Posted on 07/30/2010 8:19:04 PM PDT by Jack Hydrazine
Now that BP engineers have managed to place a cap on the company's bleeding well in the Gulf, the sprawling oil slicks seem to have retreated from the water's surface, claimed many media reports this week.
"Where is all the oil?" an AFP headline asked. Time magazine ran a piece suggesting that the environmental impact of the spill has been "exaggerated." The New York Times ran a story that said the "Gulf oil spill is vanishing fast." And this very news organization ran a story suggesting that oil-gobbling microbes are eating up a lot the oil.
These reports have angered many — particularly those close to the disaster who are still, well, seeing lots of oil.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I’m no expert, and I’m a thousand miles away, but something tells me many people will be working overtime to make sure the assessment of the situation remains bleak.
Something tells me you are indeed no expert.
Well, I was snookered by this. Don’t know why really. I guess it was the pix of the piles of dead dolphins, and the video of the dolphins thrashing around gasping for air. Or, that I’m just flat out tired of the fear and mountains of junk.
But, that did it for me. Interestingly, I have gone down a long road to find myself back at jump, when I used to be so suspicious of information about pretty much anything. So, it’s a bit like being lost in Boston’s roundels @ 2 a.m. and realizing you’ve come back to the same place.
This story has changed my thinking a lot. That, I’ll admit.
Because of the massive use of two types of Corexit dispersant, some earlier reports have stated that only about 2% of oil reached the surface, where it was also massively sprayed with Corexit, and most of the oil remains deep and continually diffusing with its wellhead injected Corexit into the Gulf waters.
The “plumes” of Corexit have been confirmed, and further information as to the fate of the deep oil combined with Corexit are lacking. Corexit has been described as the most toxic of all dispersants, and several times more toxic than oil.
Yea. I guess it takes an expert to surmise that when there's a $20 billion slush fund out there, people might be motivated to see the darker side of the situation.
Since there is no disaster can we expect that Obambi will give back the 20 billion he extorted from BP.
That goes directly into his stash.
I was recently speaking with the owner of a fairly large business close to Grand Isle, La. I said, “I’m sorry for all the problems with the oil spill.” I got back a, “What problems? This is the best year we’ve had since Katrina.”
The spill will be a “disaster” for years to come.
I live in Northwest Florida, just north of US Hwy 98. Although the oil problem wasn't as bad here as originally expected, it is still washing up on the beaches and it has severely impacted the tourism trade. Hotel/motel cancellations, fishing charter cancellations, etc. The beaches are 90% clear, and sports fishing is still open but the media painted such a doom and gloom picture that everyone canceled out. Good side is that I don't have to contend with as many 'snowbirds' in traffic, bad side is that a lot of the 'mom & pop' restaurants that I like to frequent are on the verge of closing down.
Further east towards Mississippi and Louisiana the picture is not good.
One only needs to look at the Exxon Valdez to confirm that assumption. Money was flying around for over a decade.
Never let a crisis go to waste.
The surface area of the Gulf of Mexico is 1.5 million square kilometers, or
approximately 572,900 square miles. It’s average depth is approximately 1 mile.
This means it contains about 631 quadrillion gallons. That’s 631 with 15 zeros
after it.
Estimates of the volume of the Deep Horizon oil spill range from about 90
million gallons to a worst case of about 184 million gallons. That’s a worst
case estimate of 184 with 6 zeros after it.
This puts the total amount of oil into the Gulf from this spill at about
0.29 parts per billion.
EPA allowances for drinking water contaminants (from the EPA’s website):
Arsenic 10 parts per billion
Benzene 5 parts per billion
Mercury 2 parts per billion
Carbon tetrachloride 5 parts per billion
Cadmium 5 parts per billion
Lead 15 parts per billion
Cyanide 200 parts per billion
184 million gallons would cover 1 square mile to a depth of less than 10 inches.
A single supertanker may hold 133 million gallons.
Look at this another way:
A swimming pool 50 feet by 20 feet by 8 feet holds 59,884 gallons of water.
0.29 parts per billion is achieved by adding 0.004 cubic inches of oil. A drop
1/4 inch in diameter is approximately 0.006 cubic inches. Your suntan oil
pollutes our swimming pool much worse than Deep Horizon has polluted the Gulf!
Its true that, for now at least, the oil remains concentrated in some smaller
areas, meaning they are much more polluted locally. But the ocean will disperse
the oil, much of it will be consumed by microbial action, and its concentration
will dissipate.
Can we stop panicking and acting stupidly, and get back to work?
As the head head said: stop making sense!
You are correct it is his rainy day fund
I will bet that very little if any of the cash makes it to gulf coast residents.
Math is good.
I am told that the spotters would see the oil. Radio in to the boats and the planes. It became a joke because the planes were always there first to spray their dispersants.
Most of the oil never made it to the surface because BP didn’t want to pay more for the cleanup.
I believe we’re going to regret ever allowing them to use these dispersants.
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