean it up but will give lots of advise on what they can not do. I spent 118 days under contract on the Exxon Valdez spill and unless the government has done a complete 180 there will be no benefit. Veco passed out money just like the government is doing now and yes I collected a bunch of it. Still just trying to appears the people in the lower 48. Beaches that were never cleaned look just like the ones that were cleaned. You may not be aware of it but the beach cleaners were not allowed to pick up a rock and wipe it off as they would be disturbing the environment. On top of that they were only allowed to wipe/clean a short time in each tide change. I could go on and on but? Anyway, shame it happened and public will pay for it for a long time. You are still paying for Exon spill and will for years to come. Exxon siphons off some money or the government siphons it off. which is worse? Toss up as far as I'm concerned.
 
kokonut said:
I didn't say that. Just pointing out the facts that oil seeps naturally all over the world beneath the waters in the tens of millions of barrels a year, I suppose.
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Different functions at different locations.

Oil leaking *at bottom* is NOT same as oil spilling *on top* of sea.
 
netrox said:
Different functions at different locations.

Oil leaking *at bottom* is NOT same as oil spilling *on top* of sea.
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Oil rises to the top. It's common to find tar balls and whips, sheens, and such. The only difference is the amount of quantity over time.
 
Yes and it's amazing how large an area one drop of oil will cover on the surface of water.
 
Texan Guy said:
Offshore Oil Drilling is a bad idea? I'll just have to wait to hear the results for the cause of the explosion. Terrorist attack? Angry employee? :dunno:
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it's most likely the result of human error by oil rig operator.

Sunken Oil Rig Deepwater Horizon Could Cause Huge Spill Off Louisiana Coast, Officials Say - wcbstv.com
Rose said crews were doing routine work before the explosion and there were no signs of trouble. He said the explosion appeared to be a blowout, in which natural gas or oil forces its way up a well pipe and smashes the equipment. But precisely what went wrong was under investigation.

There is a delicate balance of pressure as an oil drill is sunk into ocean rock and water is pumped down into the well to push oil up. If too much pressure builds, the oil can suddenly and forcefully gush back up. An emergency valve known as a "blowout preventer" can seal pipes off, but if it fails or isn't activated, the surge can cause a massive fire.
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Stopping Gulf Coast oil leak could take weeks
(CNN) -- Experts still hope to close a stuck valve that's let oil flow into the Gulf of Mexico for more than a week. But if those efforts fail, the next-best plans will take weeks more to stop the flow, officials say.

The undersea oil well, following a drilling rig's April 20 explosion 50 miles off Louisiana's coast, is spewing up to 210,000 gallons of light sweet crude a day into the Gulf, officials say. Part of the Gulf Coast was bracing for oily water to reach shore late Thursday.

BP, the well's majority owner, has been trying to stop the flow by using remote-controlled submarines to activate a valve atop the well. But the valve, known as a blowout preventer, is not working.

A stopgap plan -- putting a chamber over the well area and sending the oil to a ship -- is unproven at that depth and could take four weeks before it's ready. And the ultimate plan -- drilling a different well to access the first and close it with cement -- could take three months. Meanwhile, efforts to contain the spill and stop the leak are costing the well's owners about $6 million per day, BP says.

"Our focus first and foremost is how to bring this event to an end by stopping the flow of oil as quickly as we can," Doug Suttles, chief operating officer of BP's global exploration and production business, said at a news conference Thursday.

As the well's owner, BP is obligated to see to the cleanup and leak stoppage. Here's what BP says it is trying to do to stop the leak, and why each approach is taking time.

Activating the blowout preventer

When Transocean's rig sank, a steel riser that connected the rig to the well collapsed to the ocean floor, and eventually remote-operated submarines would find three leaks coming from the riser or a related drill pipe.

The blowout preventer -- a 48-foot-tall, 450-ton apparatus that sits atop the well 5,000 feet underwater -- will stop the flow if crews can get it to work. The device -- owned by the rig's owner, Transocean -- should have activated on the day of the blast, Tony Hayward, CEO of BP Group, told CNN's Brian Todd in an interview Wednesday.

Suttles said Thursday that workers aboard Transocean's rig, before it sank, tried to manually activate the the blowout preventer.

"We actually don't know why the blowout preventer has failed to stop the flow," Suttles said. "Ultimately we'll recover [it] ... and we'll find out, but that could be quite some time."

For days, BP contractors have used remote-controlled submarines with robotic arms to try to reach access portals and activate the valve.

"We've tried many different ways. Some things have showed promise, some haven't," BP spokesman Daren Beaudo said. "We're going to keep doing it until we're successful or we've exhausted our options [with the submarines].

"We don't know why the remote-operated shutdown systems haven't worked," Beaudo said.

Stopgap: Capturing the oil from the well

Patching the leaks themselves isn't possible, Suttles said. But, anticipating the submarines might never get the blowout preventer to work, BP has been working on a plan to collect the oil directly from the leaks so that it doesn't go into the ocean.

The plan calls for designing and manufacturing three containment chambers that will cover the leak. Pipes attached to those chambers would send the oil to a ship above.

The method isn't new -- it has been done in more shallow waters. But not at this depth, BP believes.

"We're not sure it's going to work, but it's certainly something worth attempting" Beaudo said. "What we've done is challenged our engineers to design something that could withstand pressures at 5,000 feet and go through a mile of water to a vessel."

One chamber has been made, and two others are coming. But completing this system for this depth takes time -- it should be ready within four weeks, BP said Thursday in a news release.

Even if the chamber system works, BP still would need a way to stop the oil. And that's where the relief well would come in.

Drilling the relief well

To permanently seal the well -- regardless of whether the blowout preventer works -- BP is preparing to drill a second well at an angle to intercept the first one. Once contact is made, drilling fluid and concrete will be put into the first well, Beaudo said.

BP has received a permit for this second well, and drilling from a contractor's rig could begin Friday. However, it won't be finished anytime soon.

"It takes roughly a couple months to 90 days to drill like this," Beaudo said. "We would go down 5,000 feet of water, then drill directionally through about 13,000 feet of subsurface." Weather conditions also could prolong the process, he said.

Which means that if the blowout preventer and chamber methods don't work, it could be many weeks before the oil stops leaking into the Gulf.

BP said it wasn't necessarily married to just these three options. It said it has reached out to other experts -- including those from rival oil companies -- to see whether they have other ideas to stop the leaks. All ideas will be considered, Suttles said.

"I don't know if we'll be able to stop it today or whether it will ultimately take a relief well. What I don't want to occur is this oil continuing to reach the surface of the sea," Suttles said.
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kokonut said:
I didn't say that. Just pointing out the facts that oil seeps naturally all over the world beneath the waters in the tens of millions of barrels a year, I suppose.
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you can go ahead and make a thread about natural seepage of oil and all but this is not a natural event. it's an environment and economic disaster. It's much much worse than Exxon Valdez oil spill.

Even though there had been no major disaster in Gulf of Mexico for past 40+ years.... one major disaster will wipe away those "40 years" and its repercussion will be felt for a very very very long time... or even permanent. That's how delicate our environment is. Look at Exxon Valdez oil spill. The accident happened in 1989 and the Arctic habitat hasn't recovered yet - 21 years and still counting.

natural seepage? nice downplaying this tragic event.
 
Anyone catch the Colbert Report segment full of excuses a couple of nights ago? Hysterical.

People in New Orleans report that the smell has reached them. I hope that people with respiratory problems will be ok or will be able to leave.
 
I'm worried for the people and the environment there...again, who will bear most of cost of the disaster? Not any owners, not those who are able to leave....
 
It's going to devaste the the fishing industry and tourist industry as many come here to to do recreational fishing. Plus it will have a negative impact on wildlife tourism cuz many hunters come to hunt there during the hunting season.
 
To add insult to injury, ExxonMobile is salivating over the prospect of increasing gas prices. Something wrong with that picture.
 
Why? Are you the poster boy for them?
 
dogmom said:
I'm worried for the people and the environment there...again, who will bear most of cost of the disaster? Not any owners, not those who are able to leave....
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according to link -

The well is leaking from three points, BP said. Under the 1990 Oil Pollution act, passed in the wake of the Valdez spill, the company is required to foot the bill for the cleanup.
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:ty: for link, jiro
have my doubts that will happen - or happen the way the company will proclaim they've done it
 
kokonut said:
Link?
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stock market. classic business 101.

here - oil price rose when the Hurricane Katrina damaged oil rigs in Gulf of Mexico.

and now - BP's stock price got stung - about 8% (link). BP lost its oil rig and will be spending billions. It costs Exxon-Mobil about $4.5 billion for Exxon-Valdez oil spill to cover lawsuit settlements, fines, clean-up, etc. Since this disaster is putting a hurt on BP, its competitor like Exxon-Mobil is "salivating over the prospect of increasing gas prices."
 
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