Earth Environment Underground

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is overshadowing another catastrophe that’s also unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico this summer: The oxygen dissolved in the Gulf waters is disappearing. In some places, the oxygen is getting so scarce that fish and other animals cannot survive. They can either leave the oxygen-free waters or die. The … Read ahead

Source: climateprogress.org

Latest at climateprogress.org

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The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is overshadowing another catastrophe that’s also unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico this summer: The oxygen dissolved in the Gulf waters is disappearing. In some places, the oxygen is getting so scarce that fish and other … Read ahead

Source: e360.yale.edu

Latest at e360.yale.edu

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As BP neared a fix that’s expected to kill for good the runaway well that’s wreaked economic and environmental catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico, the government Monday said that 10 to 12 times the amount of oil had been flowing from the well than it originally thought. … Read ahead

Source: truth-out.org

NEW ORLEANS — Robotic submarines working a mile underwater removed a leaking cap from the gushing Gulf oil well Saturday, starting a painful trade-off: Millions more gallons of crude will flow freely into the sea for at least two days until a new seal can be mounted to capture all of it. There’s no guarantee for such a delicate operation almost a mile below the water’s surface, officials said, and the permanent fix of plugging the well from the bottom remains slated for mid-August. “It’s not just going to be, you put the cap on, it’s done. It’s not like putting a cap on a tube of toothpaste,” Coast Guard spokesman Capt. James McPherson said. Robotic submarines removed the cap that had been placed on top of the leak in early June to collect the oil and send it to surface ships for collection or burning. BP aims to have the new, tighter cap in place as early as Monday and said that, as of Saturday night, the work was going according to plan. If tests show it can withstand the pressure of the oil and is working, the Gulf region could get its most significant piece of good news since the April 20 explosion on the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig, which killed 11 workers. “Over the next four to seven days, depending on how things go, we should get that sealing cap on. That’s our plan,” said Kent Wells, a BP senior vice president, of the round-the-clock operation. It would be only a temporary solution to the catastrophe that the federal government estimates has poured between 87 million and 172 million gallons of oil into the Gulf as of Saturday. Hope for permanently plugging the leak lies with two relief wells, the first of which should be finished by mid-August. With the cap removed Saturday at 12:37 p.m. CDT, oil flowed freely into the water, collected only by the Q4000 surface vessel, with a capacity of about 378,000 gallons. That vessel should be joined Sunday by the Helix Producer, which has more than double the Q4000’s capacity. But the lag could be long enough for as much as 5 million gallons to gush into already fouled waters. Officials said a fleet of large skimmers was scraping oil from the surface above the well site. The process begun Saturday has two major phases: removing equipment currently on top of the leak and installing new gear designed to fully contain the flow of oil. BP began trying Saturday afternoon to remove the bolted top flange that only partially completed the seal with the old cap. Video images showed robotic arms working to unscrew its bolts. Wells said that could last into Monday depending on whether the flange can be pulled off from above, as BP hopes. If not, a specially designed tool will be used to pry apart the top and bottom flanges. Once the top flange is removed, BP has to bind together two sections of drill pipe that are in the gushing well head. Then a 12-foot-long piece of equipment called a flange transition spool will be lowered and bolted over it. The second piece of pipe inside the well head came as something of a surprise, and raises the possibility that one of the sections of pipe became jammed in the Deepwater Horizon’s blowout preventer, though which the well pipes run. The failure of the blowout preventer, a massive piece of equipment designed to stop the unchecked flow of oil, is partly to blame for the size of the spill. “That will be an important question to ask when we pull the blowout preventer up to the surface and we’ll figure out where that pipe ultimately landed,” Wells said. After the flange transition spool is bolted in place, the new cap — called a capping stack or “Top Hat 10″ — can be lowered. The equipment, weighing some 150,000 pounds, is designed to fully seal the leak and provide connections for new vessels on the surface to collect oil. The cap has valves that can restrict the flow of oil and shut it in, if it can withstand the enormous pressure. That will be one of the key items for officials to monitor, said Paul Bommer, a professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. “If the new cap does work and they shut the well in, it is possible that part of the well could rupture if the pressure inside builds to an unacceptable value,” Bommer wrote in an e-mail Saturday. Ultimately, BP wants to have four vessels collecting oil within two or three weeks of the new cap’s installation. If the new cap doesn’t work, BP is ready to place a backup similar the old one on top of the leak. The government estimates 1.5 million to 2.5 million gallons of oil a day are spewing from the well, and the previous cap collected about 1 million gallons of that. With the new cap and the new containment vessel, the system will be capable of capturing 2.5 million to 3.4 million gallons — essentially all the leaking oil, officials said. The plan, which was accelerated to take advantage of a window of good weather lasting seven to 10 days, didn’t inspire confidence in the residents of the oil-slicked coast. “This is probably the sixth or seventh method they’ve tried, so, no, I’m not optimistic,” said Deano Bonano, director of emergency preparedness for Jefferson Parish. On Saturday he was inspecting beaches at Grand Isle lined with protective boom and bustling with heavy equipment used to scoop up and clean stained sand. “Even if they turn it off today, we’ll still be here at least another six weeks, on watch for the oil,” he said. “Shutting off the oil is a very important step, but we should not assume this disaster is over,” said Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation. “I think it’s important to recognize that there’s an enormous amount of oil still in the Gulf.” ___ Associated Press Writer Holbrook Mohr in Belle Chase, La. contributed to this report. … Read ahead

Source: chron.com

Latest at chron.com

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Avertible catastrophe’); … Read ahead

Source: financialpost.com

The sad likelihood is that many of us will squander the teachable moment provided by the Gulf Oil Catastrophe. How can we let this disgusting mess affect us in ways that will lead to the deep and lasting change we need? … Read ahead

Source: huffingtonpost.com

Latest at huffingtonpost.com

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Disasters and mankind go together like orgies and deviants. In both cases it is possible to have one without the other, but what would be the point? You’re not going to get the same bang for your buck (both puns intended). Generally disasters not caused by man are referred to as an act of God, but with all due respect to the man upstairs, he’s got nothing on man when it comes to disasters. The same goes for orgies. But enough about orgies (for now). At present there is an underwater oil well gushing more goo into the Gulf of Mexico than a 1980’s Peter North ever gushed onto the Canyon of Christy. Because of this catastrophe, people are angry, and rightfully so. A bunch of wildlife is going to die, Gumbo in New Orleans is going to be at least twice as unhealthy as before and the poor BP CEO might lose his job. Things are pretty bleak. But guess what? There have been worse. Man has created disasters far worse than this one. In fact, we’ve found 10 man-made disasters that were worse then the current one in the Gulf. So sit back, buckle up and take a ride down disaster boulevard to see ten events that were so bad they’ll make you want to wake up tomorrow and buy some BP stock. … Read ahead

Source: egotvonline.com

Latest at egotvonline.com

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As the evidence begins to wash up, showing exactly how lethal the surface component of the BP catastrophe is, scientists caution that the deep-water consequences of this “unplanned experiment” could be far more damaging, irreversible, and detrimental … Read ahead

Source: services.newsweek.com

After weeks of criticism that he has not demonstrated enough personal involvement in the government’s response to the oil spill in the Gulf, President Barack Obama delivered his weekly Saturday address to the nation from a bait and seafood shop on the Louisiana coast. “This spill has not just damaged livelihoods. It’s upended whole communities,” Obama said in the audio and video address he taped Friday during his third visit to the spill zone. “The fury people feel is not just about the money they’ve lost. They’ve been through tough times before. It’s about the wrenching recognition that this time their lives may never be the same.” In referring to the “fury” of local residents, a term that echoed what Obama described feeling himself in a TV interview Thursday, the president was clearly trying to convey a degree of emotional investment in the spill that even some White House allies have complained was lacking. Obama said the spill represented a profound and avoidable wrong that was now devastating fishermen and others who make their living in the tourism industry. “These folks work hard. They meet their responsibilities. But now, because of a manmade catastrophe — one that’s not their fault and that’s beyond their control — their lives have been thrown into turmoil. It’s brutally unfair. It’s wrong,” Obama declared. “I’m going to stand with the people of the Gulf Coast until they are made whole.” Obama also kept up his tough talk against BP, which owns the well and is responsible for funding the cleanup effort under federal law. “We’ve also ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and we will make sure they pay every single dime owed to the people along the Gulf Coast,” Obama insisted. The president noted that the federal government already has invoiced BP for $69 million for part of the initial cleanup costs, and he repeated a vow he made earlier this week that anyone who broke the law in the lead-up to the blowout of the Deepwater Horizon well in April “will be brought to justice.” While Obama was on offense against BP, his defensiveness about the government’s response was also on clear display in the weekly message. Countering claims that the federal reaction was slow or inept, the president said three times that his administration has understood the seriousness of the spill or been committed to fixing it from “the beginning.” Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, delivering the Republican response, keyed in on a different issue: the discussions the White House had with Democratic candidates Joe Sestak and Andrew Romanoff in an effort to avert competitive primary races. Steele pushed for the White House to disclose all the details of those conversations, asserting that the administration’s claim that nothing untoward or illegal happened during them doesn’t “pass the laugh test,” and painted the offers as "only part of a larger pattern of backroom, Chicago-style politics.” “Enough is enough,” Steele said. “If Rahm Emanuel has been offering government goodies to inconvenient politicians threatening Democrat incumbents, then it’s time for him to resign. If it comes out that the president knew about any of it, then we have a larger problem. And, if offering political appointments in exchange for sitting out of a campaign is the president’s proposal for “job-creation,” then we’re in for more economic misery.” … Read ahead

Source: politico.com

There has been no shortage of tragedy and heartbreak attached to what may already be the greatest environmental catastrophe in U.S. history. But elements of strangeness and irony have also been part of the story. Here, nine facts in that vein about the spill: … Read ahead

Source: theweek.com