Oil in the Gulf

BTW, threads in the Environmental Forum always have the opportunity to get closed. However, I truly believe that 3Reefers have the ability to post with self-control so that doesn't ever have to happen.

Just as a reminder;

Don't attack people. If you disagree with a previous poster, that's fine. Use intelligence as to how you disagree.
Don't attack people's governments. Real quick way of getting a thread closed. (Remember, we have members from all over the world).
Don't be "holier than thou". You have certain opinions and others may not share your view. Being smug is a way to hurt people's feelings and that is NOT conducive to people sharing on a controversial subject.

 

The latter is cheaper. I have been emailing back and forth with my girlfriends grandfather asking about all of this(he was the lawyer who got the Exxon Valdez out of trouble, I know his time is coming to him but he is a nice guy in general) and he says there is little chance they will make the well inoperable as it would kill future profits from trying to drill another well. The only thing they are probably working on is a way to attach another well to the head.. Its a huge formation and could leak for years. If this goes on for a few more days it will be much worse than the exxon valdez. much much worse.. So start eating seafood now before the prices jump out of proportion..

 

I heard another well is in the plans but it will take up to two months to get it drilled and operating so the leaking one will basically cap itself. Original reports were that 42,000 gallons per day were being leaked, this morning the leak was reported to be flowing 200,000 gallons + per day. That's ALOT of oil and what is making it worse is the Gulf currents aren't allowing all of the oil to rise to the surface. A team has been appointed to determine the amount of damage/loss of habitat and life to the seabed itself.

 

The Gulf is already so screwed up - this is really sad. I've posted a lot on this board about the large and getting larger dead zone in the gulf (no oxygen) - due to the runoff that comes down the Mississippi and spills into the gulf. This event will certainly not help that situation. Truly sad.

 

Wouldn't a simple solution to this be to attach some sort of tube to top or just over the top of the leak and have the tube end near the surface so the oil will all make it up?

I mean, a 5k foot long tube shouldn't be something too insanely hard to find or have manufactured for an oil company that's drilling down that far.

 

Oil is hydrophobic. It's going to rise as quickly as possible in spite of currents. That's why our overflows skim from the surface of the water and it's also how protein skimmers work. I don't worry about water currents at all. I am concerned about air currents once they hit the surface. (In fact, that's my test for foods. If I put them in a dixie cup of ro/di water and an hour later, there's no oil slick on the surface, I know that food shouldn't be used unless it's soaked in HUFAs).

This is a royal mess for sure and my heart goes out to people still recovering from Katrina. If this doesn't get fixed much sooner than 2 months, Bama is going to be right. Oysters, clams, shrimp, and other seafood is going to get real expensive.

 

It can certainly be reprocessed into usable products. I'm not sure why you say it can't be used to produce gasoline? Crude oil often contains up to 80% salt water by volume as it comes from the ground.

In fact brine disposal is one of the most expensive costs of oil production today. Traditionally it was just flooded into a settling pond and left to evaporate, now it has to be pumped back into exhausted wells.

I guess many of the lighter distillates will evaporate, which would deff. affect the gasoline production, but it takes a while for oil to spoil.... and if they are burning it then of course it's pretty much useless then.


As for burning it.... it's not JUST an out of sight out of mind issue, it's a valid way to deal with it. It's not ideal - ideal would be this never happened in the first place. But the long term reality is that one way or another this oil would get burned or otherwise processed in to environmental pollutants, albeit in much smaller less obvious clouds of smoke.


And I agree fully that a private enterprise would be able to stop this. I can think of several ways that if I had a few tens of millions of dollars I could easily cap the well.

 

Simple. I don't know the oil industry. None of my clients are in the oil industry so I've had no reason to learn it. As a result, I have to rely on talking heads on the idiot box and on the Internet for my information. CNN had an expert on that said it couldn't be used for gasoline but could still be used for kilns. That's the basis for what I said.

 

'Controlled burn' now lit...

WRAPUP 3-U.S. Coast Guard sets oil slick ablaze | Reuters

 

I know oil and water dont mix. But take a quart of vegatable oil and put it in a 1/2 gallon jar then fill the rest up with water. Give it a real good shake and watch how long it takes the globs to rise. I watched the video from the remote subs which showed these huge globs of crude being rolled along the bottom as they reach shallower water. It was disgusting.
Sucks that seafood will jump in price but what really is gonna hurt is the jump I think we'll see in gas prices. Any excuse to jab a little harder @ the pump is never taken for granted or overlooked imo.