I thought they had remote cutoff systems:
As work crews try to contain an oil well that is pumping thousands of barrels of crude oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico, many businesses are bracing for the worst.
Much is at stake. BP [BP 51.58 -0.98 (-1.86%)], owner of operator of the well, has already had its image dented by recent accidents. This event will likely cause its image further harm—not to mention the millions in costs associated with containing the spill and drilling a new well.
But the fallout stretches well beyond that. The oil industry is fresh from a victory over President Obama’s decision to open up parts of the Atlantic coast and eastern Gulf of Mexico to offshore drilling.
How can “Drill Baby Drill” go ahead, when government doesn’t require the industry to use the most modern safety equipment available:
Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., sent President Obama a letter Thursday reminding him that in 2000 the Interior Department insisted “oil companies have ‘reliable backup systems’ in the event of a rig blowout.”
By 2003, the plan was scrapped.
“This could be one of the world’s greatest nightmare scenarios of an oil gusher,” Nelson said.
The backup systems are supposed to act when an oil rig fails and starts leaking. Then, a valve deep under the water where the drill pipe meets the ocean floor is supposed to choke off the flow of oil. In the case of BP’s platform, either the valve wasn’t activated or didn’t work, possibly because of the explosion.
But there is another line of defense this oil platform did not have, a so-called acoustic switch. It can be activated by remote control sending acoustic pulses through the water to trigger the blowout preventer even if the rig is damaged or evacuated.
Acoustic switches are used in Norway and Brazil after those oil producing countries suffered spills. The U.S. considered requiring them, but drilling companies questioned the $500,000 cost and whether the devices even work.
Update: From the Comments … ht: LC Bennett
Covenient….
Just what the TOTUS and BRG needed to halt offshore drilling…..
Too convenient….
“I thought they had remote cutoff systems:”
They do.
You have a Blow out Preventer (BOP) system on the well head above the mudline, and you have a Sub Surface Safety Valve (SSSV) in the well below the mud line (once the well is drilled and completed). The SSSV is supposed to close automatically and isolate the fluids and gas from the well to the surface, even if the wellhead is severed from the sea floor.
When the well is in its drilling phase, the oil and gas pressure from below is controlled with weighted mud to overbalance or equalize the pressure. If the mud system is mismanaged and the active rig personal are not monitoring for specific signs of a pending “kick” you can have a disaster “blowout”.
Otherwise this incident will be investigated full stop and the exact cause will come to light eventually. There have been blowouts in the past due to ships hitting rigs, or other external causes.
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=BOP%20stack
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=subsurface%20safety%20valve%20(SSSV)
The BOP would be easier to get at if it were in ANWR!
“How can “Drill Baby Drill” go ahead, when government doesn’t require the industry to use the most modern safety equipment available”
You mean, why doesn’t government MORE STRONGLY REGULATE the industry? Good question.
This spill is going to hurt the people of New Orleans. Barrack Obama has not done enough to protect them from this spill.
Barrack Obama hates black people!
These companies need to be held to account. Fined and fined big time or shut down off shore drilling for a while. All of those who have little or no regard for the environment and the ecosystems therein illustrate their true colors of the contemptible people they really are.
Expalins why the Oil Sands are so popular . . no dry holes to drill, no blow out valves required.
Nice safe clean energy to keep our schools & hospitals warm.
Ever so much greener.
Too bad Barry has said ‘mericuh can’t use our “dirty oil”.
So sad teh chines want our “dirty oil”
Death to those who have little or no regard for the environment and the ecosystems. Did I miss anything T?
even with the latest and greatest technology, crap does and always will happen. To ban drilling because of this is akin to ban automobiles because Toyota allegedly screwed up.
As an aside, television shows on History and Discovery Channels that depict real drilling operations show that a lot more technology and safety goes on than the average layman realizes. Jed Clampetts they are not.
I wonder how much of this is going to drift up the Gulf Stream?
Would not be buying one of those Nova Scotia beach cottages at the moment.
How many want to bet that BP investors will soon be the proud owners of a few Caribbean Islands, like Jamaica!
What is this going to cost Canadian taxpayers in relief funds to Haiti and Cuba?
Lots of questions all will be a huge price tag………..TIP *suggest selling any BP shares.
Yes, T, Beyond Petroleum needs to be held to account for taking shortcuts.
Death to those who have little or no regard for the lifesaving energy use and our modern technology/energy based society.
Did I miss anything Grandad?
Bad, bad Gaia. Where are those media cameras?
[ Although accidents and hurricane damage to infrastructure are often to blame for oil spills and the resulting pollution in coastal Gulf of Mexico waters, natural seepage from the ocean floor introduces a significant amount of oil to ocean environments as well. ] Geology.com
[ Now, imagine 8 to 80 times the amount of oil spilled in the Exxon Valdez accident.
According to new research by scientists from UC Santa Barbara and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), that’s how much oil has made its way into sediments offshore from petroleum seeps near Coal Oil Point in the Santa Barbara Channel.] Science Daily
[ There is effectively an oil spill every day at Coal Oil Point (COP), the natural seeps off Santa Barbara where 20 to 25 tons of oil have leaked from the seafloor each day for the last several hundred thousand years.] Live Science
[ “One of the natural questions is: What happens to all of this oil?” said study co-author Dave Valentine of the University of California, Santa Barbara. “So much oil seeps up and floats on the sea surface. It’s something we’ve long wondered. We know some of it will come ashore as tar balls, but it doesn’t stick around. And then there are the massive slicks. You can see them, sometimes extending 20 miles [32 kilometers] from the seeps. But what really is the ultimate fate?” ] Live Science
Good, good Gaia
[ Microbes consume most, but not all, of the compounds in the oil. The next step of the research is to figure out just why that is.
“Nature does an amazing job acting on this oil but somehow the microbes stopped eating, leaving a small fraction of the compounds in the sediments,” said study co-author Chris Reddy, a marine chemist with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Falmouth, Mass. “Why this happens is still a mystery, but we are getting closer.” ] Live Science
Soooo, take the knot out of your shirt. As you were. Back to work.
Posted by: T>
We can assume T that you live in the forest somewhere eating lentils and wild mushrooms?
It must be awful to be forced out of seclusion to borrow some oxygen thief’s evil power sucking computer to make your enlightening posts.
Reading the comments, I thought I had somehow or another been shifted to a David Suzuki website.
Oil has been seeping from the floor of the Gulf for eons. This ain’t that big of a deal.
As for the suggestion that BP be sold, it has already been scalped vastly more than the estimated cleanup costs.
Get a grip, people, or alternatively, get your bicycle out of the garage and pump up the tires.
Turn off your ‘puter T, you are not doing your utmost to save the earth. You are part of the problem.
Interesting time of the spill, no, given the recent victory? Related to SWAT teams being deployed perhaps?
Conspiracy theories aside….
I bet the $500K for an acoustic shut-off valve seems like chump change now, eh, BP?
SWAT will hit the rigs fast and by air … no paid off inspectors this time, to find out just how many companies aren’t following procedures or may not be using proper equipment. As a side show, they’ll also find out how many banned substances are on board. If they hit some drill sites on the prairies, you’d think the Columbian cartel was running things.
Those who know me know that I’m all free enterprise all the time; all oil and gas and coal all the time … I just get sick of supporting the industry on my blog and trading in their stock only to find out they aren’t only dodging common sense regulations, but crying the blues over regulations that in the end are good for them, and good for all of us.
By the way, natural oil seeps have nothing to do with this … nothing … they are irrelevant.
Here’s what underwater oil flows look like after thousands of years:
Scientists find ancient asphalt domes off California coast
http://www.physorg.com/news191397828.html
The one thing I find amazing out of all of this is the timing. Obama opens up offshore drilling in a bunch of areas, and short time later we have a major disaster.
BP – worked for them – hated them!
It was all about their ‘Green’ image. What a bunch of wankers!
Posted by: Cjunk at April 30, 2010 12:14 PM >
The fact remains that there is no known cause of this disaster to be pointing fingers yet.
That will come later.
9 times out of 10 industrial accidents are caused by someone coming up with a “Presidential Solution” and not following the safety procedures and protocols already in place. In other words, human error.
If people thought like that all the time, Cjunk we would never have things like ADSCAM or blow outs that could be prevented.
I’d venture to state that at least in Canada, we have 62% of the population who think that some kind of “shortcut” is acceptable. The rest of us who don’t think like that, pay for that concept.
Mexico has been drilling, non-stop, in the gulf, for many decades. It took BP to screw up this badly. I guess they’re too busy sucking up to the green movement to bother focusing on their first responsibility, corporate responsibility.
“Oil has been seeping from the floor of the Gulf for eons. This ain’t that big of a deal.”
And everyone dies anyway, so if somebody murders someone else, what’s the big deal?
That’s pretty much your logic process.
The problem here is that 5,000 barrels per day is spilling. And that when it washes up in the wetlands it will be an ecological disaster.
And besides that, already people in New Orleans can smell the oil coming and are being told to stay in doors. Seeing as it could take 4 weeks to cap the well, yeah… that shouldn’t be a problem.
All is safe! Do not panic. The high priest of Hopey changey has announced he has dispatched SWAT teams to threaten all rigs in the Gulf into not spilling things. Just a show of love from Washington
I have actually spent a little time working on offshore rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. Those crews live in fear of a snap inspection by the regulatory authorities. Even something as seemingly inconsequential as a badly-secured sensor cable could get the rig shut down.
The timing of this incident is just too perfect. I wouldn’t, for one second, rule out sabotage of some sort.
Frankly, it couldn’t happen to a more “green” corporation than BP. Shell shoud be next. They are just as promiscuous as BP are on the green file. These two wanker companies have sucked up big time to the greeen lobby, trying to appease them and make themselves look better than the competition. So that you will buy their products over the “dirty oil” competition.
They are multinational oil companies – the bottom line is what is counting. “Dirty oil” is what they sell. If they can suck a few governments into their world by promoting how “green” they are, or how coporately “socially responsible” they are, they feel that they will escape any form of censure.
Looks good on them. Their inaction or actions will impact the bottom lines of all the others in the form of restricted areas to drill, more government regualtions, oversite and paper work, which in the end will drive up the costs to do business and diminish the amounts of oil produced.
Greens love it. You won’t. They want you dead any which way they can bring it on. Driving up the cost of oil or any other form of carbon fuel or alternative is predicated on killing off your economy in the end, so that you and your kids starve. Remember that when some nice young ladies knock on your door for donations to Greenpeace or the WWF solicits you to “save” all those doe-eyed animals they stick on their propaganda handouts.
They want you to fund your own death. Any corporation promoting “green” is a hypocrite. They certainly aren’t motivated to kill their customers off, it’s bad for business.
Two points
1) Yes, mankind is guilty of some unforgivable oil spills but so is Gaia. The Mother of all spills being the Alberta Oil Sands. Mankind is working feverishly to clean it up.
2) Media will be saying this oil spill contamination will last forever. Naturally occurring oil eating microbes know more than MSNBC.
And I agree, there is also a smell of sabotage in the air.
Posted by: ron in Kelowna>
“And I agree, there is also a smell of sabotage in the air”
My first inclination is industrial accident. That said, this will help out the Obamba administration on so many different fronts – that you simply can’t rule out “inside job”, “false flag” or any other term the conspiracy theorists will undoubtedly come up with.
I think an interesting thread on the matter would be to list ALL the ways this “crisis” helps Obamba politically. That would be an interesting and long list I’m sure, which then becomes suspect.
There have been drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico since the 1940’s.
Unless I’ve missed something, this is the first accident in the Gulf.
Why should they mandate anything? That would be Big Government. If the pelicans don’t like being covered in oil, they can move; that’s the Free Market in action.
slim – very interesting lava dome “spills” off the California coast.
How much oil and gas is down there anyways. Mankind has probably just put a very small dent in it. And I wonder how much has found its way to the surface over the millennium? Perhaps the Earth was awash in surface oil many times with just a few Jeff Clampet sites remaining.
SWAT will hit the rigs fast and by air … no paid off inspectors this time, to find out just how many companies aren’t following procedures or may not be using proper equipment.
No, inspectors, not “SWAT”. SWAT are police.
Anyway, the Deep Horizon rig was inspected by the federal government 3 times in 2010, including once in April.
“……that’s the Free Market in action.”
Exactly.
Big oil producers regulate themselves based on a free market environment. If you have a spill or other such ecological disaster, you lose profit, possibly your entire business, and maybe even see some jail time.
When the government regulates you get a bailout.
Set You Free: June 3rd, 1979, massive spill … one of the worlds biggest.
An acquaintance with familiarity with production
in the Gulf of Mexico tells me that many of the
production platforms are primitive, some
even with BOP’s on the surface!
That, of course, does not justify present-day
sloppiness.
The procedures used to handle the oil slick seem
counter-productive to me. In the first instance,
setting fire to the slick will burn off only the
most volatile components of the petroleum, leaving thick tarry residue which will be hard to
deal with.
Second, I would think about treating the slick
the way oil spills are handled on land: by seeding
them with bacteria. On land, the soil is
gathered up, seeded with bacteria, and churned
with earth-moving equipment. The result is good-quality topsoil. I don’t see why something
similar might not be effective at sea. Some of
these bacteria are very aggressive, and can handle heavy oil. In fact, ships’ engineers have
to be constantly on guard lest their fuel supply
become infected.
We are all very worried about sea birds. I, however, have prayed for the repose of the souls
of the men lost in the fire and explosion, and I
urge you to do the same if you have not done so
already.
What a day! I detest the media over-use of the catch-phrases “anytime soon” and (particularly), “gobsmacked.” However I have been gobsmacked upon reading the Terence Corcoran FP Comment page column in this morning’s National Post.
Enbridge CEO Pat Daniel is pitching for a Canadian carbon tax and cap-and-trade?!! Is the world I once knew turned upside down? I grew up in Southern Saskatchewan in Tommy Douglas’ hometown; lived under CCF/NDP socialism until I moved to Alberta where there was opportunity to make a decent living. I formed a political philosophy that “socialism demands that we all be equal . . . equally poor.”
I was (and still am, I think) a powerful defender of the free market and the oil industry that we Albertans built up from nothing. Yes, us. It wasn’t Texans so much at all. Oil patch employees work damn hard, but are fairly paid.
But on reading the Enbridge socialist plan – apparently based on us proving oil for the benefit to poor people of Asia; a Gateway pipeline to the West Coast, through Carbon Tax and cap-and-trade . . . I am reeling, my friends. I shall collect my thoughts and try to come up with a big-picture scenerio. I’m afraid it will be a conspiracy theory . . . I, like many of my SDA friends, am suspicious of sabotage re: the Gulf disaster. Can there be some kind of link???
“The timing of this incident is just too perfect. I wouldn’t, for one second, rule out sabotage of some sort.”
Yeah. That’s exactly what happened. Obama, in conjunction with his Kenyan overlords, used the same demolition team who brought down the Twin Towers to blow up the oil rig.
Excuse me Texan, this ain’t that big a deal???? You’re the one that has to get a grip here. 900,000 litres a day leakage and no control plan in sight is a big deal.
Posted by: John>
I think you may be onto something there John!
I doubt very much that he has Kenyan overloards though, obviously he was born there but I think he runs with the Black Panther Boyz out of Chicago first and formost.
” Big oil producers regulate themselves based on a free market environment. If you have a spill or other such ecological disaster, you lose profit, possibly your entire business, and maybe even see some jail time.”
Yeah, boy. Exxon shore got dinged didn’t they? All they had to do was keep appealing the lawsuit until most of the plaintive died. What did they end up paying in the end? Nobody knows. And nobody spent any time in jail. The captain had to do a few years of community service. That’s pretty much it.
Thoughtful post John Lewis, thanks.
Just read that the Feds did inspect this rig as recently as this month and two other times in the last few years.
So comes under ‘accident’ for now…but congress will use this to their advantage no matter what.
I’d help clean up if I were there.
Hopefully the area will recover quickly and not have a long term damage. One season is bad enough on this area damaged already from Katrina.
Speaking of..wonder if a hurrican could actually would help in this situation. NOT wishing them one, just wondering.
set you free: “Unless I’ve missed something, this is the first accident in the Gulf.”
Actually, they happen fairly often, just not on a scale that makes the national and international news: http://www.gomr.mms.gov/homepg/offshore/safety/safetylist.html
Meanwhile….
http://www.evworld.com/article.cfm?storyid=1483
In the national debate about opening up more of America’s offshore regions to oil and gas drilling — and setting aside the problem of carbon dioxide-induced climate change — a sixty mile long stretch of coastline that reaches roughly from Ventura Country west north west to San Luis Obispo Country, well south of the Big Sur coast, has some 2,000 active sea floor oil seeps. According to former JPL physicist Bruce Allen, the tectonically active zone is estimated to have leaked some 800 million barrels of oil over the last 10,000 years.
inspections dont mean squat if you shut the shear rams on the collars.
Da&%^#&^mmit, if BP screws up my oyster/shrimp season I am not gona be a happy camper.
Mt. Olive, Louisi-yana, USA.
Hey, is this gonna screw up the Goricals new beach front ‘low carbon footprint’ shack?
How-come this damm thing just blew up, and why’s Bammy sending in swat?
There is so much mis-information going on that it is no wonder folks are confused. Work in 5000′ of water is vastly different from work in 500′ of water or on land. The equipment is different but operating principals are very similar. SWAT folks and other Gov’t folks without oil field experience won’t be able to tell a real problem from an imagined problem. This talk about the right location of the BOP’s, surface vs. seafloor, assumes there is ONE right way to do things. Many major incidents result from a series of small seemingly insignificant events all occurring at the same time.
Heard on Rush that “Homeland Security” has been called in, was this a terrorist attack?