BP Oil Leak

[Polis4rule]

Originally Posted by Fat Norid

Yes, it recently claimed the title of "worst oil spill in US territory," passing the Exxon incident near Alaska. That being said, it still has not surpassed Ixtoc 1 spill yet, and hasn't come close yet to the Gulf War oil spill.

Upper ranges for the Deepwater Horizon spill have it surpassing the Ixtoc spill and nearing the Gulf War oil spill.

[Alan]

Originally Posted by Fat foxy_eisenhower

tl;dr

I read somewhere, I can't remember but I can have my dad e-mail me the link later today, that they found some huge oil deposits somewhere.

Also, I want to retract my earlier post, I still enjoy the lack of traffic, but I saw pictures of dead ducks covered in oil and it made me sad. ;__;

I still, however, do not blame BP for this. Shit happens from time to time, and mistakes are made. This just happened to be a really big oil spill and it happened on their watch.

[Ancien Régime]

This is not a case of "Shit happens."

This is a case of negligence in order to make short-term (and by short-term I mean profit that is exceeded by the costs factorially) profit.

[Phantom_IV]

I'm watching the Oval Office address, are you?

And hmm, the end of that speech sounded like a sermon.

[Viashino_wizard]

My impression of the address is basically that Obama's definitely gonna do... something? And that he wants BP to pay to fix their mess.

[mattj]

I don't really care how it gets fixed.

I just want my millionaire life back. This is terrible. I mean. I can't go on floats on my yacht because I have to be at all these press conferences trying to explain how it wasn't my fault. And I had to reschedule all my posh parties too. I don't know how people can live like this.

[Shroomisaur]

Originally Posted by Fat MrIndigo

Nuclear fission is the only power source that can possibly replace carbon fuels. All the 'green' power sources are not efficient enough on one scale or another (whether it's reliability, space, or time). Fission's also politically unviable, because the biproducts are useful for making nuclear weapons; although there are processes to make the leftovers essentially harmless, they are more expensive than simply selling it to someone who is less scrupulous so economically it's unlikely to last.

Hopefully, ITER will work and then we can all get clean fusion power.

I agree with your stance on this issue... no matter how much politicians clamor about "green" energy, it's just too expensive to be viable. Nuclear energy is clean, efficient, and reliable; too bad the very mention of the word "nuclear" or "radiation" causes irrational panic amongst the population, it's actually very safe.

Anyhow, about the Oil Spill... I agree with the OP in that Obama is behaving very immaturely about this whole issue; trying to blame British (sigh) Petroleum for this isn't getting it fixed any sooner. He claims to be doing everything possible to fix this, but I see nothing, and no results.

But despite this, the true fault does lie with BP for cutting corners. And they are proving to be incompetent at fixing their own problems. I seriously wonder if BP will be able to recover from this disaster.

I'm sure of one thing: they won't if officials continue to make comments like "I want my life back" after 11 workers were killed and countless animals are dying... I really was taken aback by the sheer stupidity and selfishness of the CEO's remark (and of course, that's just one of many).

[FreakOfNature]

It's so funny how Exxon used to be viewed as the big bad oil company and BP was the one with their shit together. Now Exxon is putting loads of money into alternative energy and running and almost perfect violation records on their rigs, while BP on the other hand is destroying our whole east coast (assuming the gulf stream does it's job.)

[Ancien Régime]

BP has had a long, long, long history of safety fuckups; they've had about 3 rig explosions this decade (here, Australia, and Texas), and they've had a history of cutting corners to save money.

It's just back to bite them in the ass in a big way this time.

[cantab]

Originally Posted by Fat ginganinja

Oil companies have bought out the technonogy since they would be out of business otherwsie

Oil companies have invested in renewable energy because they're not stupid. They know it's going to be the future - how near a future depends on what governments do but even if governments do nothing we'll get peak oil at some point. The oil companies want a piece of that because otherwise they're doomed to failure in the long term.

As for the OP:

Originally Posted by Fat sce4

What I want to address is how politicians, especially Obama, are handling this crisis.

Politicians should mostly keep their noses out. Right now they should be providing financial and other assistant and direction for the containment and cleanup efforts, and supporting BP if needed in stopping the spill. Maybe the US government could call in someone other than BP, but really, the only other organisations with the resources and expertise
Once the spill is stopped, there should be criminal and civil legal proceedings against those suspected to be responsible. Questions of blame can be settled in the courts - that's what courts are for - not by Obama's mudslinging which he only did to try and help his own approval ratings. Based on what is currently known I would suspect some hefty fines and if the law allows prison sentences.

From a technical perspective, the number 1 question is why the hell didn't the blowout preventer work?. Until we have a satisfactory answer to this question (from a technical engineering standpoint not a finger-pointing legal blame one), I don't think any new drilling should be allowed, nor any operations like what BP was doing when the disaster occured. And if the US government has the power they should force all oil companies in their territory to run extra safety checks. The oil companies ought to do this ANYWAY - if I were a Shell or Exxon manager I'd be wanting to make damn sure the same thing doesn't happen to us.

Originally Posted by Fat The Requiem

I'm entirely convinced that this entire oil spill crisis was plotted and executed, and money is the reason the earth is still bleeding into the gulf.

Do you really think BP is that bloody stupid?

Originally Posted by Fat Deck Knight

Why is Deep Water Horizon out drilling so far into the sea? Because do-gooder environmentalists made it illegal to drill in much safer venues for oil.

Proof please. Name me one conventional on-shore or shallow-water oil field in the US that is estimated as big as the Deepwater Horizon field ('Macondo Project', 50 million barrels estimated) and that an oil company has been completely banned from drilling on environmental grounds. Not tar sands, because frankly the environmental impact from routine exploitation of them gives the Deepwater Horizon blowout a run for its money.

Originally Posted by Fat Overhazard

I believe that my biggest disappointment was that the company didn't have an "Oh, shit! Button." Not all worse-case-scenario's can be predicted but at the very least there should of been something that could of prevented or greatly limit the spill.

They do. It's called the blowout preventer. It didn't work. It's suspected that was due to it not being maintained properly.

Originally Posted by Fat MrIndigo

BP should be bankrupted over this, and the managing directors should be put in an American jail for years.

And thousands of employees who had absolutely nothing to do with the disaster should lose their jobs, and whole towns lose their main employer and suffer terrible unemployment and deprivation for decades. That's what should happen is it?

Originally Posted by Fat Ancien Régime

I'm more offended that BP seemingly didn't have a plan than the government not executing one. But good point, yeah.

They did. In fact they had several. The plans just didn't work, because they were untested, because there's never been a blowout at this kind of depth before.

Originally Posted by Fat Aura Guardian

It's a very bad spill, one of the worst in America's waters. So, yeah, I think calling it one of the worst spills ever - it is one of them - is justifiable. And that data - wasn't it compared to the other big spills? (and the biggest - wasn't a war going on in the area or something?

To clarify - this spill is ONGOING. To say it's a small spill is like saying your beer is short measure when the bartender's still pouring it.

Originally Posted by Fat Alan

Also the eco-system will recover in time, its not the fucking apocolypse.

This is something we just don't know. History has shown size of a spill relates very poorly to environmental damage.

Attached are New Scientists scans of an article about the issue. I think Smogon is resizing them, so they're a bit hard to read sorry.

Originally Posted by Fat Lelouch

"BP" is convenient shorthand for a massive company consisting of thousands of people. When I say you should blame people more relevant, I mean the people involved in the particular leaking facility. Not BP, an intangible entity, and not its CEO.

Most legal systems allow bringing proceedings against a company. As for blaming the CEO - when someone accepts the job of CEO, they willingly accept ultimate responsibility for what their company does. And they get paid a crapton to take that risk.

[Objection]

I think a lot of people are looking at this the wrong way. This oil spill is a result of something going wrong, so the most important questions are "What went wrong?" and "How can we prevent the same thing going wrong for all future endeavors?" and "How do we know that this (ie, answer to second question) is a surefire way and the best way of preventing the same thing going wrong?" The answers to the first two questions would have to be as specific as possible, and the third question requires a perfectly logical justification for an answer.

[MrIndigo]

Originally Posted by Fat cantab

Most legal systems allow bringing proceedings against a company. As for blaming the CEO - when someone accepts the job of CEO, they willingly accept ultimate responsibility for what their company does. And they get paid a crapton to take that risk.

Actually, most countries don't have any kind of personal responsibility enforced against the CEOs or other boardmembers. It's only in recent times that abuse of the corporation-is-its-own-legal-entity-and-so-the-members-aren't-responsible principle has led to legislative reforms in some jurisdictions to pierce the 'corporate veil'.

[Electrode]

One of the biggest disapointments with this whole disaster - besides the damage - is how, instead of rolling up his sleeves and trying to get together great engineers to figure something out, or (sooner than he did) talking with BP and other oil companies, Obama waited; instead of supplying leadership, he just threw insults like a child and tried to look tough by talking about kicking some asses.

Then, when there's tons of damage and everyone is pissed at everyone, he gets BP to whip money at those effected by the disaster, as if that fixes anything.

[Veedrock]

Then, when there's tons of damage and everyone is pissed at everyone, he gets BP to whip money at those effected by the disaster, as if that fixes anything.

I genuinely don't know what you expect to be done instead. Clearly the victims are not going to be satisfied with just an apology. Yeah, this disaster sucks, but can it be undone? No. So what's the big deal with trying to alleviate them the best he can? Seriously, if YOU are the victim, money fixes a hell of a lot more than nothing. You can think of it as a cop out all you want, but it helps.

[cantab]

Originally Posted by Fat Electrode

instead of rolling up his sleeves and trying to get together great engineers to figure something out, or (sooner than he did) talking with BP and other oil companies, Obama waited

Well what could he have done? The "great engineers" who might be able to "figure something out" are already working for BP or other oil companies.

[Electrode]

Originally Posted by Fat cantab

Well what could he have done? The "great engineers" who might be able to "figure something out" are already working for BP or other oil companies.

I wouldn't feel as if he blew it off if he tried to get people together sooner. Even if it didn't work out, it would have been sooner than what he actually did.

[Electrode]

Originally Posted by Fat Veedrock

I genuinely don't know what you expect to be done instead. Clearly the victims are not going to be satisfied with just an apology. Yeah, this disaster sucks, but can it be undone? No. So what's the big deal with trying to alleviate them the best he can? Seriously, if YOU are the victim, money fixes a hell of a lot more than nothing. You can think of it as a cop out all you want, but it helps.

I guess that I shouldn't put it all on how I feel that it was a cop out - I also don't like how his oval office address turned into blather about his energy plans.

I suppose that I shouldn't of said that the money does nothing, rather that it's insulting that he got more involved at the "end" of the events instead of the beginning of the events.

[SAN DIEGO SUPER CHARGERS!]

This is all Sarah Palin's fault.
Drill baby drill

[cantab]

Bit of a bump, to say that it seems like they've done it! The oil has stopped flowing.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-10670760

They still need to do some testing, and if I recall correctly we had something before that was reported successful but then failed, but it's looking good.

Of course no doubt there will be questions as to why, since this thing worked, it couldn't have been done ages ago. I work in a job which frequently involves troubleshooting problems - thankfully none remotely as serious as this oil leak - and I know that almost always one ends up pursuing several blind alleys before finding and fixing the actual problem. So that may be one answer.

Now, I should imagine attention needs to be turning towards the environmental impact and the ongoing cleanup. It looks like this spill is the largest marine oil spill in history, bigger than Ixtoc I and the Gulf War spill. But volume is not the only factor governing environmental impact.

Also, for a bit of perspective - even the upper end of the estimates would make the value of the spilled issue a little over $6 million - peanuts compared to the cost of the cleanup and likely compensation claims. Probably 10-20% of the total oil in the field spilled out.

Hopefully the way the financial numbers work will diminish the chance of this happening again. If a company risks billions in losses drilling an oil field worth mere millions, that company can be expecting to take care regarding safety. On the other hand - BP and/or its contractors didn't.

[Polis4rule]

Originally Posted by Fat cantab

Proof please. Name me one conventional on-shore or shallow-water oil field in the US that is estimated as big as the Deepwater Horizon field ('Macondo Project', 50 million barrels estimated) and that an oil company has been completely banned from drilling on environmental grounds. Not tar sands, because frankly the environmental impact from routine exploitation of them gives the Deepwater Horizon blowout a run for its money.

Why do you need proof? If you lived in a Gulf State, you'd know that there is constant pressure to push the rigs further and further off the coast. For example, Florida has (or had, I don't remember if it was appealed) a drilling moratorium that extends 200 miles from land. Now I'm not sure if this was later reduced to 50 miles, but the fact still stands. Oil companies are forced to drill further out. Granted, some spots have more oil than others, but there is a wealth of oil closer to shore.

[cantab]

Deck Knight made a statement without giving any source or evidence. So I requested some. We all make uncited statements round here, because it takes effort to find citations and this is an online forum not an essay. But we should be prepared to produce sources if asked for.

I'd be interested to know, however, what rationale Florida had for such a drilling moratorium. There's a difference between genuine environmental fears and nimbyism.