Offshore Oil Drilling and the Oil Rig Disaster in the Gulf

[thelakelander]

Fla. declares emergency over oil spill

GULFPORT, Miss. -- President Barack Obama sent Justice Department investigators and military aircraft to the Gulf of Mexico Friday in response to the growing fear of the environmental damage that a spreading oil slick may cause, but he declined to abandon plans for new offshore drilling because of the unfolding disaster.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist declared a state of emergency for six Panhandle counties, saying the slick spill from the Deepwater Horizon platform threatens Florida's coasts ``with a major disaster.''

Crist discussed the state's and federal response with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and other federal officials Friday and plans to tour the response operations in Pensacola on Saturday.

State emergency operations officials said that the easterly drifting spill is expected to reach Escambia County by Monday, with a light sheen approaching within 33 miles.

The state plan calls for 30,000 feet of inflatable containment booms in the waters outside of Pensacola. But, according to a briefing report released late Friday, state officials said ``booms are largely ineffective at this time due to chop which washes the spill over the booms.''

As Mississippi officials laid miles of plastic booms to block crude from their state's shores and environmentalists asserted that the spill was far worse than officials have acknowledged, Obama said he'd asked Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to review what went wrong when the drilling rig exploded in flames April 20 and sank two days later.

Depending on what the review recommends, the president said, ``We're going to make sure that any leases going forward have those safeguards,'' but that, ``I continue to believe that domestic oil production is an important part of our overall strategy for energy security'' as long as it's done ``responsibly.''

Lawmakers from Florida and up the East Coast called on Obama to shelve new lease plans.

Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/04/30/1607315/fla-declares-emergency-over-oil.html#ixzz0meLARCnP

[tufsu1]

this is talking about the blowout preventer....what I suggested is a remote shut-off....could have been activated as soon as the fire started (while crew were escaping), before the rig sunk....apparently Norway, Brazil, and others require it...the U.S. doesn't (with some lobbyi9ng assistance from the oil in dustry of course).

[tufsu1]

even worse is that the slick is within 25 miles of the loop current...if it gets caught up in that, then it could go around the keys and into the gulf stream to the east coast within a week.

[north miami]

Did anyone catch a couple of weeks ago (NPR state/local news) the comment by a State of Florida Enviro official
that a harmful oil spill impact to Florida's shoreline would be mitigated by the fact that there would be plenty of other places in Florida for tourists to go??

There are spill warnings posted on "Notice To Mariners" and other vessel cruising sites.I have heard from a few of my recreational boating customers and contacts-to the effect they never thought they would ever see such warnings.

The cry "Drill Here! Drill Now!" could be viewed as an element of terrorism.Think about it.

[north miami]

Two decades of waves of Comp Plan 'revisions' and development impacts could never compete with a wave of oil.

[BridgeTroll]

They should round up every idiot who was ever heard saying that, draft their stupid asses into a clean up crew and make them clean this mess up.

Right alongside every idiot in this country who uses oil...

[Dog Walker]

There was a mention in today's TU in the oil spill story that in a 2002 series of tests of the blowout preventers, 40% of them failed to work just as the one on this rig failed to work.

2002-2010, and NOTHING was done in the meantime to fix the problem?  Or raise our safety standards to meet Brazil's?!

[BridgeTroll]

Not sure what you mean?  Evey person who uses oil in this country is partially to blame for this ecological disaster.  The same thing could happen to every rig out there.  The risk is clearly too great and I think we should shut em all down.  This is the perfect time to help wean ourselves from oil and the risks and responibilities associated with its production.

[tufsu1]

Two decades of waves of Comp Plan 'revisions' and development impacts could never compete with a wave of oil.

huh...this is related how?

[BridgeTroll]

You yourself were for this policy, bridgetroll.

Yes I was.  Of course that was before this accident.  (I'm guessing Mr Obama is rethinking his decision also) I always believed in the technology to keep disasters such as this at bay.  It failed... miserably.  The fix is likely to take weeks and mean while the hole will continue gushing oil.

Those rigs exist because we want the oil at an inexpensive price.  It is time for the entire American public to accept its responsibility for the existence of the rigs and their dependence on oil.

Shut ALL the offshore rigs down.

[NotNow]

This is a disaster on many levels.  The cause must be found and we must work to ensure that it doesn't happen again.  We must take the lessons learned in controlling and cleaning this spill so that we can be more efficient next time.  And there will probably be a next time.  We use oil for energy, we pump it from the Earth, refine it, ship it around the world and put it into a multitude of machines.  There will be accidents.  To simply call for stopping any of the production steps is not realistic or responsible.  We must continue to improve our processes and strive to attain energy independence and efficiency.  I am all for alternative energy sources, but we must find, design, and build economically viable systems before we can change the dependence on oil.

[JeffreyS]

I think a moratorium is in order for the time being.  How BP steps up to solve this problem and truely compensate all who are affected by their accident will color my opinion. If people have to spend twenty years fighting in court for justice like so many in Alaska have then to hell with the oil companies.  Exxon still tries to get out of paying court awarded sums.  I was for more drilling but this has scared me.  I want to see press releases from all of the oil companies opening their checkbooks to limit this disaster.

[BridgeTroll]

Cap em all.  This exact thing can happen to virtually every rig out there.  I think in the coming weeks... as this disaster expands... the calls for all the rigs to be shut down will become louder.

[JeffreyS]

ah yes....another oldie but goodie.

The real truth is liberals want high oil prices.  They want these because they want society to be reoriented in ways that they prefer (more mass transit, denser development, to stop "global warming", etc) but that voters evidently do not want.  So, instead of going to the people and asking for a gas tax to raise oil prices to levels they prefer they do sneaky things like prevent drilling where known oil quantities are located, prevent the development of new refineries domestically, try to scare people, etc.  I think this is fundamentally dishonest and they should be ashamed of themselves.  I am personally all for denser development and more mass transit and less fossil fuel use but the shift has to be gradual and voluntary IMO.

This is a national security issue and should be legislated as such.  Less forenge oil specifically Middle east, more localized power supplements for the grids such as single home solar and wind and at least put our large trucks on natural gas.

[BridgeTroll]

Are you sure?

Yep.