BP Says "Top Kill" Operation Has Failed 768
MrShaggy sends a quote from a CBC story: "BP has scuttled the 'top kill' procedure of shooting heavy drilling mud into its blown-out oil well in the Gulf of Mexico after it failed to plug the leak. BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles told reporters on Saturday that over the last three days, the company has pumped more than 30,000 barrels of mud and other materials down the well but has not been able to stop the flow. 'These repeated pumping[s], we don't believe will likely achieve success, so at this point it's time to move to the next option,' Suttles said."
Suppose they can't stop the oil (Score:2, Interesting)
What would that mean for the environment?
Nickels (Score:1, Interesting)
If BP converted their quarterly profits to coin and dropped a huge sack of nickels on the spill it would stop.
I'd rather they use dollar coins, by way of punishment, but at this point I'll take the nickels.
Why only focus on the leak? (Score:5, Interesting)
Déjà-vu (Score:3, Interesting)
Seems all to be a Déjà-vu : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHmhxpQEGPo
Time to invest in renewable energy? (Score:5, Interesting)
... because your BP shares are going to be worth a lot less ;-)
Seriously though this accident has thrown up a lot of interesting information - such as how the US imports vastly more oil than it produces on its own territories, and I can only imagine regulation around oil drilling will become more strict rather than less after this has all been sorted out. Given that the USA does love to consume energy I would have thought that the silver lining might be increased investment in alternative energy sources; you've got a huge country with a lot of space for generating wind/solar/wave power. Now might be a time to explore more than pilot projects? Possibly an increased nuclear power plant program as well though I am not too sure about whether this is in political favour at the moment?
One thing amazes me about the present fiasco is that we don't hear of more accidents like this, how many offshore oilrigs are there round the world? I guess the oil industry is either pretty careful or pretty lucky when it comes to oil extraction (or good on PR cover-ups...)
How to really motivate them... (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's an idea for how to really motivate BP - and any other company with the potential to cause such massive havoc...
For every day that the oil continues to gush, the top 10% of their employees, by total compensation, should be required to work for a day on the clean-up crews. Not simply going to meetings and coming up with plans - they are to get down and dirty scraping oil off rocks and washing birds. The kind of work that gets oil under your fingernails and in your hair, with the smell soaked so deeply into your skin that it takes weeks to get it out.
After all, these guys have so much money in the bank that firing them won't hurt, and fining the company will just translate into higher oil prices. If they had some real skin in the game, I think we would have seen them take the problem a whole lot more seriously from day one.
Re:Amazing (Score:5, Interesting)
There are alternatives to all of those products. If the oil industry wasn't so heavily involved in politics, the absurd regulatory structure that makes oil the best way to do just about anything would not exist, and alternative methods of producing many goods would come about.
Have a look through the dormant patents held by oil companies for a taste of how things could be, but aren't thanks to businesses run amok.
Re:Amazing (Score:5, Interesting)
Really? How exactly do you test solutions for catastrophe of unknown nature a mile underwater, working with wells of unknown pressure filled with oil and gas of unknown composition? You do understand this was an exploratory well right; the point of this thing was largely to find out what is down there.
If you have a solution to this problem of being able to prove catastrophic failure modes can be solved by doing X with all the other unknowns you are clearly way smarted than the rest of us and I welcome our new over lord; otherwise you just another arm chair quarterback here.
Re:Amazing (Score:2, Interesting)
One solution known to work (the russians did this method), is nuking the hole and collapsing it to an extent that the pressure of the oil can't breach it. You then concrete over the rubble.
BP cannot use this method themselves. It requires Obama to step in and take some responsibility. It's a proven method that's probably a whole lot cheaper and reliable than anything BP has done and the envoironmental implications aren't anywhere near as bad as all the oil. BP can then foot the bill for the nuke and handle any decontamination needed.
Sadly Obama was all too willing to let companies drill for oil in the gulf, knowing there's risk of something like this happening and is content to sit there saying how awful BP are to deflect any blame he might receive.
Re:Expect repost.... from 1979! (Score:4, Interesting)
Oh quiet. People think that this stuff is new or something, in the same way that the gulf doesn't already leak a few million or is it a few hundred thousand, barrels of oil naturally every year anyway. The reality is when you're dealing with a BFP is to go through the steps of things that have and haven't work in the past. Working your way through up to what will work. Anywho it's just my guess but they'll have to use something in relation to relief wells, it's a large amount of oil with just a little bit of water giving it forced pressure.
*parts may be sarcasm.
Re:Suppose they can't stop the oil (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't shovel that crap you fucking industry shill.
Nothing but a very small number of anaerobic microbes can survive in an oil-saturated environment, as oil coats cell surfaces and prevents oxygen transfer. A dumping of that much oil into the world's ecosystem will have catastrophic results, and if it makes its way into the Gulf Stream, it'll be spread globally with results too great for me to describe without sounding like a crazed religious apocalyptic doomsayer.
If the entire well is emptied into the global current system, it will be enough to reduce fish populations to levels where seafood is taken off of humanity's menu. It's unlikely that whales will survive, as krill cannot survive even with trace amounts of oil in their water. And the effect on atmospheric oxygen with phytoplankton levels reduces is impossible to predict, but it'll be large.
This is a catastrophe, not some "shift in ecological balance". Take your misinformation and downplaying tactics elsewhere.
Re:Top Kill (Score:3, Interesting)
I would add the following [deepwater.com] few [halliburton.com] lists [halliburton.com] to the above.
Reaganomics 101 (Score:1, Interesting)
Wait, I heard about this. It's called Reaganomics. But maybe the kids have a new name for it these days, what do I know?
I am not an economist, not really; but I think it goes something like this: Smaller government is good, and the free sector can best self-regulate, and grow. As a result, great wealth is possible to accumulate, and it will naturally be dispersed across the community, and economy.
And that is exactly what we have here. A very large, profitable, and dare I say efficient company, well except in safety perhaps. But they are very profitable for their shareholders, and the wealth grows and gets passed around.
Oh dear, I hope this will not be misconstrued as an argument for wealth-distribution, when I really want is more regulation and accountability. And penalties imposed by the government, not penalties imposed by BP on the environment and everything pertaining to it. Big Polluters (BP) should PAY, and if they went under and the cost of energy rose, I see that as a good thing.
Another name for Reaganomics was the 'trickle-down' theory. Of course that's a slight misnomer, because it is difficult to get that stuff back down there at all, but I digress.
As a result of BP's growth and success over the years, now wealth is being transferred to a new, emerging sector of the economy, and thousands of smaller entrepeneurs engage in the clean up effort, lawsuits, etc. As a result of BP's largess, new smaller oil collection and recycling companies will grow; (nevermind they used to shrimp).
Just put your trust in the markets. Free-market economics can overcome civilization, because its more powerful.
Personally, if it means the price of oil is increased, I say OK, because then people will then use less.
[some things I wrote in sarcasm folks]
Re:Yeah, right. (Score:2, Interesting)
That said, OP is a dumbass too. The conditions in former soviet waters are possibly quite different from these waters and the nuke isn't an infallible solution with no ill effects. It's a nuclear bomb, there's obviously some dangers.
However, what IS disturbing is that the nuke option is being dismissed out of hand. It has a track record of some real success, this indicates that's is not some crackpot theory that someone drempt up while high on meth. It's a valid option that deserves consideration.
Every option has risks. Nukes, top kill, and anything else BP or anyone else will present. These options need to be considered and judged. But here's the issue, this is an ENGINEERING problem. We need ENGINEERS to stop this oil leak. It's being handled by politicians, lobbyists, and the business and accounting majors at BP. Not a real surprise that nothing is getting done.
Re:Time to invest in renewable energy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, this accident was sort of the worst case scenario in that every fail-safe mechanism failed.
Its worst case in a hell of a lot of other ways:
1) Timing. Wells kick all the time while drilling, but while you're drilling you've got the mindset and equipment to work around it so you don't get blowouts. Cement jobs fail all the freaking time, but thats OK since you've got a hole full of heavy mud. BOPs, being mechanical devices in the ocean, fail on occasion, but thats OK because four nines of uptime, combined with un-used rate of four nines, means no problem for about eight nines. Too bad it all happened at the precise worst time.
2) Geology. Despite whatever the idiots on TV say, this is a hybrid gas/oil well not an oil well. A leaking oil well is no problemo you just suck up the oil at the source. Can't do that on a hybrid well because the methane hydrates from the gas clog up the works. Also oil gushers rarely catch fire and vaporize the platform, TV movies excepted. A leaking gas well is no problemo for the TV newsies because nothing washes on shore. Turning the GoM into a big methane fizzy drink is not an ecological ideal but its not, relatively, as bad. So, if it were a pure oil well, you'd have an intact platform uncontrolably squirting oil into a supertanker tied up next door, or worst case you'd be able to capture about 99% of the oil at the source. Or if it were a gas well you'd probably still have sunk the platform and killed everyone, if not even worse than it was, but there would be nothing floating ashore. Also the geology of the bottom of the GoM is completely unknown to the newsies so you get idiot ideas from people whom refuse to understand that the bottom of the GoM is a thousand feet of muck. They think its like the "little mermaid" movie where its all solid granite, and all their ideas reflect that inaccurate assumption.
Re:long history of cutting corners (Score:1, Interesting)
Thank god we have you here to tell us how to do it. In all seriousness, the reason they don't "just simply do <insert whatever fucking thing here>" is because the idea you came up with in 20 minutes with no engineering knowledge or even a proper comprehension of what EXACTLY the circumstances are we're dealing with here is probably not going to work. And by "probably not going to work" I mean that someone who actually knows what they're doing would shoot you for presenting something so stupid.
You're talking depths of over one mile. Do you know how much pressure there is that deep? I'm willing to bet that you don't, but let's assume that you do. Do you know what the implications are of that? Do you know how to power "large propellers that would add dynamic push to the static, gravity added push against the leak." a mile under water? What the fuck? Do you know how to get these "large legos" into a hole that is (how wide? Surely you must know, you're apparently the fucking expert on this shit.) while exactly (how many?) BARRELS of oil rush out per minute? You need (how much?) force to "push against" this leak in order to stop it.
Yes, oil companies should be required to have solutions for stopping leaks such as this, but could everyone please stop putting out their nonsense "engineering solutions" out there. The situation isn't as simple as you think and people smarter than you are working on this. If you came up with it in 10 seconds then it WON'T FUCKING WORK. STOP ADDING TO THE NOISE BY SPEWING MORE FUCKING BULLSHIT. That's exactly the LAST thing we fucking need right now.
Re:Amazing (Score:1, Interesting)
Saying that alternatives are not economical is bs. It takes political will to make a change and fearless leader to finally say no. They banned the production of cars in the US during WW2 to produce tanks and airplanes - why couldn't something similar happen now to build more sustainable solutions ?
Re:In the mean time (Score:3, Interesting)
You have a false Dilema situation:
are they pursuing the only thing sure to work, which is drilling at a tactically chosen spot of the same oil field to relieve or nullify the pressure at the leak?
Correct action, wrong intention. The goal is to fill the well, from the bottom up, with heavy mud, just like when it was drilled. The "only" way to do that, which always works, is to drill the relief well. 100% odds of success. It just takes "about a quarter" to do. If you want to get all technical about pressures, the goal is to get the pressure due to the drilling mud to equal the down hole formation pressure... then theres no flow. (Once nothing is moving, you replace the heavy mud with heavy concrete, with predictable permanent results)
Or are they really going through all options sequentially, with the least costly and fastest solutions first.
Correct action, wrong intention. Its all PR. The stuff they're trying is basically PR with a slight chance of working and minimal odds of making the situation worse. I'm surprised they don't have the FIRST robotics schoolkids working on it for PR purposes, etc. For PR reasons you can't show the relief wells digging deeper for three months on TV every night, even if thats the only thing that'll work for certain. Also depending on random luck, three months is about the minimum time required. Unlike everything done so far, it'll work for certain, but it might take... six months due to problems, who knows.
Some good life-advice is anyone whom tries to promise how fast they can dig a well, other than setting a finite lower time limit, is basically either being vague to the point of uselessness, talking about averages, or is a total B.S.er.
Why not continue pumping? (Score:3, Interesting)
One article said that the oil flow stopped while they were pumping in the mud. Why not continue the pumping operation with seawater to keep the pressure in the BOP as high as possible?
Re:Amazing (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Market Is Rigged Against Consumer Choice (Score:1, Interesting)
Ah, no, I don't want to consider that. Do you know why I don't want to consider that? Because it's a lie. Maybe you yourself aren't intentionally lying, you're just believing a lie that someone else is spreading. Heck, maybe even the person who started it even believed it was true when they made it up, even though they hadn't bothered to check. Have you seen a map of oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico? Here's a link [cruisebruise.com] to one. Obviously government regulation is what's keeping them a certain distance offshore, but it's not forcing them that far out. The reason they're drilling that far out is because they're following the oil, period! The locations closer to shore are already saturated with wells.
Now please either find a successful argument against what I've said, or stop spreading this stupid untruth. Sure it satisfies some sort of need among certain people to blame everything on the tree-hugging liberal commies who are too stupid to know what's really good for them. Crazy right wing types seem to like to wallow in self-righteousness and shake their heads at whoever isn't in their clique. Trouble is, most of the time, they're just plain wrong, not to mention either extremely gullible or intentionally dishonest. Which of those are you, or, if you're not one of those, how can you possibly be right about this?
Re:Amazing (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Amazing (Score:1, Interesting)
Every post that I've seen in this thread that has been shilling for Big Oil has had your name attached.
Come on, out with it, you work in the oil & gas industry, don't you?
Re:Amazing (Score:4, Interesting)
Anyway, I have provided two examples of replacements which are viable, if not complete.
Your definition of viable doesn't take into account 'cost effective.' algae biofuel [wikipedia.org] probably won't be cost effective until oil hits $800 a barrel. That would put gas prices at around $25 a gallon. If that happens, all transportation in the US will effectively stop, thus it's not viable in any real sense. So you are wrong.
Solar is better, but it still isn't competitive with traditional methods of generating electricity, without government subsidies. If it were, it would be 100% viable, and everyone would be doing it. But it's not. You have to take price into consideration with these things.
Incidentally, even though algae is expensive, there are a number of companies and organizations trying to make algae truly viable. Some of these are even sponsored by oil companies. So in a way, you are also wrong when you say, "no oil company is building biodiesel plants." If it ever becomes viable, they will build the plants.
Re:Amazing (Score:1, Interesting)
Substitute apples with grapes and you have yourself a boycott.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9sar_Ch%C3%A1vez [wikipedia.org]
Re:Expect repost.... from 1979! (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah you can look up the cleanup reports for it. The reality is there was no real long term damage, and the old boon, skim and soak methods they were using at the time were 40yrs old. Travel to the areas where the spill were and you won't find environmental damage.
Re:I'm almost afraid to ask... (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, but no, but yeah but:
You have to realize that all those recent estimates are generally from folks whom financially benefit from enhanced estimates of reserve size. Its kind of a game on "theoildrum.com" to guess just how much they overestimate vs what is actually produced.
Typical example from wikipedia quoting some initial reports from 2008 "The condition and size of the Carioca/Sugar Loaf field has yet to be clarified[1], however there is speculation that it could contain between 25 and 40 billion barrels["
Two years later we get:
http://oglobo.globo.com/pais/mat/2010/05/12/anp-anuncia-megacampo-de-petroleo-no-pre-sal-da-bacia-de-santos-916568146.asp [globo.com]
Petrobras says its only 4.5 billion barrels.
Similarly, one can read news.google articles watching Tupi estimated drop over the years from above 8 billion to now only about 5 billion.
The oil biz is somewhat less transparent and open than most slashdotters are used to.
Re:Amazing (Score:5, Interesting)
Do you really think that Shell, Exxon or Texaco or any other oil company would handle this better, or is prepared for a problem like this?
No, but those companies probably wouldn't have had this problem in the first place. You see, BP has the worst safety/regulatory compliance of any of the major oil companies by far. They've got 760 citations for "egregious, willful safety violations" from OSHA; their nearest competitor in the oil industry, Sunoco, has 8 (Exxon, the last poster-child for oil-industry irresponsibility, has only 1.) Their regulatory compliance for EPA issues is just as bad in comparison to their cohort. And I'm sure if you look at people supplying hookers and blow to the MMS, they're right at the top, too. Bottom line, BP is "the worst of the worst" when it comes to playing by the rules despite it's pretty green and yellow logo. They deserve to have all leases terminated and no more granted in perpetuity. Maybe then they'd get their act together.