Capacity' Of BP To Solve, Military Might Have Role

[Acanthus]

I still say drop a 100 ton metal block on the site of the well.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

We've been paying fees and taxes for 16 years to fund the program, so does BP and every other oil company. This is a program established in 1994 for just this reason, to clean up and deal with a catastrophic oil spill. The EPA (Environmental Protection Administration) is funded and tasked with dealing with disasters of this magnitude. WTF have they been doing? They should have begun the mobilization of resources within hours of the explosion. Instead they're dithering, confused,ineffectual and useless.

There is nothing that can be done by the EPA, BP, or others. As you state in your next post I quoted about oil floating, that is what the EPA and others are equipped for. Oil floats, but when it's going through the pressure and temperature zones from 5000 ft to surface, it doesn't act like normal. It's not like we can just wait for it to all come to the surface and skim it off. Many reasons for that, but one being ocean currents affect the oil on it's rise to the surface.

They have mobilized their surface skimmers and oil cleanup boats. Have you looked at any of the pictures taken of them? They are there, but there isn't much they can really do about it. They are simply overwhelmed with the sheer amount of oil being released. Do you honestly think the EPA is sitting around with ships able to help that aren't there right now (save stuff in the Pacific/Alaska which shouldn't be mobilized to help, namely due to the fact that a spill could happen and we have no resources able to save that area)?

Their job is to clean up the mess that results from the blow-out, not to stop the blow-out itself. Guess what? Oil floats, sooner or later it rises to the surface and can be dealt with. Do you even remember the Exxon Valdez? Do you recall what was learned from it ? What the hell has the EPA been doing for the last month ? Especially with the billions of dollars in funding and the 14 friggin years they've had to prepare for just this type of disaster?

Ok, so we agree that the government's objective is not to stop the leak, and that oil/gas companies should be doing that since they are equipped to do so correct?

Oil does float, but in this spill it doesn't just surface as you would expect. You bring up the Exxon Valdez, which in terms of "oil spill disasters" was the worst US one. There are some very important differences between the two spills. First off, Valdez crude is not the same type as this crude. Secondly, because it was a surface ship the spill at maximum depth was no more than 100 feet. That means that it went right to the surface, and stayed there. The oil in the Gulf is rising through the water and it's working kind of like a 5000 ft cracking tower. The light stuff rises, but a lot of it doesn't and remains under the surface where we have no way to clean it. Finally, this occurred in open ocean, and the waves/water are making it difficult to use normal methods of cleanup. Factor in that the over 5,000 ft of rise it is going to disperse immensely. That means it's a lot harder to contain, or create a "game plan" to contain it.

That's a BS question on the order of "Are you still beating your wife" :answer yes or no. Get real. We've been paying fees and taxes for 14 years so the EPA could have a system in place, did you even read my prior link? It's their job and what have they been doing with those billions of dollars and the 14 years to prepare?

Well, the question "are you still beating your wife: yes or no" shouldn't have any conditionals in the answer

We have been paying for 14 years. They have some equipment, which has been deployed. The scale of this simply is too much for them to handle.

 

[theeedude]

I agree with small government conservatives, we need to maintain a permanent EPA navy of thousands of cleanup ships staffed with full time government employees always on standby Not having one and counting on private sector to deal with the messes they create is a terrible omission, that I hope is fixed promptly

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

I still say drop a 100 ton metal block on the site of the well.

I seem to recall this being discussed somewhere before.

Problem there is that it could create enough pressure backed up that the oil just goes sideways until it finds new ways up to the surface.

 

[Darwin333]

Who is paying?

BP? I'm in.

Absolutely. If BP doesn't want to do it RIGHT NOW then the Feds should pay the tab upfront in order to ensure that it gets done as quickly as possible and send BP the bill.

 

[Darwin333]

I agree with small government conservatives, we need to maintain a permanent EPA navy of thousands of cleanup ships staffed with full time government employees always on standby Not having one and counting on private sector to deal with the messes they create is a terrible omission, that I hope is fixed promptly

How about they just hire the people with all of that stuff, provide as much labor as required and then some (whole bunch of unemployed people right now), put a serious John Wayne type of dude on the ground as a point man that can cut through bureaucratic red tape bullshit (like Gen. Honore during Katrina) and provide any other asset at their disposal that might help. The biggest thing being basically a blank check and ensuring extremely fast and efficient communications between the various government agencies.

Then they send BP the bill.

We could have had supertankers sucking up the surface oil weeks ago if BP would have gotten them here. Since BP did not the Fed has a duty to protect the countries national security, so they should have hired them and sent BP the bill. It is an extremely viable and proven effective method of containing the spill and mitigating environmental impact. 45 days in and we are still trying to boom the shit off, dumping tons of toxic dispersant and creating huge underwater plumes of "toxic soup". Microbes that "eat" the oil and have been successfully used by the CG, Navy, Army and various other government agencies don't even know when they will get an EPA "test", how many weeks to get approval for the sand berms that we JUST got and last I heard LA is having to hire the dredges themselves, etc...

 

[Darwin333]

There is nothing that can be done by the EPA, BP, or others. As you state in your next post I quoted about oil floating, that is what the EPA and others are equipped for. Oil floats, but when it's going through the pressure and temperature zones from 5000 ft to surface, it doesn't act like normal. It's not like we can just wait for it to all come to the surface and skim it off. Many reasons for that, but one being ocean currents affect the oil on it's rise to the surface.

They have mobilized their surface skimmers and oil cleanup boats. Have you looked at any of the pictures taken of them? They are there, but there isn't much they can really do about it. They are simply overwhelmed with the sheer amount of oil being released. Do you honestly think the EPA is sitting around with ships able to help that aren't there right now (save stuff in the Pacific/Alaska which shouldn't be mobilized to help, namely due to the fact that a spill could happen and we have no resources able to save that area)?

Plenty of tankers to hire. We offload supertankers that are larger than Nimitz Class Aircraft Carriers where the oil is washing ashore. It doesn't matter what you have it matters what you can GET. Uncle Sam has bottomless pockets meaning there is virtually no asset in the world they can not get access to (obviously within reason), actual .gov property is not required.

Furthermore, the EPA could be fasttracking tests, or at least fucking responding to, for companies that have successfully used microbes that "eat" oil for the CG and Navy already. The US government has already used the stuff successfully and last I heard they can't even get an answer of when the EPA will grant them a test.

Ok, so we agree that the government's objective is not to stop the leak, and that oil/gas companies should be doing that since they are equipped to do so correct?

Oil does float, but in this spill it doesn't just surface as you would expect. You bring up the Exxon Valdez, which in terms of "oil spill disasters" was the worst US one. There are some very important differences between the two spills. First off, Valdez crude is not the same type as this crude. Secondly, because it was a surface ship the spill at maximum depth was no more than 100 feet. That means that it went right to the surface, and stayed there. The oil in the Gulf is rising through the water and it's working kind of like a 5000 ft cracking tower. The light stuff rises, but a lot of it doesn't and remains under the surface where we have no way to clean it. Finally, this occurred in open ocean, and the waves/water are making it difficult to use normal methods of cleanup. Factor in that the over 5,000 ft of rise it is going to disperse immensely. That means it's a lot harder to contain, or create a "game plan" to contain it.

Agreed, however all that can be done is not being done. Not by a long shot. The bullshit of allowing BP to be the "shotcallers" on the containment and cleanup effort was flat out ignorant. It is starting to look like we have remedied that situation but we have wasted a ton of time and still are.

Well, the question "are you still beating your wife: yes or no" shouldn't have any conditionals in the answer

We have been paying for 14 years. They have some equipment, which has been deployed. The scale of this simply is too much for them to handle.

Uncle Sugar has virtually bottomless pockets. That means they can rent 100 times the equipment they have deployed and have it on-site very quickly.

After all is said and done they send the bill to BP. This isn't a difficult concept to grasp. All that can be done is NOT being done, period. It doesn't matter whose fault it is at this particular moment in time. All that matters is doing whatever is possible to protect this countries national security and so far all parties involved have not done anywhere close to everything possible.

 

[RedCOMET]

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0322640020100603

US wary of nuclear blast to stop Gulf oil leak


Really?

 

[monovillage]

As you can see the EPA is really on top of clean up efforts in the gulf. Their main focus is on data collection, monitoring the destruction and limiting how dispersants are used.. Way to go EPA! You guys rock!

http://www.epa.gov/bpspill/qanda.html