# Oil slick



## benbo (May 3, 2010)

I'm surprised nobody around here has talked much about the oil spill. Anybody know anybody involved in the spill or the clean up? Anybody looking at some fatty money from a lawsuit? Or did I just miss another thread?


----------



## Supe (May 3, 2010)

The only fatty thing we'll be seeing is a fatty gas hike.


----------



## Master slacker (May 3, 2010)

You may have heard the news in the last two days about the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig which caught fire, burned for two days, then sank in 5,000 ft of water in the Gulf of Mexico. There are still 11 men missing, and they are not expected to be found.

The rig belongs to Transocean, the world’s biggest offshore drilling contractor. The rig was originally contracted through the year 2013 to BP and was working on BP’s Macondo exploration well when the fire broke out. The rig costs about $500,000 per day to contract. The full drilling spread, with helicopters and support vessels and other services, will cost closer to $1,000,000 per day to operate in the course of drilling for oil and gas. The rig cost about $350,000,000 to build in 2001 and would cost at least double that to replace today.

The rig represents the cutting edge of drilling technology. It is a floating rig, capable of working in up to 10,000 ft water depth. The rig is not moored; It does not use anchors because it would be too costly and too heavy to suspend this mooring load from the floating structure. Rather, a triply-redundant computer system uses satellite positioning to control powerful thrusters that keep the rig on station within a few feet of its intended location, at all times. This is called Dynamic Positioning.

The rig had apparently just finished cementing steel casing in place at depths exceeding 18,000 ft. The next operation was to suspend the well so that the rig could move to its next drilling location, the idea being that a rig would return to this well later in order to complete the work necessary to bring the well into production.

It is thought that somehow formation fluids – oil /gas – got into the wellbore and were undetected until it was too late to take action. With a floating drilling rig setup, because it moves with the waves, currents, and winds, all of the main pressure control equipment sits on the seabed – the uppermost unmoving point in the well. This pressure control equipment – the Blowout Preventers, or ‘BOP’s” as they’re called, are controlled with redundant systems from the rig. In the event of a serious emergency, there are multiple Panic Buttons to hit, and even fail-safe Deadman systems that should be automatically engaged when something of this proportion breaks out. None of them were aparently activated, suggesting that the blowout was especially swift to escalate at the surface. The flames were visible up to about 35 miles away. Not the glow – the flames. They were 200 – 300 ft high.

All of this will be investigated and it will be some months before all of the particulars are known. For now, it is enough to say that this marvel of modern technology, which had been operating with an excellent safety record, has burned up and sunk taking souls with it. The well still is apparently flowing oil, which is appearing at the surface as a slick. They have been working with remotely operated vehicles, or ROV’s which are essentially tethered miniature submarines with manipulator arms and other equipment that can perform work underwater while the operator sits on a vessel. These are what were used to explore the Titanic, among other things. Every floating rig has one on board and they are in constant use. In this case, they are deploying ROV’s from dedicated service vessels. They have been trying to close the well in using a specialized port on the BOP’s and a pumping arrangement on their ROV’s. They have been unsuccessful so far. Specialized pollution control vessels have been scrambled to start working the spill, skimming the oil up.

In the coming weeks they will move in at least one other rig to drill a fresh well that will intersect the blowing one at its pay zone. They will use technology that is capable of drilling from a floating rig, over 3 miles deep to an exact specific point in the earth – with a target radius of just a few feet plus or minus. Once they intersect their target, a heavy fluid will be pumped that exceeds the formation’s pressure, thus causing the flow to cease and rendering the well safe at last. It will take at least a couple of months to get this done, bringing all available technology to bear. It will be an ecological disaster if the well flows all of the while; Optimistically, it could bridge off downhole.

It’s a sad day when something like this happens to any rig, but even more so when it happens to something on the cutting edge of our capabilities. The photos that follow show the progression of events over the 36 hours from catching fire to sinking.


----------



## Sschell (May 3, 2010)

wholy crap!


----------



## Road Guy (May 3, 2010)

$350 Million? Did I read that right??

damn I didnt know the gulf got that deep (me=dumb) but it was in almost a mile deep water?

I dont know how they would even fix something like that, hope their are smarter folks out there than me, but if bringing in another rig is the only proposed solution I cant see that happening too soon..

Its a shame what its going to do to the region down there, they have been hit hard enough one would think already...


----------



## RIP - VTEnviro (May 3, 2010)

> I'm surprised nobody around here has talked much about the oil spill. Anybody know anybody involved in the spill or the clean up? Anybody looking at some fatty money from a lawsuit? Or did I just miss another thread?


We're too busy worrying about getting everyone drinking water in Eastern Mass to worry about other people's hiccups!



> The only fatty thing we'll be seeing is a fatty gas hike.


I saw that on either the Globe or the Herald (Boston papers) website today that gas spiked 6 cents/gal locally since the spill.


----------



## humner (May 3, 2010)

Our president has recently been notified about the oil spill, only took him 8 days to, I guess, find out.


----------



## humner (May 3, 2010)

VTEnviro said:


> > I'm surprised nobody around here has talked much about the oil spill. Anybody know anybody involved in the spill or the clean up? Anybody looking at some fatty money from a lawsuit? Or did I just miss another thread?
> 
> 
> We're too busy worrying about getting everyone drinking water in Eastern Mass to worry about other people's hiccups!
> ...


Heard you guys had a small water leak in one of your little tunnels.


----------



## RIP - VTEnviro (May 3, 2010)

^Someone's 5/8" domestic service was a little leaky at the corp stop. No biggie.


----------



## Dexman PE (May 3, 2010)

VTEnviro said:


> ^Someone's 5/8" domestic service was a little leaky at the corp stop. No biggie.


I thought it was just a 1/4" plastic tube from the landscaping.


----------



## wilheldp_PE (May 3, 2010)

Why would one oil rig, that wasn't even in full production yet, sinking cause gas prices to spike? Oh yeah...that's because gas prices are controlled by professional gamblers that don't understand a damn thing about the commodities that they trade.


----------



## Dleg (May 3, 2010)

What a freaking disaster. It sounds like everything that could go wrong, did.

I worked on offshore oil platforms back in the early 90s, and I always felt relatively secure that something like that wouldn't happen. Well, at the very least, that only I and those around me would burn and die in a quickly controlled blowout that would be shut down using the multiply redundant BOPs and other systems, and that the oil slick would stop within minutes.

I wonder if Freon has any insight, or if maybe he's even out there right now.


----------



## Master slacker (May 3, 2010)

I have the rest of the photos from that report on my work computer. They're all simply fantastically horrible. I don't know how else to say it. Our fishermen, crabbers, and shrimpers are already tremendously hurt. Even if they could go out for healthy product, they're not allowed to get to their grounds in the first place. BP's going to pay, like bho stated, but they're not going to sweat too long. They'll pass the bill on to us so we can pay off their debt.


----------



## MA_PE (May 3, 2010)

> We're too busy worrying about getting everyone drinking water in Eastern Mass to worry about other people's hiccups!


Hard to believe but the failure was in the NEW line (~6 years old) and not the original 50 yo line.

someone's gonna pay big time for this one.


----------



## EM_PS (May 3, 2010)

Master slacker said:


> It’s a sad day when something like this happens to any rig, but even more so when it happens to something on the cutting edge of our capabilities.


x2


----------



## PE-ness (May 9, 2010)

I keep thinking back to the words of Homer Simpson, upon learning of the Exxon Valdez spill. "Don't cry, Lisa, there's plenty more oil where that came from!"


----------



## Supe (May 10, 2010)

Up $.10 here.

I think the important thing to remember is that this is all Bush's fault.


----------



## kevo_55 (May 10, 2010)

PE-ness said:


> I keep thinking back to the words of Homer Simpson, upon learning of the Exxon Valdez spill. "Don't cry, Lisa, there's plenty more oil where that came from!"


LOL!


----------



## rudy (May 21, 2010)

humner said:


> Our president has recently been notified about the oil spill, only took him 8 days to, I guess, find out.


BP did a fine job of covering it up. Forcing workers to sign no-fault papers before allowing them back on shore. Closing off the shores along the blast from the media.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 21, 2010)

rudy said:


> humner said:
> 
> 
> > Our president has recently been notified about the oil spill, only took him 8 days to, I guess, find out.
> ...



I'm not sure I'd call that a cover up. And it wasn't BP's rig out there, it was Transocean's. My understanding is that it was Transocean's crew as well.


----------



## frazil (May 26, 2010)

I keep watching the live cam (BP disaster cam) hoping to see some little robots moving around. When are they going to plug this thing up?


----------



## Kephart P.E. (May 26, 2010)

This is all so much horseshit in my opinion, you made the mess you clean the mess up. Oil and gas companies are in this business to make lots of money, heck and I have had and continue to have several clients in the field, but all this sidesteping of blame is annoying.l

I guess they should have set aside some of those record profits they made a couple of years ago.



Chucktown PE said:


> rudy said:
> 
> 
> > humner said:
> ...


----------



## Master slacker (May 26, 2010)

It's sickening seeing the live feed.


----------



## frazil (May 26, 2010)

^agreed. but I can't stop watching.

It sounds like they've started the top kill procedure. now the video is showing a close up of some parts - I'm not sure what we're looking at.


----------



## Master slacker (May 26, 2010)

I see the hoses for cement / mud injection. I hope this works.


----------



## Paul S (May 26, 2010)

CNN has the live feed also, if the BP feed is not showing up.


----------



## frazil (May 26, 2010)

I wish there was a live sound feed from the control room.


----------



## Master slacker (May 26, 2010)

I can imagine that it'd either be NSFW or silent.


----------



## Road Guy (May 26, 2010)

35 days and counting, you would think if they could bring Apollo 13 home they could get some people with some good ideas...


----------



## Dexman PE (May 26, 2010)

Unfortunately, the guys who brought home Apollo 13 have long since retired...


----------



## Capt Worley PE (May 27, 2010)

Road Guy said:


> 35 days and counting, you would think if they could bring Apollo 13 home they could get some people with some good ideas...


I think it is the deepest blowout ever, and some of the others have taken several months to plug. Give 'em a break, they are trying, trying stuff that hasn't been done before at that depth.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 27, 2010)

It's not as if BP did this intentionally. I'm sure they made mistakes but we've all made mistakes in our careers as engineers. It just happens that when they make a mistake in their subsector of the oil/gas industry the consequences are much larger than, if for example, I were to undersize a pipe by 2 inches.

The fact of the matter is that their equipment failed and while it might make some feel good to get angry at some rich CEO, no one could have predicted this. And while we are dependent on companies like BP to deliver oil and gas as part of our energy supply, we have to accept accidents like this as an unfortunate cost of what it takes to allow us to live our intensive energy consumptive lifestyles.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 27, 2010)

Looks like they stopped it.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/na...0,5782115.story


----------



## Paul S (May 27, 2010)

Chucktown PE said:


> Looks like they stopped it.
> http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/na...0,5782115.story



This claims that report is premature: Reuters


----------



## RIP - VTEnviro (May 27, 2010)

Master slacker said:


> It's sickening seeing the live feed.






frazil said:


> ^agreed. but I can't stop watching.


Like Meatspin!


----------



## frazil (May 27, 2010)

exactly! "will it ever stop?!"


----------



## frazil (May 27, 2010)

they're using some robot arm to move stuff around now.


----------



## Master slacker (May 27, 2010)

Chucktown PE said:


> It's not as if BP did this intentionally. I'm sure they made mistakes but we've all made mistakes in our careers as engineers. It just happens that when they make a mistake in their subsector of the oil/gas industry the consequences are much larger than, if for example, I were to undersize a pipe by 2 inches.
> The fact of the matter is that their equipment failed and while it might make some feel good to get angry at some rich CEO, no one could have predicted this. And while we are dependent on companies like BP to deliver oil and gas as part of our energy supply, we have to accept accidents like this as an unfortunate cost of what it takes to allow us to live our intensive energy consumptive lifestyles.


I don't plan to accept this as an "unfortunate cost". The son of one of our pipefitters onsite was killed on that rig. From what I gather from numerous sources, this was very preventable. Of course, this is preliminary and there are a lot of different rumors flying around. However, each of the stories I'm hearing is that the operators / management knew something wasn't _quite_ right, but continued their production as if nothing were wrong. We'll see how it plays out in the end, but "oopsie" doesn't come to mind with this incident. "Negligence" is the word I'm currently using and may very well be using in the months to come.


----------



## frazil (May 27, 2010)

the robot arm is now hitting the pipe with a wrench.


----------



## Capt Worley PE (May 27, 2010)

frazil said:


> the robot arm is now hitting the pipe with a wrench.


To a robot with a wrench, the entire undersea kingdom is a nail.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 27, 2010)

Master slacker said:


> Chucktown PE said:
> 
> 
> > It's not as if BP did this intentionally. I'm sure they made mistakes but we've all made mistakes in our careers as engineers. It just happens that when they make a mistake in their subsector of the oil/gas industry the consequences are much larger than, if for example, I were to undersize a pipe by 2 inches.
> ...


That may be. But it still appears that there were multiple, cascading failures of redundant pieces of equipment. So even if they were negligent in their drilling, I don't think anyone could have predicted that every valve on the BOP would have failed.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 27, 2010)

Capt Worley PE said:


> frazil said:
> 
> 
> > the robot arm is now hitting the pipe with a wrench.
> ...


I saw that as well. Is that oil that's still spewing or is that the drilling mud? Everything I'm reading is saying that the top kill worked but if that's the case it seems that the plum would have subsided.


----------



## frazil (May 27, 2010)

I think its mud, but if its capped then there shouldn't be mud coming out either, right? What's happening?!!!


----------



## Master slacker (May 27, 2010)

I think there might be a Fudgey story waiting to be written.


----------



## FLBuff PE (May 27, 2010)

frazil said:


> I think its mud, but if its capped then there shouldn't be mud coming out either, right? What's happening?!!!


I haven't been keeping track, but I know that first they were trying to pump mud into the hole to stop the oil. Then they were going to follow that with cement (not the eb.com member, but the substance). Maybe the mud is flowing out in the in between time of mud injection to cement injection? All guesses on my part, so I could be blowing smoke up everyone's a$$e$.


----------



## jmbeck (May 27, 2010)

Comments like these are the reason I'm upset with BP. Granted, they're taken out of context. But, even so, do these things really need to be said, considering?

*"The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume."*

– TONY HAYWARD, CEO of BP, on the scope of the company's oil spill

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/ma...-gulf-oil-spill

*"Louisiana isn't the only place that has shrimp."*

– RANDY PRESCOTT, BP, on the concerns of rising prices for shrimp and oysters

http://thelensnola.org/2010/05/24/five-yea...ter-capitalism/


----------



## Dleg (May 27, 2010)

Capt Worley PE said:


> frazil said:
> 
> 
> > the robot arm is now hitting the pipe with a wrench.
> ...


LOL! Nice one.

I'm not willing to just write this off as an unfortunate cost of drilling for oil, either. Sure, things "just fail" once in a while. But in my experience, there are vast differences in corporate cultures, ways of doing things, general leadership direction from the top, etc., that can all have a dramatic effect on how often things "just fail". As I've said elsewhere, I have no working experience with BP. But I have worked around pretty much all the other oil companies, and saw some where this kind of accident would not have been a surprise. They may eventually be able to attribute the accident to one piece of equipment or one person's individual negligence, but in my experience the other factors that contribute to the corporate culture have as much or more to do with the failings than the individual.

But we'll just have to wait and see on that.


----------



## engineergurl (May 27, 2010)

I am still obsessing over the cat-x that was given for the nepa process... none of us at work have been able to find out which one it falls under technically (in our opinion) or a document that states which one... but google is a big world... and none of us has had the time to really look into it under the FOIA since we are so busy....


----------



## Dleg (May 27, 2010)

The Oil &amp; Gas industry is like the coal industry or the Ag industry - lots of special exemptions written into the law, through lobbying. It's usually an easy sell, too, since our entire economy is dependent on it. Sorta like all the ag exemptions - people gotta eat, so they get out of a lot of the requirements that apply to other businesses and activities. So, they're probably under some catex that was written specifically into the law, or regulations promulgated by the illustrious MMS.


----------



## engineergurl (May 27, 2010)

Dleg said:


> The Oil &amp; Gas industry is like the coal industry or the Ag industry - lots of special exemptions written into the law, through lobbying. It's usually an easy sell, too, since our entire economy is dependent on it. Sorta like all the ag exemptions - people gotta eat, so they get out of a lot of the requirements that apply to other businesses and activities. So, they're probably under some catex that was written specifically into the law, or regulations promulgated by the illustrious MMS.



I know, we deal with cat-x's every other minute, we just aren't familiar with the ones we don't use. I figure that if we have so many options with our jobs, that there was bound to be industries like that... but we also process nearly 100 environmental considerations a day. Most REC's come back concur with conditons... (oooo, that's where the mitigation and monitoring comes in on the small activities, GO ME!) considering the size of this kind of operation, i find it hard to believe that BP or any other company would want to drill with out doing an EIS for at least public relations purposes.


----------



## Master slacker (May 28, 2010)

jmbeck said:


> *"Louisiana isn't the only place that has shrimp."*
> – RANDY PRESCOTT, BP, on the concerns of rising prices for shrimp and oysters
> 
> http://thelensnola.org/2010/05/24/five-yea...ter-capitalism/


That quote, in particular, burns the piss out of me. That sorry sack of shit needs to get his f'ing ass out there in the Gulf and marshlands and clean up. I would have no reservations slugging him in the face if we were to ever meet. :madgo:


----------



## Capt Worley PE (May 28, 2010)

This is one of those times when I'm glad I don't eat seafood.


----------



## RIP - VTEnviro (May 28, 2010)

frazil said:


> exactly! "will it ever stop?!"


I freely admit I watched 96 spins last night.


----------



## Chucktown PE (May 28, 2010)

Capt Worley PE said:


> This is one of those times when I'm glad I don't eat seafood.



this is why I catch my own seafood, with the exception that I will buy Salmon from the store.


----------



## frazil (May 28, 2010)

how do you get the job driving the ROV around?!


----------



## Dleg (May 28, 2010)

I don't know. I met a few of those guys when I worked in the oil field. Typical service job, though. High stress and extremely long hours - you don't typically work a "schedule" - just completing tasks. If those tasks happen to take 48 hours to complete, then that's how long you work.


----------



## Twofrogs (May 31, 2010)

Dleg said:


> The Oil &amp; Gas industry is like the coal industry or the Ag industry - lots of special exemptions written into the law, through lobbying. It's usually an easy sell, too, since our entire economy is dependent on it. Sorta like all the ag exemptions - people gotta eat, so they get out of a lot of the requirements that apply to other businesses and activities. So, they're probably under some catex that was written specifically into the law, or regulations promulgated by the illustrious MMS.


I couldn't agree more. From my perspective this is the real socialism, hey...a big round of applause to the anti-regulatory crowd of the past 10-15 years on this quagmire. Brilliant!!


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 1, 2010)

^^ Yep, it's all Bush's fault.


----------



## Master slacker (Jun 1, 2010)

Everything is.


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 1, 2010)

Some folks forget that the dems have been in charge of Congress for four years now and BO has been in office for a year and a half.

And for Twofrogs, exactly what government regulation would you have put in place to prevent this? And stopping all offshore drilling isn't a reasonable answer considering 1/3 of our oil/gas come from the Gulf of Mexico.


----------



## Twofrogs (Jun 1, 2010)

Chucktown PE said:


> Some folks forget that the dems have been in charge of Congress for four years now and BO has been in office for a year and a half.
> And for Twofrogs, exactly what government regulation would you have put in place to prevent this? And stopping all offshore drilling isn't a reasonable answer considering 1/3 of our oil/gas come from the Gulf of Mexico.


Like you are stating we need as much oil/gas to be produced in the US for the US. Regardless who the leader is - "wink, wink" type of enforcement of any regs on the books is destructive and wrong...since we have to eventually pay for all the screw-ups, essentially this is worse than socialism - no benefits from the profits, but pay when shit hits the fan. Regs are not my forte, but one could easily imagine some sort of common sense applied - back-up plans, funding for back-up plans, fail-safe design completed, sign-offs, redundancies, system monitoring....etc, versus what we have now - a git'er done mentality, where self-regulation doesn't work, especially when greed is the driving factor. Here, government does have a role, but has lost its upper-hand, probably due to all the lobbying &amp; subsidizing of this industry.


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 1, 2010)

Twofrogs said:


> Chucktown PE said:
> 
> 
> > Some folks forget that the dems have been in charge of Congress for four years now and BO has been in office for a year and a half.
> ...



My point is the back up plans and the fail-safe design failed. No amount of regulation by some bureaucrat could have prevented this. And most would argue that the offshore oil/gas industry is highly regulated as is.

It's convenient to point the finger at BP because they're a big evil corporation and I'm sure their CEO made a lot of money last year. But don't you think that given the consequences they would have chosen to operate as carefully as possible.

To me, this is an impressive response considering their back up plans and fail-safe designs have failed and they don't have any other options available at the moment.

BP Response

Also, I think it's interesting to note that the White House released a statement late last week that said BP isn't doing anything without approval from BO's cabinet. Exactly what expertise do those morons have that would qualify them to "help"?


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 1, 2010)

One more thing while I'm thinking about it. Has it ever occured to anyone that BP might not have had to drill in 5000 feet of water if the environmental whack jobs hadn't convinced our dipshit politicians that drilling shouldn't be allowed in the shallower waters of the Gulf. This forced the oil companies far offshore to the deeper waters. If this accident had happened in 500 feet of water, instead of 5000, it would have been taken care of long before now. In fact, it might well have never happened in the first place.

Similarly, if the environmental whack jobs hadn't convinced our dipshit politicians that drilling shouldn't be allowed in the shallower waters of the Atlantic Coast, this accident would have hasppened in 500 feet of water, instead of 5000.


----------



## Twofrogs (Jun 1, 2010)

Am not going to be a chearleader for BP on this one, the fact that so many livelihoods are going to be ruined, probably for the second time, because someone along the line royally screwed up is wrong. I love gulf shrimp!! It tastes better than oil


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 1, 2010)

I'm not a chearleader for BP either, but to say that 'more government regulation would have prevented this' is assinine.


----------



## Dexman PE (Jun 1, 2010)

Chucktown PE said:


> I'm not a chearleader for BP either, but to say that 'more government regulation would have prevented this' is assinine.


Which ass would you rate a 9?


----------



## Dleg (Jun 1, 2010)

Chucktown PE said:


> One more thing while I'm thinking about it. Has it ever occured to anyone that BP might not have had to drill in 5000 feet of water if the environmental whack jobs hadn't convinced our dipshit politicians that drilling shouldn't be allowed in the shallower waters of the Gulf. This forced the oil companies far offshore to the deeper waters. If this accident had happened in 500 feet of water, instead of 5000, it would have been taken care of long before now. In fact, it might well have never happened in the first place.
> Similarly, if the environmental whack jobs hadn't convinced our dipshit politicians that drilling shouldn't be allowed in the shallower waters of the Atlantic Coast, this accident would have hasppened in 500 feet of water, instead of 5000.


I speak from experience that the big oil companies were moving into deeper water anyway, of their own accord, because that's where new oil is. The easy stuff is all gone, for the most part. It's an engineering challenge to drill and produce from deeper waters, and that's the exact kind of thing people like us strive for. And, as the price of oil goes up, these deeper reservoirs become more practical. Imagine the risks we will be taking when oil hits $200 a barrel.

Again, it is premature to be arguing over who is at fault and whether or not more or less regulation would have prevented this. It is not public yet what really happened.

Plus, the breaks for the oil industry go way back. Before Bush, before BO. One of the reasons the EPA regulations take up an entire shelf is because of all the specific, individual exemptions written into them for oil &amp; gas, coal, and agricultural facilities. I've heard it said, and it's absolutely true, that we ALL share the blame in this, a little bit, at least. Lobbyists, congressmen, industry people, and every single one of us who drives a car or relies on plastics and other petroleum products.

The thing that bothered me the most about working in the oil field was my neighbors in Ventura, CA, on the beach. My oilfield roomates and I joined them once for a (illegal) bonfire and beers one night, and as soon as they found out we worked on the platforms that were visible from there, they gave us so much shit we had to leave. And those bastards were the ones making those platforms necessary - commuting to LA every day, driving SUVs. That's why I am 100% in favor of drilling in ANWAR. If you are going to live the lifestyle, you better accept the consequences. In my opinion, it's better that this spill happened in the Gulf of Mexico, than, say, off of Nigeria or Malaysia or something. Then it would have been nothing more than a tragic byline, quickly forgotten, where some other poor bastards who can barely afford to eat pay the price for our SUVs and modern conveniences have to deal with it.

It sucks and we need to find out what happened and, if necessary, punish any wrongdoing, but we should also be willing to accept our part in all of this, and future accidents.


----------



## ElCid03 (Jun 1, 2010)

Does anyone know how the relief well is coming along?


----------



## wilheldp_PE (Jun 1, 2010)

CNN's Breaking News story on it says this about the new capping procedure. No new word on the relief well.



> A new flow of oil emerged from BP's damaged undersea well in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday evening after a remote-controlled submarine successfully cut into the well's riser pipe.
> BP used robots in its latest attempt to curtail the flow of crude from the largest spill in U.S. history, which spread to barrier islands off Alabama and Mississippi on Tuesday.
> 
> When the robot submarines cut into the undersea well's riser pipe, a fresh spew of oil temporarily obscured the view of the mechanical arm. The cut was a first step toward placing a cap over the well that has spewed hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico every day since late April.
> ...


----------



## Master slacker (Jun 2, 2010)

The ROV is holding onto some swiss-cheesed box-looking thing right now. I have no idea what it is. :huh:


----------



## Supe (Jun 2, 2010)

That makes two of us...


----------



## Road Guy (Jun 3, 2010)

Dleg, i am fairly sure that even if everyone in the country drove a prius there would still be oil rigs all over the planet


----------



## Master slacker (Jun 3, 2010)

Hybrids are a joke. They may not use as much gas, but the batteries aren't any better. When was the last time anyone used non-toxic disposal of batteries or even heard where all the battery material comes from?


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 3, 2010)

Master slacker said:


> Hybrids are a joke. They may not use as much gas, but the batteries aren't any better. When was the last time anyone used non-toxic disposal of batteries or even heard where all the battery material comes from?



There's actually some good reading material on where they mine the raw materials for the batteries. I think it's up in Canada. It has turned the land into a toxic waste dump.


----------



## Ble_PE (Jun 3, 2010)

I've stayed out of this conversation mostly because I have absolutely no idea how the leak should be stopped and I know that BP is doing whatever they can to stop this thing as quickly as possible. We all see how well that is going. I saw this article this morning and it seems like a plausible solution, but it involves the N-word (N meaning nuclear). What is everyone's thoughts on this?

Link to article.


----------



## Road Guy (Jun 3, 2010)

considering obama cant make any decisions I doubt this one would ever get off the discussion table..

I wonder though if blowing the hell out of it would only make the oil leak bigger? Also it said the ruskies had to drill 4 miles and BP said they need until August to drill the relief wells...

I find it amusing that FX is running Armageddon so much during this well bust, you woudl think showing a cowboy happy oil drillers wouldnt be all the PC right now....


----------



## Dleg (Jun 3, 2010)

Road Guy said:


> Dleg, i am fairly sure that even if everyone in the country drove a prius there would still be oil rigs all over the planet


:dunno: ???? Not sure you understood my point.


----------



## Road Guy (Jun 3, 2010)

In reference to the suv driving Americans 

Your right about the location though, a few months back a tanker got of course and ran into australias barrier reef and I don't think it even made CNN for more than 30 seconds


----------



## Dleg (Jun 3, 2010)

Right. SUVs, priuses, they all use oil so basically it's the same thing. If we all drove Priuses we'd still need that same oil, maybe a few years later, but we'd still need it. Planes, ships, trains, asphalt, we're pretty heavily dependent on the stuff. Oil WILL run out, so sooner or later we're going to need to face that fact and develop some alternatives.

As a purely strategic measure, I would think the US (and the rest of the world, for that matter) would want to conserve oil for those uses like airplanes, for which no reasonable alternative exists. Switching to electric cars, or fuel cell cars, or something like that would seem to be an extremely good idea, but will not happen until it is too late, if only market forces are at play. If we just wait for the price of oil to make alternative fueled cars attractive, then will we have killed air travel?


----------



## Master slacker (Jun 4, 2010)

Oil will NOT run out any time soon. Why does everyone assume that it will?


----------



## Chucktown PE (Jun 4, 2010)

The last number I heard was that we have 100 years of known oil reserves. So assuming we don't find any more oil, which is a stupid assumption, we'll run out in 100 years. I hope that, given the advances in technology over the last century, we'll have some fairly impressive new alternative energy sources 100 years from now.


----------



## Master slacker (Jun 4, 2010)

I'm all for new technologies like hydrogen, nuclear, and what-not, but this waste of money on stupid sh1t like wind and hybrids are ridiculous. Hybrids pollute in a completely different way and wind is so completely inefficient and cost stupid. Nuke, hydrogen, solar (for hydrogen production).


----------



## Dleg (Jun 4, 2010)

The wikipedia page on "peak oil" makes for interesting reading. All points of view are considered.



> Predictions of the timing of peak oil include the possibilities that it has recently occurred, that it will occur shortly, or that a plateau of oil production will sustain supply for up to 100 years. None of these predictions dispute the peaking of oil production, but disagree only on when it will occur.





> "All the easy oil and gas in the world has pretty much been found. Now comes the harder work in finding and producing oil from more challenging environments and work areas. ” — William J. Cummings, Exxon-Mobil company spokesman, December 2005





> It is pretty clear that there is not much chance of finding any significant quantity of new cheap oil. Any new or unconventional oil is going to be expensive. ” — Lord Ron Oxburgh, a former chairman of Shell, October 2008


----------



## Dleg (Jun 18, 2010)

Some good info in this AP article on the possible negligent actions of BP leading up to the blowout:



> *BP engineer called doomed rig a 'nightmare well'*
> By MATTHEW DALY, Associated Press Writer Matthew Daly, Associated Press Writer – Mon Jun 14, 6:17 pm ET
> 
> WASHINGTON – BP took measures to cut costs in the weeks before the catastrophic blowout in the Gulf of Mexico as it dealt with one problem after another, prompting a BP engineer to describe the doomed rig as a "nightmare well," according to internal documents released Monday.
> ...


These mostly seem pretty seriously bad decisions to me. The whole "nightmare well" quote is obviously overblown.

Here is some damning evidence against BP: an argument between the rig superintendant, Jimmy Harrell, and the BP "company man" just prior to the cement job, when BP rejected the "common practice" cement job practices, like running adequate centralizers on the casing string:



> Testifying before the Coast Guard and MMS panel last month, Douglas Brown, the chief mechanic on the Deepwater Horizon, said that on the morning of the day that the rig exploded Harrell had a "skirmish" over drilling procedures during a meeting with BP's "company man," well site leader Robert Kaluza. "I remember the company man saying this is how it's going to be," Brown told the panel. As Harrell was leaving the meeting, according to Brown, "He pretty much grumbled, 'I guess that's what we have those pincers for,'" referring to the blowout preventer on the sea floor that is supposed to be the last resort to prevent a leak in the event of an emergency. The blowout preventer failed following the explosion on the rig, causing the massive spill.


Later that day, in the midst of the blowout and fire, a satellite phone call between Harrell and "someone" was overheard by as many as three other individuals on a nearby support vessel:



> ...according to this witness account, Harrell was screaming, "Are you fucking happy? Are you fucking happy? The rig's on fire! I told you this was gonna happen."
> Whoever was on the other end of the line was apparently trying to calm Harrell down. "I am fucking calm," he went on, according to Buzbee. "You realize the rig is burning?"


----------



## Dleg (Jun 18, 2010)

Finally! I have found diagrams of the actual BOP and well construction:

Blow Out Preventer

Well Diagram


----------



## Dleg (Jun 18, 2010)

This is also an exceptionally informative series of diagrams, illustrating the failed "top kill" method. Shows the damage to the BOP.

Top Kill Diagram


----------



## Dleg (Jun 18, 2010)

And if you're interested in what's happening now, a good diagram of the "top hat" being used to collect the oil.

Top Hat


----------



## Paul S (Jun 18, 2010)

Cool find Dleg!


----------



## archeng1 (Jun 22, 2010)

definitely some great info here,

heard a story from a guy who bought a rental property in Panama City, gutted it fixed it up and had it rented at $2200 per week for pretty much the entire summer. all of his renters backed out after July 4th and now he can't even fetch $1200 per week. Sad he can't afford the place w/o the income.


----------



## Dleg (Jun 30, 2010)

An excellent, in depth look into how the BOP works, and potential reasons why it failed in this NY Times article.

(I'm impressed with the NYT guys, far better reporting than I've seen from any of the other news sources, which have either sensationalized it or gotten the details laughably wrong. Or both...)


----------



## TouchDown (Jul 15, 2010)

Sounds like they are making some progress on the cap.

So, is the plan once a cap is on and flow has stopped, than you can hook to it and pump concrete back into it to plug it for good?


----------



## benbo (Jul 15, 2010)

TouchDown said:


> Sounds like they are making some progress on the cap.
> So, is the plan once a cap is on and flow has stopped, than you can hook to it and pump concrete back into it to plug it for good?


I know less than zero about this.

But I suspect BP's plan, if possible , would be to figure out a way to suck oil out through the cap and sell it.

They might need the money to pay off the lawsuits.


----------



## Dleg (Jul 15, 2010)

I'm not sure if the "cap" obviates the need for the relief wells to truly kill the well. Probably not - you really need to be able to fill the well with mud from below. But, it's possible the cap may make it possible to force mud in at a high enough pressure to make it work from the wellhead. At any rate, the relief wells are almost complete, from what I understand, so my guess is they will go ahead and complete them.

The cap is working, though, and no more oil is escaping into the Gulf as of about 2.5 hours ago, so that's excellent news.


----------

