Happy Memorial Day!

Nobody forced a private company to try and extract oil in deep water. If they can't do it safely and profitably, then they can always, you know, not do it.

true, but I didn't hear much complaining from the Louisiana Coast when they had the most economic growth over the last decade in the US

and, there is a lot of rush to conclusions here without seeing how the cleanup efforts actually go

BP can afford the clean-up

In medicine they call it do no harm. In manned space exploration the loss of even 1 life is a catastrophic event. Yet in mineral extractions, clean up the mess later is a more optimal strategy?

I used to work heavy construction, the protocols we followed and safety procedures we worked under would bounce you off the site in 10 minutes today. Was the injury rate higher back then? Not really. Accidents happen now as well as then. But as time goes on, any rational person plans to alleviate potential problems, not plan for when the injury will occur. We don't want to lose an arm, so we will allow a hand to be severed isn't rational.

When the crisis is finally controlled and the inevitable hearings(witch hunt) are in progress the causal factors will be more known. If anyone uses "to make an omelet, you need to break some eggs" they will be crucified. Managing risk has been used as a strawman of late, a phrase to pay lip service when calamity hits.

They may be able to afford it, but I have little doubt that costs will be passed along to you know who...

to consumers of the end product

perfect

but, there is quite a bit to say that the companies have been getting better and better

it's been over a fifteen years since a major blowout near the US

in 1900, the US would have 6k people die per year drilling oil

things are getting better

don't let the scare media and politicians frame this debate

On this matter I don't. I believe the drilling should be done, it's where the resource is, and the proximity to refining is perfect.

If this accident was from a tectonic fault shift, incoming freighter blown into the drill rig, or any other Act of God event, the eco freaks would have no ground. But the initial investigation shows willful disregard for everything other than $$$$. This well was probably meant to be sold to another player, BP's direction was to drill and cap, not put into production. It explains the hurry up for the cap(sea water instead of drilling mud), the lack of a $500k acoustic valve, and other skipped regulations.

In an industry where profits are monumental, these hacks cheaped out. Now everything is gonna get a whole lot worse for each and every new exploration. There's no scare card to play anymore, there is an historical record otoh. The habitat destruction, show slides or videos. The oil companies can what, say its not true? Facts are extremely difficult to disprove with rhetoric.

http://globalwarming.house.gov/spillcam

They are now apparently cutting the top off the riser. This should be interesting to watch. I can't wait until this fiasco ends up as an episode of Engineering Disasters.

The work that saw is doing is pretty impressive imo. Engineering disaster aside, it's fascinating to watch the ROV's work 5k' under the sea imo.

i don't think people truly understand what it means to have this happen 5,000 ft deep

http://globalwarming.house.gov/spillcam

For anyone awake right now, they've maneuvered a piece of equipment labeled "Cut" that looks like some sort of underwater jaws of life right below the kink where the leak is, it looks like they are ready to cut the top off at any time now.

660 post grunch - I was speaking to a lawyer at one of the larger oil companies this weekend, he said that all of the stuff that BP has been attempting to do since the **** hit the fan has all been fluff and was never going to work. They are estimating that it will take seven weeks to sort out.

As part of our continued re-branding effort, we are now referring to the spill as "Shell Oil's Gulf Coast Disaster". #bpcares

brilliant

i see my upside down funnel idea is up next

Are they paying you royalties for your idea?

At least we don't have to hear about the "junk shot" any more. Every time I hear that my legs instinctively clamp together and I wince.

probably was a bad idea to come out with this statement at the beginning:

Here comes the criminal investigation. This should be fun.

Carole Browner, one of Obama's top energy advisors, was on Bloomberg today. She said that the top levels of government have been involved since day 1 on the rig explosion/sinking. They've lent the expertise of hundreds directed under Chu. BP would come up with plans based on their own minds and the consultation from the government. BP would present the next step to the government and the government would approve of each step as being the best one at every step.

The criminal probe, in my guess, is going to be about the events leading up to the disaster. The post disaster actions are on the up and up.

Kind of a funny aside. I've been reading Matt Ridley's new book, The Rational Optimist. One of the points of the book is how much safer oil drilling has been. Oil spills had been trending lower for quite some time. Of course, this accident happened in the intervening time between the book being written and released.

I've been mesmerized by the spillcam all day

That video is truly awesome.

Trying to find an independent source for these stats but I saw a report today that stated that yearly oil spills from tankers and oil rigs world wide amount to about 250 million gallons a year of oil. Also Saddam dumped over 500 million gallons of oil into the Persian Gulf in 91-92 time frame.

BP Ready for Spill 10 Times Gulf Disaster, Plan Says (Update1)

Italics added for emphasis.

BP Plc said in permit applications for drilling in the Gulf of Mexico that it was prepared to handle an oil spill more than ten times larger than the one now spewing crude into the waters off the southern United States.

“Proper execution of the procedures detailed in this manual will help to limit environmental and ecological damage to sensitive areas as well as minimizing loss or damage to BP facilities in the event of a petroleum release,” the company said in its oil-spill response plan, filed with the U.S. Minerals Management Service in 2008.

The company listed as its worst-case scenario a blowout in an exploratory well 57 miles west of the disaster, in a valley on the seafloor known as Mississippi Canyon. It’s about 33 miles off the coast of Louisiana. Such a blowout could have spewed 250,000 barrels a day, according to the 582-page plan.

I guess we can surmise that this MMS agency of the federal govt is completely worthless. Apparently Obama admin moved slowly in trying to overhaul the agency:

Birnbaum 'took fall' after MMS played catch-up after lapses in ethics, oversight


But Birnbaum's abrupt departure, coming just 10 months after she had taken the agency's helm, says more about the Obama administration's inability to improve MMS and the industry it regulates than Birnbaum herself. Facing a historically troubled agency, Salazar and his top deputies focused first on promoting easy-to-achieve changes and offshore wind development rather than conducting a broad agency overhaul.

Offshore wind development, GMAFB.

From the start of her tenure, Birnbaum told others in Interior and elsewhere that she worried about the culture of MMS and about her ability to change it when so many of its employees worked outside of Washington.

"She knew there were problems. She saw this as an agency that was both demoralized and captured by the industry," said one federal official who spoke with Birnbaum early in her tenure and requested anonymity to comment on a personnel matter. "She was fumbling around on how to do these [reforms] and looking around for ideas."

Reforming entrenched federal bureaucracies is much easier said than done. Current administration is a bureaucracy creator on steroids.