My only complaint about boycotting getting gas from BP stations is that typically, those gas stations are independently run businesses that just happen to be using BP as their provider/distributor. While I have no issues with people choosing to boycott BP, it does have the unintended effect of hurting someone who barely has anything to do with BP.
The thing that I find amusing is that Obama, who I do actually have decent amount of respect for, is constantly blaming BP and making them out as the spawn of satan, when the original Blowout was caused by shoddy cementing by Halliburton, an american company, and the actual drilling was performed by Transocean, an american company...
Goliath wrote:The thing that I find amusing is that Obama, who I do actually have decent amount of respect for, is constantly blaming BP and making them out as the spawn of satan, when the original Blowout was caused by shoddy cementing by Halliburton, an american company, and the actual drilling was performed by Transocean, an american company...
If you were any more wrong you'd be French.
I'll stick to public stuff.
BP was the toolpusher. BP, by industry practice and contract, managed, oversaw, and approved all actions. BP ordered the type of casing used and ordered that it be used over objection. Thats why they couldn't use the proper muds and cementing again over objection.
Obama is a typical politican, spinning things for his own agenda, BP are operating at depths unheard of to try and cap the leak, and he is going on and on and on about it, but they are doing their best surely? Its costing them a fortune and money talks.
They should say to him "go on then, you fix it with a miracle and we will give you ten billion dollars"
Its just spin, if he could get it capped then he would do and screw what BP say.
As for the dakka lot, its just more ridiculously jingostic nonsense from Frazz et all because the company has the word "British" in it. Im sure they wouldnt be bleating as much if it was Exxon again, and im sure no oil company purposely blows up a rig. gak happens, i dont see the need to be childish about it and start talking conspiracy or some such nonsense.
Honestly though, i speak to my missus on a daily basis and then then i speak with the aggresively patriotic bible thumping no such thing as global warming Obama is the spawn of satan gun toting dakka republicans and im truly stunned the South hasnt just went and formed another country, because they two different "types" of American im seeing must mix about as well as oil and water...
mattyrm wrote:Obama is a typical politican, spinning things for his own agenda, BP are operating at depths unheard of to try and cap the leak, and he is going on and on and on about it, but they are doing their best surely? Its costing them a fortune and money talks.
They should say to him "go on then, you fix it with a miracle and we will give you ten billion dollars"
Its just spin, if he could get it capped then he would do and screw what BP say.
True that (PM sent FYI).
Although if I were more of a liberal mindsight I'd just pull a Chavez and seize all their assets and put their CEO on show trial if he were in the US.
As for the dakka lot, its just more ridiculously jingostic nonsense from Frazz et all because the company has the word "British" in it. Im sure they wouldnt be bleating as much if it was Exxon again, and im sure no oil company purposely blows up a rig. gak happens, i dont see the need to be childish about it and start talking conspiracy or some such nonsense.
Wo HO! You don't remember Exxon Valdez. I do. You'd be wrong.
Who's saying it was purposeful?
who's saying its a conspiracy?
Honestly though, i speak to my missus on a daily basis and then then i speak with the aggresively patriotic bible thumping no such thing as global warming Obama is the spawn of satan gun toting dakka republicans and im truly stunned the South hasnt just went and formed another country, because they two different "types" of American im seeing must mix about as well as oil and water...
Oil and water? Geddit!?
Wo, for your analysis to be correct, the Obama would have to be an aggressive Bible thumping dakka republican. I really missed that call...
If Obama thought he could fix it he would have taken over trying to do so long ago. The fact that he hasnt allows him to make lots of noise and say 'lets take action' as if he was actually going to do something.
BP has to pay a lot of people who have lost their jobs, if BP lost their income because everyone boycotted them (which would never happen), then they would not be able to pay all these jobless people on the coast.
Yes, Saint Obama is starting to get on my nerves. He should either chill out and go play with his weird cross breed poodle or help find a solution. I would also point out that BP employs quite a few Americans, a number of whom one assumes were involved in this little enterprise.
mattyrm wrote:
They should say to him "go on then, you fix it with a miracle and we will give you ten billion dollars"
Sounds like a good deal to me. One nuclear warhead for sufficient capital to produce quite a few more. Of course, we're currently reducing our current warhead stockpile, and the resulting pressure wave would have a good chance of taking out the two relief wells being drilled, so its probably not the best option.
Thing is when Obama said nothing Fox and friends roasted him. Remember them saying this was his Katrina? I think he spoke up because when he was quiet Rush started to say he was in with the BP people. At this point nothing he can do is right.
Thing is, BP has a pretty crappy record outside of this.
And it is silly that it is easier to have a go at BP because they’re perceived as British. Multinational companies are just that, multinational. Their priorities have nothing to do with any they may have originated on, or what country they might be listed in (BP is on the NY stock exchange in addition to London, by the way).
And Obama is just sounding off, making an effort to look strong and like he’s contributing. The people who’d bag Obama would bag him for being silent, just like they bag him for making noise. The noise machine will be the noise machine.
sexiest_hero wrote:Thing is when Obama said nothing Fox and friends roasted him. Remember them saying this was his Katrina? I think he spoke up because when he was quiet Rush started to say he was in with the BP people. At this point nothing he can do is right.
Environmental disasters are always touchy political issues for the President. On the one hand, they can't be completely ignored, on the other, they can't be the central focus of attention. The President is generally supposed to be a voice of leadership, and in my opinion that means avoiding emotional rhetoric as much as possible. Obama did a far better job of this on the campaign, and even on the health care issue, than he has so far managed to do with respect to the oil spill.
In part this is a reflection of the disposition within the environmentalist community, which truly does engage with environmental catastrophes on an emotional level. However, I think the major reason behind the character of Obama's response has been the criticism of his style as being overly distant, and intellectual. To my mind, it was a mistake to respond to this criticism. From what I've heard said of him by various people who have known him throughout his career, he really is a distant intellectual, which explains why he seems so disingenuous when he wants to seem angry.
Were I to have been the President's adviser, I would have recommended that one press conference be given over entirely to the oil spill. Other than that, I would have left any specifics to the cabinet, or chief of staff; especially given the an economy threatening to enter a recession.
Beware!!! Canadians are just Brits in disguise!! I've seen the coins!! You can't fool me!!
How about boycotting all gas? I decided to try to stop using my car three months ago. It's absolutely no problem. I live in a city, which helps, but so do most people. Now I just start it a couple of times a week for 10 minutes so it doesn't freeze up.
That's what will make a difference.
Plus you can't believe how much money I am saving!!! HA! MORE MODELS!!
Golden Eyed Scout wrote:I will never buy oil from BP now, unless I aboslutely positively have to.
(looks at checking account balance to make sure no one mysteriously added $1.0 million).
I too will join this boycott and promise to not buy an Aston Marton, Jaguar, or Rolls Royce for the next six months.
Golden Eyed Scout wrote:I will never buy oil from BP now, unless I aboslutely positively have to.
(looks at checking account balance to make sure no one mysteriously added $1.0 million).
I too will join this boycott and promise to not buy an Aston Marton, Jaguar, or Rolls Royce for the next six months.
Ha ha Suckers, more for me.
Astins and Rollers gotta catch em all!
(aren't most Jags are just Ford Mondeos these days? You are right to boycott them).
Golden Eyed Scout wrote:I will never buy oil from BP now, unless I aboslutely positively have to.
(looks at checking account balance to make sure no one mysteriously added $1.0 million).
I too will join this boycott and promise to not buy an Aston Marton, Jaguar, or Rolls Royce for the next six months.
Ha ha Suckers, more for me.
Astins and Rollers gotta catch em all!
(aren't most Jags are just Ford Mondeos these days? You are right to boycott them).
I say no to the boycott, for the simple reason that, for the most part, BP gas is one of the more expensive in the local market.
Obama is just making noise because he does not seem to actually know what to do. Most of his advisors are his chicagoland toadies. If he knew what to do he would have acted a bit sooner than 6 weeks into this.
I can understand that it is quite hard to fix a leak that is a mile deep. But didn't they think about this when they put the pipeline in? What was thier contingency plan? 'We'll cross that bridge when we come to it'?
On the whole Obama front to coin a phrase much loved by our yankee cousins 'cut the guy some slack.' What do you want him to do? If he didn't mention it then everyone would say he was being paid by BP to keep it quite. So he gives them a hard time about hoping to speed them up a bit. Does anyone here really expect him to dive down himself and sort it out?
tp_1983 wrote:I can understand that it is quite hard to fix a leak that is a mile deep. But didn't they think about this when they put the pipeline in? What was thier contingency plan? 'We'll cross that bridge when we come to it'?
On the whole Obama front to coin a phrase much loved by our yankee cousins 'cut the guy some slack.' What do you want him to do? If he didn't mention it then everyone would say he was being paid by BP to keep it quite. So he gives them a hard time about hoping to speed them up a bit. Does anyone here really expect him to dive down himself and sort it out?
No. What I expect the President to do is not make mistakes similar to his predecessor. In some recent cases, he appears to be less confident than he appeared during his campaign. In this case he is acting almost too late to be effective.
So to be clear, what would you actually like him to have done? As every politician will tell you it's very easy to be confident in opposition, very hard when in power.
tp_1983 wrote:So to be clear, what would you actually like him to have done? As every politician will tell you it's very easy to be confident in opposition, very hard when in power.
MANAGE THE FEDERAL RESPONSE PROPERLY.
Actually manage the thing. Don't talk. Don't legislate, manage it. Kill the red tape on projects. Be the Commander in Chief and control the assets on the ground efficiently.
The fact he has time for parties and speeches shows he's not in the game. GET IN THE ING GAME.
tp_1983 wrote:So to be clear, what would you actually like him to have done? As every politician will tell you it's very easy to be confident in opposition, very hard when in power.
MANAGE THE FEDERAL RESPONSE PROPERLY.
Actually manage the thing. Don't talk. Don't legislate, manage it. Kill the red tape on projects. Be the Commander in Chief and control the assets on the ground efficiently.
The fact he has time for parties and speeches shows he's not in the game. GET IN THE ING GAME.
So you think it is red tap that is stopping anyone from stopping this leak?
Its nothing to do with the leak being a mile deep? I suppose the scientists at BP know exactly what to do, the government just won't let them.
This is actually a very technical issue and no one knows exactly what to do.
I'm sorry to disspaoint you this is the real world, not DC comics. Super Obama can't just get on a train to the coast, read the hand book to mending deep sea dropped bollocks en route and then knock some heads together and save the day.
tp_1983 wrote:So you think it is red tap that is stopping anyone from stopping this leak?
Its nothing to do with the leak being a mile deep? I suppose the scientists at BP know exactly what to do, the government just won't let them.
This is actually a very technical issue and no one knows exactly what to do.
I'm sorry to disspaoint you this is the real world, not DC comics. Super Obama can't just get on a train to the coast, read the hand book to mending deep sea dropped bollocks en route and then knock some heads together and save the day.
No the elimination of red tape would help though. The Scientists at BP are baffled... this, apparently, is not something they planned for. Our Government gave them all this time to resolve the situation.
This was BP's mess to fix almost 7 weeks ago. They FAILED! They continued to propose ideas after their "go to" plan flopped. Yesterday a reporter asked a BP rep if they had an idea of how much oil continues to leak into the Gulf. His answer was how much oil they had captured with this latest attempt. But it seems this is nothing more than a stop-gap anyway because they have this captured oil, but have no idea on what to do with it. The Plan... BURN IT.
Obama should have immeadiatly had the EPA, Fema, Experts in the field of deep sea drilling, Local and state officials, and enviromental scientists working on how to deal with the oil that had spilled and solutions for the event that BP was unable to stop the leak in a timely manner.
helgrenze wrote:Obama should have immediately had the EPA, Fema, Experts in the field of deep sea drilling, Local and state officials, and environmental scientists working on how to deal with the oil that had spilled and solutions for the event that BP was unable to stop the leak in a timely manner.
I think you'll find all these people were involved right from the beginning if not in the forefront then in contingency plans. Actually when you come to a multi national the size of BP I would expect they have better specialist knowledge on this subject than the US government does.
The real scandal here is why BP ever thought it was a good idea to put oil pipes down that deep, with no way of mending them.
And who let them do it? Oh, that would have been Obama's predecessor. He was involved in the oil business wasn't he?
tp_1983 wrote:So you think it is red tap that is stopping anyone from stopping this leak?
Its nothing to do with the leak being a mile deep? I suppose the scientists at BP know exactly what to do, the government just won't let them.
This is actually a very technical issue and no one knows exactly what to do.
I'm sorry to disspaoint you this is the real world, not DC comics. Super Obama can't just get on a train to the coast, read the hand book to mending deep sea dropped bollocks en route and then knock some heads together and save the day.
No the elimination of red tape would help though. The Scientists at BP are baffled... this, apparently, is not something they planned for. Our Government gave them all this time to resolve the situation.
This was BP's mess to fix almost 7 weeks ago. They FAILED! They continued to propose ideas after their "go to" plan flopped. Yesterday a reporter asked a BP rep if they had an idea of how much oil continues to leak into the Gulf. His answer was how much oil they had captured with this latest attempt. But it seems this is nothing more than a stop-gap anyway because they have this captured oil, but have no idea on what to do with it. The Plan... BURN IT.
Obama should have immeadiatly had the EPA, Fema, Experts in the field of deep sea drilling, Local and state officials, and enviromental scientists working on how to deal with the oil that had spilled and solutions for the event that BP was unable to stop the leak in a timely manner.
He Didn't. He wasted valuable time.
I don't blame the well on Obama. I blame him for not handling the federal side of the cleanup efforts properly and coordinating with the states, for not acting like what he should be-the chief executive. He's not the chief legislator. He's the chief executive. Rung the ing departments in ing crisis mode. Why is Napolitano even near this? Wait why is Napolitano even employed at this point? Why is Holder running around threatening people, including the companies working on the relief wells who weren't parties to the spill? Its stupid and slows everything up because everyone is going to cross their T's 5 times before doing anything and NOT WORKIGN ON THE PROBLEM, but its the response of someone who doesn't know how to run things and get something done.
Red tape is not for the well. Red tape clearing is for the cleanup efforts. red tape clearing is to get the MMS /Interior Department to get their act together. They issued four confluicting reg orders in about a week. Everyone is running around like chickens with their heads cut off because there is no one in charge.
tp_1983 wrote:
The real scandal here is why BP ever thought it was a good idea to put oil pipes down that deep, with no way of mending them.
This is the crux of the argument right here; the problem is that no-one really has any idea of how best to fix it since this type of drilling has never been carried out before. BP really are flying by the seat of their pants here; no amount of Obama jumping up and down will make any difference.
You can't blame Bush for what this "multinational" corporation did not plan for.
There are other companies drilling in similar conditions and at similar depths. (Fraz can correct me if I am wrong.. I believe he knows more on that than I do.)
And since you brought up Bush... Obama's response was almost identical to Bush's Katrina response. He waited, because he didn't seem to understand the problem.... Because no-one else around him understood it either.
tp_1983 wrote:
The real scandal here is why BP ever thought it was a good idea to put oil pipes down that deep, with no way of mending them.
This is the crux of the argument right here; the problem is that no-one really has any idea of how best to fix it since this type of drilling has never been carried out before. BP really are flying by the seat of their pants here; no amount of Obama jumping up and down will make any difference.
You have to have it fixable prior. Its like space. once the accident happens you're ed.
tp_1983 wrote:
The real scandal here is why BP ever thought it was a good idea to put oil pipes down that deep, with no way of mending them.
This is the crux of the argument right here; the problem is that no-one really has any idea of how best to fix it since this type of drilling has never been carried out before. BP really are flying by the seat of their pants here; no amount of Obama jumping up and down will make any difference.
You have to have it fixable prior. Its like space. once the accident happens you're ed.
Well quite. There's a huge amount of arrogance assumed on the part of BP here, no doubt.
Frazzled wrote: Its like space. once the accident happens you're ed.
Good example. BP used a rig that had problems before. The relief valve was not tested at that depth. They had no contingency plan in case of a blowout. At a depth where preasure is too much for human life, you have to plan for any failure.
Why do you think it takes so long to build a space capable rocket?
To go back to the original question, you can't really boycott the oil drilled by a particular company. It's a commodity, BP can sell oil to Shell or Russia and make pretty much the same amount of money as it can selling it to you.
Interestingly, OPEC ran into the same problem when it tried to stop selling oil to the United States (what really hurt us was that they also decided to slow down production across the board).
The real scandal here is why BP ever thought it was a good idea to put oil pipes down that deep, with no way of mending them.
And who let them do it? Oh, that would have been Obama's predecessor. He was involved in the oil business wasn't he?
Hmm.. yes and no.
BP stopped funding -- directly -- both the Libs. and Dems around 2002.. but kept funding certain individuals like Andrew Lindquist. Former director of policy for energy policy for Cheney.
The papers drawn up in the 2 years he was there are still classified as "secret" although there have been leaks which suggest a certain firm.. ... "helped" draw up the papers which included recommendations to allow deep sea drilling and exploitation in areas such as Alaska.
After Lundquist left office he set up his own lobbying firm... astonishingly enough a certain oil firm was amongst his first clients.
Even more astonishingly the firms like BP then benefited hugely from the laws that he'd helped to draft with around $ 2 billion of subsidy going towards helping with the drilling.
Lundquists's firm is... "Bluewater Strategies"... can't make this up can you. They still work as BP's WAshinton lobbyist firm , people who work for them including Eric "I was nearly Obama's health secretary but for those pesky taxes" Washburn.
Of course to get the rights to drill they had to pass checks set by the US Minerals Management Service -- until 2007 the chief of staff of that department with regards to the Gulf of Mexico was one Jim Grant.
.. two guesses which large oil firm he now works for eh ?
There is also, apparently, some general hilarity in the "BP Regional Oil Spill REsponse Plan -- Gulf of Mexico " dated 30th of June 2009. It mistakenly lists a Japanese home shopping website as a primary equipment supplier for BP in the region for 24/7 spill response and even goes into detail about their plans to protect "Sea Lions, seals, sea otters and walruses".. hmm... no cut and paste job from another plan there eh.
Say what you like about these oil firms.. they sure are slick operators.
A large part of BP's problem is that the former chairman, Lord Brown, was very keen on cost reduction by outsourcing.
It now seems he outsourced what should be core competencies such as the ability to drill and operate safely, and to manage disasters when they occur, rather than peripheral things like marketing.
That said, Americans seem to have a naive belief that the President can and should fix everything through leadership, which of course he can't. Obama is therefore attempting to deflect blame from himself by emphasising the British of British Petroleum.
This is unhelpful because BP is a highly international company like any major multi-national, and secondly it unfairly tars the whole of Britain with the same brush -- we are supposed to be the USA's best allies and look what we get for it.
The reason why the leak isn't getting fixed is because fixing it is very difficult under a mile of sea.
I feel very sorry for the local fishermen and everyone, and they should be compensated. The blame game won't help with that, in fact it makes it harder because by depressing BP's share price they encourage the management to spend cash on a dividend which reduces the money available for compensation.
On another note it is interesting to compare the BP situation with the Union Carbide disaster at Bhopal.
Er....thats how it works. "Outsourcing" is not the issue. Oilfield service companies have been around as long as BP and do their jobs well. But BP was in charge. The issue is BP cut corners to save money and time.
The usual incestuous government/company relationship that occurs here and many places. We need to gut out the culture of government workers becoming lobbyists.
Seeing as other people here read Private Eye, i'll type out one of the back page stories for the amusement of those who can't/don't buy the magazine
BP to plug leak with Blue Whale
"We're hoping we can get a Blue Whale to swim into the area and then into the cracked pipeline which now has a really huge hole in it." said a BP spokesperson. "Our experts think it will become wedged and stop the flow of oil, though some may leak out of it's spout. We are looking for a suitable Blue Whale and are hoping to lure it to the site with a trail of BBQ flavoured plankton."
Asteroid
If the Blue Whale doesn't work, we are considering trying to get an asteroid to smash into the Gulf of Mexico. It has been done before we think, and might plug the leak, though it might mean it destroys life on Earth as we know it but that would be a small price to pay. There are loads of asteroids about...I'm sure we could get one and push it towards the Earth with the Space Station.
Lizard People
If that fails we could probably come in from below the pipeline by travelling through the centre of the Earth, going in under the Polar Ice Cap. We could talk to the Lizard People who live there and arrange for transportation through the molten core in special heat resistant suits and come up and plug the leak by spraying molten lava into the pipeline, although this may might have an adverse effect on the soft-shell crabs. cont. p.94
Frazzled wrote:Er....thats how it works. "Outsourcing" is not the issue. Oilfield service companies have been around as long as BP and do their jobs well. But BP was in charge. The issue is BP cut corners to save money and time.
The usual incestuous government/company relationship that occurs here and many places. We need to gut out the culture of government workers becoming lobbyists.
I'm not saying the people to whom the work was outsourced weren't any good. I am saying that the point of outsources is to not have to do the things you are not very good at -- the motive being to save money.
Once you start down this road, you run the danger of failing to keep the people in house who have the skills and knowledge to manage the outsourcing properly, or perhaps not consulting them properly.
I see this all the time where I work -- it's not oil drilling but the psychology is the same.
Newsweek has a great article up about BP boycotts, how they are seemingly highly ineffective, and how they are morally dubious considering the questionable nature of BPs competitors.
Oh contraire its outsourcing highly qualified skillsets. The guys they outsourced it to are the premier guys in the industry. Plus they are not cheap. Thats why they were trying to move along because the dayrates for deepsea rigs are really high. Again BP retained the management/primary toolpusher role. They didn't outsource the thing they should have outsourced-management.
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ShumaGorath wrote:Newsweek has a great article up about BP boycotts, how they are seemingly highly ineffective, and how they are morally dubious considering the questionable nature of BPs competitors.
Deadshane1 wrote:Does it make any sense to make a point of not buying gas (or anything else for that matter) from BP stations due to this accident?
Are they really doing all that is possible to remedy this spill/leak?
No it was an unfortunant accident. Sure there was probably something that should have prevented it but no one is perfect. Just like a surgeon will eventually mess up a procedure, eventually an oil company will mess up a well.
I can assure you, from inside sources. Yes they absolutely are. They are going above and beyond in certain regards also.
ShumaGorath wrote:Newsweek has a great article up about BP boycotts, how they are seemingly highly ineffective, and how they are morally dubious considering the questionable nature of BPs competitors.
So.. It is now week 7 after the accident.
Obama has only this week made any effort to talk to the families of the men that died on that rig.
The president's private meeting with the families in the State Dining Room is part of his effort to show the public, that he is on top of the situation.
7 Weeks after the fact he is "on top of the situation."
Official numbers on the oil they are now recovering is @620,000 Gallons a day, estimated to be half of what is flowing.
Given even that number, means that more that 300 Million Gallons has already spilled into the Gulf.
Thats over 700,000 Barrels.
Thats more than enough to flood a major city.
To put that into perspective, a 55 gallon drun is roughly 3' tall x 2' diameter... It would take @75 of these to fill a 10'x10'x10' space. It would take nearly 10,000 such spaces to hold all that oil.
Or 140 US football fields, endzone to endzone.
And that is a conservative estimate.
As for a boycott... not needed. BP is being hurt worse by the bad press than any boycott could do.
ShumaGorath wrote:Newsweek has a great article up about BP boycotts, how they are seemingly highly ineffective, and how they are morally dubious considering the questionable nature of BPs competitors.
helgrenze wrote:So.. It is now week 7 after the accident.
Obama has only this week made any effort to talk to the families of the men that died on that rig.
The president's private meeting with the families in the State Dining Room is part of his effort to show the public, that he is on top of the situation.
7 Weeks after the fact he is "on top of the situation."
Official numbers on the oil they are now recovering is @620,000 Gallons a day, estimated to be half of what is flowing.
Given even that number, means that more that 300 Million Gallons has already spilled into the Gulf.
Thats over 700,000 Barrels.
Thats more than enough to flood a major city.
To put that into perspective, a 55 gallon drun is roughly 3' tall x 2' diameter... It would take @75 of these to fill a 10'x10'x10' space. It would take nearly 10,000 such spaces to hold all that oil.
Or 140 US football fields, endzone to endzone.
And that is a conservative estimate.
As for a boycott... not needed. BP is being hurt worse by the bad press than any boycott could do.
All Obama is doing is kneejerk reactions and using this for publicity. He has offered very little constructiveness to the whole situation.
I have more faith that the Almigthy Lord of the Sea and Maker of Monumentally succesful movies- James Cameron and the team of brains hes working with can solve this debacle. And maybe make another multibillion dollar 3d movie in the process
Thats just a touch of sarcasm, but he is a seriously experienced oceanographer- and who knows- crazier things have happened.
But a boycott is superfluous at this point- 99% or people have no clue where there gas comes from- if its not a named station they can get it from a variety of vendors that might use BP, exxon, chevron etc etc. And as others have mentioned- if you stop buying BP's stuff, they cant afford to fix their enormous fubar.
helgrenze wrote:So.. It is now week 7 after the accident.
Obama has only this week made any effort to talk to the families of the men that died on that rig.
The president's private meeting with the families in the State Dining Room is part of his effort to show the public, that he is on top of the situation.
7 Weeks after the fact he is "on top of the situation."
Official numbers on the oil they are now recovering is @620,000 Gallons a day, estimated to be half of what is flowing.
Given even that number, means that more that 300 Million Gallons has already spilled into the Gulf.
Thats over 700,000 Barrels.
Thats more than enough to flood a major city.
To put that into perspective, a 55 gallon drun is roughly 3' tall x 2' diameter... It would take @75 of these to fill a 10'x10'x10' space. It would take nearly 10,000 such spaces to hold all that oil.
Or 140 US football fields, endzone to endzone.
And that is a conservative estimate.
As for a boycott... not needed. BP is being hurt worse by the bad press than any boycott could do.
Just an FYI, when they talk about "barrels of oil"; a barrel equals 42 US gallons. The term goes back to the late 1800s when they used wooden barrels.
ShivanAngel wrote:
All Obama is doing is kneejerk reactions and using this for publicity. He has offered very little constructiveness to the whole situation.
The thing is Obama is getting so much stick for this. People are not buying his spin. So why bother continuing. He could always try doing something constructive instead.
ShivanAngel wrote:
All Obama is doing is kneejerk reactions and using this for publicity. He has offered very little constructiveness to the whole situation.
The thing is Obama is getting so much stick for this. People are not buying his spin. So why bother continuing. He could always try doing something constructive instead.
Constructive like using his black magic to fix the leak at the bottom of the ocean.
Napolitano is the Secretary of Homeland Security. The Federal Emergency Management Agency is a component of The Department of Homeland Security. Janet Napolitano is the cabinet member who is directly responsible for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is one of the agencies involved in the federal response to the oil spill.
I work in the oilfield for an oilfield services company. Two of our personnel when the Deepwater Horizon exploded (They got off fine). I think there needs to be some clarification on this whole thing.
First BP was the overseeing entity for that well. They contracted Transocean to drill the well, an oilfield services company to conduct the directional drilling segment(s) of the well and to survey/log the well, another third party (Halliburton) to do the cement work, another to maintain and condition the drilling fluids (mud). There are meetings every twelve hours where all of the representatives from these various companies give a status of their operations and an outline of the next twelve hours activities. Anything occuring that was not discussed at the meeting must be brought to the "Company Man's" (The BP Rep) attention. I speak from first hand experience that everybody out there is playing a big game of CYA.
The mud engineer puts too much loss circulation material (LCM) down hole and clogs up the works for the survey equipment, but decides to omit that from the meetings and the survey guys take the heat for their tool failing. The rig hands dump too much diesel into the drilling fluid which lowerd the mud weight causing a gas kick, but they leave that detail out of the meeting and the mud engineer get blamed.
It goes on and on. So BP may or may not have been aware of the situation that ultimately led to the explosion.
Next is the fact that the oil companies do have the technology and expertise to deal with sealing the well better than the government, but on the cleanup front the government could have and should have taken a much larger role and earlier in the disaster than they did. BP would have to pick up the bill of course but the government has done more to impede the process of containing the spill than helping. A suspension of the Jones Act, a willingness to accept help from foreign advisors knowlegable in oilfield and/or subsea blowouts, allowing the Army Corps of Engineers to forego Environmetal Impact Studies for building protective sand bars etc etc would have helped. The apathy towards this crisis until the polls were dripping in bile is disgusting, but Obama will just continue as his MO dictates and blame everybody else. Maybe the ass he's looking to kick should be his own.
sexiest_hero wrote:Thing is when Obama said nothing Fox and friends roasted him. Remember them saying this was his Katrina? I think he spoke up because when he was quiet Rush started to say he was in with the BP people. At this point nothing he can do is right.
Fox isn't a news channel.
Its a propaganda channel for retards and dumbasses. If you watch Fox, your as dumb as Glen Beck.
Its a propaganda channel for retards and dumbasses. If you watch Fox, your as dumb as Glen Beck.
I might be a good idea to avoid drawing false conclusions when making claims as broad as yours.
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Tyras wrote:...but Obama will just continue as his MO dictates and blame everybody else. Maybe the ass he's looking to kick should be his own.
He placed blame directly on himself in at least one his public addresses. Granted, he was harshly critical of BP for about a month before the speech being discussed in that article, but there it is.
ShivanAngel wrote:
All Obama is doing is kneejerk reactions and using this for publicity. He has offered very little constructiveness to the whole situation.
The thing is Obama is getting so much stick for this. People are not buying his spin. So why bother continuing. He could always try doing something constructive instead.
Constructive like using his black magic to fix the leak at the bottom of the ocean.
dogma wrote:
He placed blame directly on himself in at least one his public addresses. Granted, he was harshly critical of BP for about a month before the speech being discussed in that article, but there it is.
Obama's words and actions are often, as is in this case, completely uncoupled from each other. He and his administration have been acting like teens who's parents just discovered their weed stash. "I was just holding it for them, it's not my fault, I didn;t think it would be a bad thing, blame them it's their drugs"...
How long will be long enough for Obama to take responsibility for his own administration and stop blaming Bush? Yeah, Bush was too cozy with the oil companies, but what exactly did Obama do to fix the problems at the MMS? He even made it a point in his campaign. His administration was apathetic, for whatever reason, and now he's in damage control. The sad thing is he seems to be more focused on PR damage control than environmental and economic damage control.
As a side note, while I'm posting in the thread: People are going to have to brace themselves for the reality that current law caps the financial responsibilty a company can be held liable for in crisis like this. BP won't get the full tab on this, and if Congress puts out a retroactive law to go after BP they might win some points with an angry public but will do irreperable damage to the business climate in the US. Companies will be so frightened to do business in the US for fear of laws being created to mold a litigious environment to suit their own whims that the doors to the US economy might as well be boarded up with an "Out of Business" sign.
dogma wrote:
He placed blame directly on himself in at least one his public addresses. Granted, he was harshly critical of BP for about a month before the speech being discussed in that article, but there it is.
Obama's words and actions are often, as is in this case, completely uncoupled from each other. He and his administration have been acting like teens who's parents just discovered their weed stash. "I was just holding it for them, it's not my fault, I didn;t think it would be a bad thing, blame them it's their drugs"...
How long will be long enough for Obama to take responsibility for his own administration and stop blaming Bush? Yeah, Bush was too cozy with the oil companies, but what exactly did Obama do to fix the problems at the MMS? He even made it a point in his campaign. His administration was apathetic, for whatever reason, and now he's in damage control. The sad thing is he seems to be more focused on PR damage control than environmental and economic damage control.
As a side note, while I'm posting in the thread: People are going to have to brace themselves for the reality that current law caps the financial responsibilty a company can be held liable for in crisis like this. BP won't get the full tab on this, and if Congress puts out a retroactive law to go after BP they might win some points with an angry public but will do irreperable damage to the business climate in the US. Companies will be so frightened to do business in the US for fear of laws being created to mold a litigious environment to suit their own whims that the doors to the US economy might as well be boarded up with an "Out of Business" sign.
Funny how that doesn't stop companies from operating in china... Faux economic hyperbole with little bearing on reality aside, while the government was "slow to react" the climate of the disaster has been one of a 'constant promise of an end'. When BP promises that the leak will be stopped in a week every two weeks while significantly (and intentionally) underreporting the size of the leak it creates a situation where it is easy for a governmental body to be somewhat complacent. The government fell for the trap of the promise that the leak would end soon and now it's left with the final admission that the leak is significantly larger than the recorded estimates and promises of BP itself. The final admission of the realistic size of the issue now that BP finally can't do anything to stop it (aside from capturing a bit and waiting) has made the problem significantly worse for the government (in hindsight). The country shouldn't have trusted BPs analysis of the problem in the first place, in retrospect it's quite clear that there was significant reason for BP to lie about the scale of the disaster while it still believed it could stop it quickly.
Many of the things obama could have done in response to quicken the government reaction to the spill are still unpalatable. You specifically mentioned environmental impact modeling for the creation of sandbars, and while that may seem like an unimportant process in light of the danger the dead sea effect and constant erosion of the coast created in dubai by these very same practices speak otherwise. In truth there isn't a spectacular amount the administration could be doing here. There is already a considerable amount of question as to the effect of the dispersants and whether they were a good idea at all and no one in history has attempted to control or deal with the plume effect now being grappled with. To quote a comedy article relating to this exact issue, until we manage to figure out how to flip submarines upside down and shoot the well to death the government doesn't have a whole lot of hard power on this issue.
Tyras wrote:
Obama's words and actions are often, as is in this case, completely uncoupled from each other. He and his administration have been acting like teens who's parents just discovered their weed stash. "I was just holding it for them, it's not my fault, I didn;t think it would be a bad thing, blame them it's their drugs"...
I suppose I'm not really certain how one accepts blame with action. At least , short of 'acting' to accept blame by stating "I accept the blame for this bad thing which happened."
Tyras wrote:
How long will be long enough for Obama to take responsibility for his own administration and stop blaming Bush? Yeah, Bush was too cozy with the oil companies, but what exactly did Obama do to fix the problems at the MMS? He even made it a point in his campaign. His administration was apathetic, for whatever reason, and now he's in damage control. The sad thing is he seems to be more focused on PR damage control than environmental and economic damage control.
As I said, it appears he said exactly that. Given the delay between the his first response, and the speech mentioned in the article I posted, the period of time appears to be 31 days. That said, I don't recall the Bush administration ever being mentioned. I recall a lot of discussion about how the MMS was too closely tied to the petroleum industry, but that's it. Though, in all honesty, I'm not sure what you expect from political speeches. They're all about public relations, even when they are focused on economic or environmental relief efforts, and in a crisis situation that means damage control.
If you think that Obama is spending too much time giving speeches, then I can see, and agree with, your point.
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ShumaGorath wrote:
Many of the things obama could have done in response to quicken the government reaction to the spill are still unpalatable.
At the moment it seems that simply acting quickly, instead of waiting 7 days to become personally involved in the issue, would have done a lot to prevent the criticism. However, as you pointed out, its difficult to effectively prioritize issues when the agencies already in contact with the situation do not know its severity, or are being deliberately mislead by an actor that does. At the very least FEMA and the EPA should have placed personnel and equipment on standby for quick deployment in order to facilitate containment.
Not that it would have been effective, of course, but it would have been the prompt involvement people seem to be calling for.
Some of the blame lies in BP catering to the environmentalists and not drilling closer to shore which would have been safer and less risky and easier to repair the damage had it been closer to shore. Of course the tree huggers want wells drilled as far off shore as possible to try to protect the environment.
Not saying being closer to shore would have stopped an explosion but getting equipment 1k feet down would be a far cry easier than getting equipment apporximately 1 mile down.
Some quick hits on the oil leak and the gov'ts response.....
"It's very discombobulated and disorganized," Orange Beach, Ala., Mayor Tony Kennon said of the federal response after tar balls stained the beach and entered Perdido Bay this week, without protection from booms. "They had five weeks to get ready for this, and it still happened."
Early on, the Coast Guard was widely viewed as giving BP too much control on the scene, effectively looking the other way when the company offered misleadingly rosy assessments. Allen, for example, went along for weeks with BP's insistence that measuring the amount of oil spewing from the well was unimportant, only later pressing for accurate figures after scientists complained that it could help officials plan for containing the mess and account for liability.
There's also the Katrina-like gap between what federal officials say is happening and what local leaders say they are seeing. Since the beginning, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen has insisted the government and BP deployed more resources than needed. That is consistently disputed by local and state officials who complain of poor coordination, shortages of boom and skimmers, agonizing delays in getting responses to requests and a general reluctance to try new or experimental cleanup strategies.
Allen said that he had dispatched Coast Guard liaisons to every local official three weeks ago and that he could only respond to specific concerns leaders say aren't being addressed.
"The parish presidents have a conduit into the incident command and the president every night on a conference call," he said.
Asked by another reporter if he "trusts" BP, Allen said "We have to have a cooperative … relationship."
"I have spent more time fighting the officials of BP and the Coast Guard than fighting the oil," Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser said. "We've got to find someone to put in charge who has the guts and the will to make some decisions."
Nungesser's parish includes the Louisiana marshes first hit by oil a month ago where recently pelicans were found coated with thick oil.
David Camardelle, mayor of Grand Isle, La., said he meets daily with state and federal officials but that when he brings up a problem or offers a solution he's told "BP or EPA, or the Coast Guard is going to have to approve this before we can do anything."
Camardelle complained that shrimpers in his community who sign up for the "vessels of opportunity"
"are being sent off on ships where they find no oil (and) ... they want to return and help protect their communities." At other times they were "ready to go but just waited at the docks for the call," he told lawmakers.
Does any of this sound like a Government that acted quickly and resposibly... or a bunch of national politicians trying to save their jobs and look good in the press?
Some of the blame lies in BP catering to the environmentalists and not drilling closer to shore which would have been safer and less risky and easier to repair the damage had it been closer to shore. Of course the tree huggers want wells drilled as far off shore as possible to try to protect the environment.
I'm pretty sure thats more an issue with coastal property costs and the ruination of oceanside vistas damaging the value of oceanside property, but then environmentalists typically don't want any sort of sea based oil drilling anywhere.
Not saying being closer to shore would have stopped an explosion but getting equipment 1k feet down would be a far cry easier than getting equipment apporximately 1 mile down.
The oil would have also had a significantly more major impact on the coast much more quickly. Oil disperses in water while bacteria eats and reduces it in volume. On the shore it just sort of sits and rots while it kills things. The farther the oil travels the more it disperses (hence why the ixion disaster didn't destroy the planet while the exxon valdeez is still being talked about. One is hundreds of times the size of the other.).
Does any of this sound like a Government that acted quickly and resposibly... or a bunch of national politicians trying to save their jobs and look good in the press?
Did someone say that they acted quickly and effectively? That said it's unlikely they could have protected everything (even with a better reaction time), five hundred miles of coast is a lot of floaty logs and rope.
Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
An oil spill caused by a massive multinational corporation. If it was just england dumping oil into the gulf I think environment>allies would make sense.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
An oil spill caused by a massive multinational corporation. If it was just england dumping oil into the gulf I think environment>allies would make sense.
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
An oil spill caused by a massive multinational corporation. If it was just england dumping oil into the gulf I think environment>allies would make sense.
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
Meh, it's not like england has anyone else to cozy up too. Might as well get mad when they feth up the pool.
Except the UK has been our closest military ally since, what? 1914? It really isnt worth losing trust over. Its some oil, itll get cleaned when it gets cleaned, until then Mrytle Beach/Hilton Head is very nice.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Except the UK has been our closest military ally since, what? 1914? It really isnt worth losing trust over. Its some oil, itll get cleaned when it gets cleaned, until then Mrytle Beach/Hilton Head is very nice.
I think my point was that if they cut ties over something so small as that then they would clearly be fairly self destructive as a country.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
I would suggest that such a comment could only come from someone who has access to pretty trees and beaches.
When did Britain become critical to US national security?
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Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Except the UK has been our closest military ally since, what? 1914? It really isnt worth losing trust over. Its some oil, itll get cleaned when it gets cleaned, until then Mrytle Beach/Hilton Head is very nice.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
I would suggest that such a comment could only come from someone who has access to pretty trees and beaches.
When did Britain become critical to US national security?
Hmmm, since 1776 and 1812 when they showed us how valuable it was to have some national security?
Democrat, Republican, Liberal, Neo-Con, they're all bought and paid for.
Your vote, such as it is, is worthless.
Were destroying the planet. And as the planet goes, so do we.
All this nonsense about politics and oil spills and Obama, Bush, Halliburton, BP, etc etc. is only so much filtered information and political posturing. there's not a word that comes out of any of these peoples mouths you should believe, but if you do, more power to you.
Time to wake up guys. The little guy is just that, the little guy. No more, no less. You can whine about the state of affairs in the world today as much as you want. You can back the Right or the Left, the Religious or the Secular. It doesn't make that much of a difference.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
I would suggest that such a comment could only come from someone who has access to pretty trees and beaches.
When did Britain become critical to US national security?
Well, I only live in Hawaii for part of the year . But now my Spring Break is ruined!
I want to know what American lives more than a two hour drive away from some form of natural recreational area? Except those poor people from Kansas....
Its just good to have allies. Especially allies with common background, motivations, history, etc. I mean think of all the British people on Dakka, if the US and Britain severed all diplomatic ties because America wants to get into a dick measuring contest how would that affect the many communities of gamers and others who's organizations reach to the UK?
As for security, all the English speaking countries have deep rooted mutual cooperation treaties and agreements that most dont know about, about things that are a big deal to keeping all nations running smoothly (satellites, military programs, intelligence, etc).
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Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Except the UK has been our closest military ally since, what? 1914? It really isnt worth losing trust over. Its some oil, itll get cleaned when it gets cleaned, until then Mrytle Beach/Hilton Head is very nice.
Im just worried about imparting any earthly wisdom I'll accumulate in my life to my progeny. They can judge for themselves if the status quo is worth fighting for. To me, it's not.
I look at this world as a very savage place. There's too many things that happen that just really shouldn't. Know what I mean? And I don't question the why's or the wherefore, because it really doesn't matter. It's gonna happen. And when something catastrophic on a level never seen before occurs, maybe well all wake up, myself included.
Until then, it's all just a slow burn. Enjoy it while you got it.
Since when did the UK stop being a first world country? 1st World = World Power. They get a vote on the security council too dont they? Thats pretty big.
They don't have the raw economic power and influence of China, India, and the USA. Security Council Smurity Council. I wouldn't call Germany a world power, neither Italy, nor much of Europe for that matter. Doesn't stop them being First World.
The EU as a whole is a major international actor. Though the UK may not have the economic power of China or India, both those countries are on a crash course for self destruction. China is encroaching on the mountains that feed the majority of India's rivers with the water they drink. Russia owns some nice oil feilds right above China. India and Pakistan are too hostile, and if India gets too big Pakistan will have nothing to lose by going full throttle on them. China cant call in its US debts without us taking some severe 'feth you' measures that would cripple a significant portion of China's economy and industry, sure they may make it, and we might be fethed, but both nations will recover. Not to mention any kind of conventional armed conflict between any first world nation WILL end with some form of nuclear attack, and once that happens its game fething on and Im glad I live up in the mountains.
The question of being a world power depends on what you define as being a world power. That sounds solipsistic, however if you look at size of economy, nuclear capability and seats on the Security Council, then Europe is easily in the lead, and several of its component countries are still in the top 10 considered as individual countries. (For example, the UK's GDP is nearly double that of India.)
If you look at conventional military force projection, Europe's capability is low, though both the UK and French have engaged in overseas operations in recent years.
To a great extent, the ability to project conventional military force is a reflection of cash spent, which depends on political will.
Automatically Appended Next Post: BTW talking to my brother, who lives in Oregon, I asked if he had taken any stick from the locals for having an English accent.
He said the oil leak barely made any news where he lives. It's too far away to interest people and they are hardly aware it is happening.
While on aside the UK and France are de facto world powers because they has some power projection capability (carrier fleets and quality armed forces), high technology, officially sanctioned nukes, a security council veto each and a G7 economy.
The difference is that the UK is not a 'superpower' and hasn't been since 1939. France was last a 'superpower' in 1814.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
I would suggest that such a comment could only come from someone who has access to pretty trees and beaches.
When did Britain become critical to US national security?
You know all those terrorist attacks originating from Europe you haven't had? You're welcome.
No, a First World nation is a heavily industrialized, democratic, capitalist country, friendly to the United States. Belgium, for instance, is a First World nation, but not any sort of world power. The Soviet Union was a world power, but not a First World nation (they were part of the "Second World"; heavily industrialized socialist countries).
On the other hand, the UKis pretty powerful. In fact, I'd say they easily have a place in the five most powerful nations on Earth. Chinese officials have ranked them the second most powerful nation, although that did take into account their alliance with the United States.
Albatross wrote:
dogma wrote:
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:
Yet it would seem as if some members of our faultless government are acting as if it is just Britain. And the Environment is never worth losing an ally over. I pity the person that thinks pretty trees and beaches are more important than the security to have pretty trees and beaches.
I would suggest that such a comment could only come from someone who has access to pretty trees and beaches.
When did Britain become critical to US national security?
You know all those terrorist attacks originating from Europe you haven't had? You're welcome.
IGLannister wrote:
I look at this world as a very savage place. There's too many things that happen that just really shouldn't. Know what I mean?
No. I find the world fascinating.
IGLannister wrote:
It's gonna happen. And when something catastrophic on a level never seen before occurs, maybe well all wake up, myself included.
Until then, it's all just a slow burn. Enjoy it while you got it.
That's existentialism. You've covered about 60 years of philosophical history in ~1 day. Good for you.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Since when did the UK stop being a first world country? 1st World = World Power.
No. World powers have the ability to project force in the course of unilateral action, or nominally influence the decisions of states of only tangential significance. For example, the US can affect economic policy in India, the UK could not match that feat. Of course, that doesn't mean the UK is not powerful. They, as Orkeo noted, quite powerful; particularly in the sense that they hold at least some sway over the former Commonwealth.
There are only 4 world powers. The US, China, India, and the collective EU. Iran will probably be on this list soon, if they manage to contain their own popular discontent.
Orlanth wrote:India is not a world power yet, but they soon will be.
Iran, certainly not.
India controls a population nearly twice that of the EU and certainly more than the EU and America combined. They are a world power by that measure alone, regardless of their other accomplishments.
Orlanth wrote:India is not a world power yet, but they soon will be.
As Shuma said, by controlling roughly 16% of the global population India is necessarily provided with the ability to influence the decision making process of any given state. Similarly, their sheer human mass allows for force projection due to a relative insensitivity to casualties.
Orlanth wrote:
Iran, certainly not.
Iran is the beneficiary of geographic fortune. Being located adjacent to the Straits of Hormuz provides them with the ability to influence the policy choices of the entire developed world. Combine that with an influential, and highly effective, insurgency network and you have global reach. Give them nuclear weapons and they'll be in a situation nearly analogous to that of Russia in the old Soviet Union.
by population but if they they fought the US they would lose from Nuclear warheads.
Anyway I think the BP oil leak is stupid I was watching my trusty friend Jon Stewart. And I have to say that the BP Situation is pretty stupid consdering that they are not working that hard. Top Hat and Hot Tap
Hot Tap
Top Hat
Hmmmm
Lets see
H-O-T T-A-P=T-O-P H-A-T
Wow Very creative and not only that but the dome really?
And I love the new Ideas lets put Beer making elements into the gulf so that we can intoxicate the gulf!
And the nuclear opition. Send a nuclear missle into the Gulf. Hmmmm Lets Make are fishing area's even worst!
WOW I think we need smarter people working on this situation.
Kilkrazy wrote:Napolitano is a kind of pizza, isn't it?
There is an excellent ice cream of the same or similar name.
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Tyras wrote:I work in the oilfield for an oilfield services company. Two of our personnel when the Deepwater Horizon exploded (They got off fine). I think there needs to be some clarification on this whole thing.
First BP was the overseeing entity for that well. They contracted Transocean to drill the well, an oilfield services company to conduct the directional drilling segment(s) of the well and to survey/log the well, another third party (Halliburton) to do the cement work, another to maintain and condition the drilling fluids (mud). There are meetings every twelve hours where all of the representatives from these various companies give a status of their operations and an outline of the next twelve hours activities. Anything occuring that was not discussed at the meeting must be brought to the "Company Man's" (The BP Rep) attention. I speak from first hand experience that everybody out there is playing a big game of CYA.
The mud engineer puts too much loss circulation material (LCM) down hole and clogs up the works for the survey equipment, but decides to omit that from the meetings and the survey guys take the heat for their tool failing. The rig hands dump too much diesel into the drilling fluid which lowerd the mud weight causing a gas kick, but they leave that detail out of the meeting and the mud engineer get blamed.
It goes on and on. So BP may or may not have been aware of the situation that ultimately led to the explosion.
Next is the fact that the oil companies do have the technology and expertise to deal with sealing the well better than the government, but on the cleanup front the government could have and should have taken a much larger role and earlier in the disaster than they did. BP would have to pick up the bill of course but the government has done more to impede the process of containing the spill than helping. A suspension of the Jones Act, a willingness to accept help from foreign advisors knowlegable in oilfield and/or subsea blowouts, allowing the Army Corps of Engineers to forego Environmetal Impact Studies for building protective sand bars etc etc would have helped. The apathy towards this crisis until the polls were dripping in bile is disgusting, but Obama will just continue as his MO dictates and blame everybody else. Maybe the ass he's looking to kick should be his own.
Word. Preach on brother.
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Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
Now that I am not on the work computer I'd be just fine with that. They fethed us, feth them.
It's multiple failures and lots of fingering pointing at this stage.
The government should have stricter regs about design and emergency preparation. I don't understand how they don't have design standards - not necessarily 'the casing should be X inches thick' but at least 'the casing needs to be designed by a professional engineer and have a minimum factor of safety of 1.5'. Further, as I understand it, BP had gotten the permit on the basis of being able to being able to contain a larger spill. Further, it appears that this was simply a 'Yes, I can handle a spill of such-and-such magnitude'. I don't think anyone ever checked if or how they would accomplish that. I wouldn't require them to equipment on the rig, but either have it on-hand or be able to obtain it quickly.
Further, BP was willing to take short-cuts to turn a profit. Clearly, they didn't evaluate all the risks properly. Further, they had used their clout in Washington to get favorable legislation.
And shame on Congress for allowing the oil industry to lobby and have a fairly small cap ($75 mill is a lot, but not when your profit is measured in billions) on their damages. In a truly free market, BP could be sued and bankrupted.
Better industry standards are needed. Better regulatory oversight (and this isn't necessarily more, just doing their job better). And Congress needs to stop passing legislation that favors deep pockets over the people they represent.
Nice to have an oil worker here to give a close range view.
Tyras wrote:
How long will be long enough for Obama to take responsibility for his own administration and stop blaming Bush? Yeah, Bush was too cozy with the oil companies, but what exactly did Obama do to fix the problems at the MMS? He even made it a point in his campaign. His administration was apathetic, for whatever reason, and now he's in damage control. The sad thing is he seems to be more focused on PR damage control than environmental and economic damage control.
Obamas entire presidential campaign hinged on the fact he was not-Bush.
Tyras wrote:
As a side note, while I'm posting in the thread: People are going to have to brace themselves for the reality that current law caps the financial responsibilty a company can be held liable for in crisis like this. BP won't get the full tab on this, and if Congress puts out a retroactive law to go after BP they might win some points with an angry public but will do irreperable damage to the business climate in the US. Companies will be so frightened to do business in the US for fear of laws being created to mold a litigious environment to suit their own whims that the doors to the US economy might as well be boarded up with an "Out of Business" sign.
interesting I am expecting somthing similar to that.
The way I see it BP is being given full weight of the blame which galls many people here in the UK, we dont know its not deserved, but we have no proof it is. Halliburton etal were at the same Senate inquiry meeting and all theree companies present blamed the other. BP has by far the deepest pockets though.
We are concerned over unfair spurious laws and dangerously unfair claims by government officials. Ken Salazar calling or BP to be billed ofr the drilling moratorium in the Baufirt sea. BP didnt stop that the US government did. Waiting six months wont make the well magically safe its grandstanding and unfair levying that makes people wonder if other spurious claims are to be made.
As for retroactively increasing the payout limits, that is unlawful. One of the central principles of justice is that events prior to the introctution of a crime or bill are exempt from thart bills rulings. Agaij that raises quwestions as to wghat Obama wants from BP, a free piggy bank?
The biggest worry comes frfom Obamas insistance that BOP honours commitments to pay all damages. This is dangerous. BP has shown willingness to pay despite what Obama is crowing with 'nickle and diming'. BP must however be wise. Compensation is an emotive issue damages do not necessarily reflect actual loss but loss plus inconveneinece and inconveneince can far outweight any loss. You have to add to that a sizable percentage as legal fees. No comapny in the world can afford to offer blank cheque compensation to several gulf states, the monetary compensation will be inflated. What BP will need to do is say yes wwe will hopnour our commitments and pay people what hey have lost, but stick very closely to the limited liability rules.
Thus they can say, yoiu lost $100K in revenue but we have already paid out the $75M maximum we can pay in economic damages thus we will generously refund you the $100K, but will not pay you the $200k you are asking fro for distress or the $300K your lawyer wants to claim in fees. If when there are complaints BP will have to stick to its plan of making volunteer payments while sticking to its liability rights when it comes to ancillary costs.
To fail to do this will clearly bankrupt the company. Lawsuits like this can reach crazy money all too easily, and this is especially risky due to the US governments blatant hostility and unfair dealings with BP. If every Gulf coast resident asks for claims for non monetary comopensation plus lawyers fees there is no way BP can survive. The only other option is to default.
BP made $4.4 billion in Q4 of 2009. They won't go bankrupt.
The company announced that underlying replacement cost profit for the fourth quarter of 2009, before non-operating items and fair value accounting effects, was $4.4 billion – an increase of 70 per cent on the same period in 2008.
Haliburton and Trans have some liability in this. BP was the one calling the shots, but who knew what and when hasn't been established. A disaster of this magnitude is not the fault of one person or event, it's multiple failures by many people.
They intentionally under reported the volume and damages of the spill for weeks and are complicit in slowing the governments reaction to the possible repercussions of the spill. While they may not have been willfully complicit (beyond industry leading negligence concerning safety practices for the last few years) in the explosion they were certainly complicit in lying to the public and the government concerning the rate of the leak. They're pretty damn guilty.
ShumaGorath wrote:They intentionally under reported the volume and damages of the spill for weeks and are complicit in slowing the governments reaction to the possible repercussions of the spill. While they may not have been willfully complicit (beyond industry leading negligence concerning safety practices for the last few years) in the explosion they were certainly complicit in lying to the public and the government concerning the rate of the leak. They're pretty damn guilty.
And yet the world keeps turning.
So they stop the leak (eventually) and then do what they can to clean it up. We move on.
Marshal2Crusaders wrote:Whichever tv pundit talked about nationalizing BP needs to be put down and have his family sold into sex slavery in eastern europe. Totally unacceptable to hurt our diplomatic relations with the UK over an oil spill. Allies>Environment.
Now that I am not on the work computer I'd be just fine with that. They fethed us, feth them.
Did you miss the part about BP being Multi-national? Britain didn't feth you, don't feth Britain.
BP is owned 40% by British companies/Individuals, and 39% by American individuals.
The Deepwater Horizon Rig was only owned 65% by BP, 25% was owned by Anadarko, a Texan company
Transocean, the company who ran the rig day to day, have been questioned related to their understaffing of the rig on the day of the accident; only 18 people were on the rig, and none of them were engineers, electricians or mechanics
Only 8 of the 126 people working on the Deepwater Horizon were BP employees.
Not all of the blame can be attributed to BP, and none at all to Britain as a whole.
Goliath wrote:Not all of the blame can be attributed to BP, and none at all to Britain as a whole.
Well. duh.
It's all Obama's fault.
Amen to that.
What's worst is that several BP gas station owners have reported vanadalism. It's no surprise people are so narrow minded as to think the owners of BP gas stations are to blame.
God, I hate this countries population sometimes (actually most of the time, this example doesn't do much to reinstill my faith in society as a whole).
mattyrm wrote:Obama is a typical politican, spinning things for his own agenda, BP are operating at depths unheard of to try and cap the leak, and he is going on and on and on about it, but they are doing their best surely? Its costing them a fortune and money talks.
They should say to him "go on then, you fix it with a miracle and we will give you ten billion dollars"
Its just spin, if he could get it capped then he would do and screw what BP say.
As for the dakka lot, its just more ridiculously jingostic nonsense from Frazz et all because the company has the word "British" in it. Im sure they wouldnt be bleating as much if it was Exxon again, and im sure no oil company purposely blows up a rig. gak happens, i dont see the need to be childish about it and start talking conspiracy or some such nonsense.
Honestly though, i speak to my missus on a daily basis and then then i speak with the aggresively patriotic bible thumping no such thing as global warming Obama is the spawn of satan gun toting dakka republicans and im truly stunned the South hasnt just went and formed another country, because they two different "types" of American im seeing must mix about as well as oil and water...
Oil and water? Geddit!?
I hardly call it childish to question a companies boarders on what to do to make money. Yes BP will eventually rake out billions to clean this mess up when they decide to put a stop to the leak, but until then gas prices will rise, as well as basically slingshoting Obamas bill to ban offshore drilling. Which only benifits the rich, because they'll be making billions in return in the trade for foreign oil. Is it childish to question why several BP CEOs sold stock weeks before the inccident?
Further more, My father worked for Oceaneering in the gulf for a few years. Part of his job was setting up and testing the equiptment needed to stop a leak like this. He's personally simulated these acctual events, and Oceaneering is very capable of fixing the problem.
Goliath wrote:Not all of the blame can be attributed to BP, and none at all to Britain as a whole.
Well. duh.
It's all Obama's fault.
That is equally unfair. Obamas mask has slipped during the oil leak crisis, his visage as a statesman has expired. Obamas strength was that he appeared to the US as a leader, yet in the first true crisis that requires him to act as a presendent to be a leader has has come up short.
While Obama is partly at fault for the lack of a solution, he cannot be blamed for the problem.
Is so hard to see that its all part of a bigger picture? Too many people are getting rich for this to be an accident.
With more and more people waking up to what is really going on, which effects every country, the plans changing. Researching project Bluebeam, in relation to hasty meetings of "secret" societies. They're using the bible against the masses.
Step 1. Would invovle publicly inflicting panic, a man made rapture. It is too easy to edit a live feed on television. Reporter A interviews Religious Icon A and all of a sudden he disappears, and by this example multipule public religious Icons vanish on live t.v. What would any day to day person believe. The rapture is happening now. When everyone is left behind, people panic.
Step 2. Put in place a means to control everything from the temp. in your home, to the amount of electricity you can use. On top of inflated gas prices, and food/clothing/ etc. People are forced to do what they must to survive. Even if that means doing the very thing they're taught not to do.
Step 3. Using Project Bluebeam, ensure complete and utter Panic by projecting the face of God into the sky. People as a mass will riot in fear of being left behind. The uproar among the people will provide enough reason to put the world under massive military control.
Step 4. The overall downfall of society everywhere.
Even people with no overall knowledge, or care, have related images they've seen on television to passages in the bible. The waters will be red as blood, oil slicks on the water give a redish tint to the water. If a day to day person can make these observations, is it that hard to believe that there is more than a ooooopps, our bad.
mattyrm wrote:Obama is a typical politican, spinning things for his own agenda, BP are operating at depths unheard of to try and cap the leak, and he is going on and on and on about it, but they are doing their best surely? Its costing them a fortune and money talks.
They should say to him "go on then, you fix it with a miracle and we will give you ten billion dollars"
Its just spin, if he could get it capped then he would do and screw what BP say.
As for the dakka lot, its just more ridiculously jingostic nonsense from Frazz et all because the company has the word "British" in it. Im sure they wouldnt be bleating as much if it was Exxon again, and im sure no oil company purposely blows up a rig. gak happens, i dont see the need to be childish about it and start talking conspiracy or some such nonsense.
Honestly though, i speak to my missus on a daily basis and then then i speak with the aggresively patriotic bible thumping no such thing as global warming Obama is the spawn of satan gun toting dakka republicans and im truly stunned the South hasnt just went and formed another country, because they two different "types" of American im seeing must mix about as well as oil and water...
Oil and water? Geddit!?
I hardly call it childish to question a companies boarders on what to do to make money. Yes BP will eventually rake out billions to clean this mess up when they decide to put a stop to the leak, but until then gas prices will rise, as well as basically slingshoting Obamas bill to ban offshore drilling. Which only benifits the rich, because they'll be making billions in return in the trade for foreign oil. Is it childish to question why several BP CEOs sold stock weeks before the inccident?
Further more, My father worked for Oceaneering in the gulf for a few years. Part of his job was setting up and testing the equiptment needed to stop a leak like this. He's personally simulated these acctual events, and Oceaneering is very capable of fixing the problem.
Ah, got you. So BP WANTS to have the value of its company slashed by 40%...
I mean, I'm happy for your Dad and everything, but this disaster is pretty much unprecedented - if fixing it was that simple it would have been done yesterday. The suggestion that they would just let oil spill into the gulf, doing untold environmental damage and costing them billions, because of some shadowy agenda, is just moronic and childish.
I think its entirely possible that safety considerations were ignored on the premise that any spill would drive up the price of crude, and therefore serve to mitigate losses. Similarly, I think its possible that company executives would sell their stock in BP before commencing an operation they acknowledged to be of significant risk. I do not think that BP intentionally allowed the spill to grow to its current proportions.
dogma wrote:I think its entirely possible that safety considerations were ignored on the premise that any spill would drive up the price of crude, and therefore serve to mitigate losses. Similarly, I think its possible that company executives would sell their stock in BP before commencing an operation they acknowledged to be of significant risk. I do not think that BP intentionally allowed the spill to grow to its current proportions.
Oh, it's 'possible'. It's also 'possible' that 9/11 was an inside job, but no-one seriously believes that either. I find it extremely difficult to believe that a major oil company would purposefully make a move like that, especially since they would not have had a clear idea of what would happen in the event of a serious leak at that depth. And lets' be clear - they DIDN'T know what would happen for certain. If they had of known, they would have had an effective contingency plan, and we wouldn't be having this converstaion. I can't see them betting their American market on some vague notion of a short-term increase in crude prices. It would make for a *passable* Tom Clancy novel but that's about it.
*goes to check the markets*
And Brent crude (amongst others) is down for the quarter, a dip the start of which coincides with the Deepwater Horizon explosion.
Then explain why the rig was drasticly understaffed, none of the onboard crew were engineers. Explain why the crews had to sign papers keeping them quite from the press.
As for the theory being too ridiculous, they've successfully tested the technology to do such a thing.
It's ok though i'd rather have stayed ignorant to the facts if I could go back, it would save a lot of sleepless nights thinking how im going to provide for my kid when society breaks down.
Albatross wrote:
Oh, it's 'possible'. It's also 'possible' that 9/11 was an inside job, but no-one seriously believes that either. I find it extremely difficult to believe that a major oil company would purposefully make a move like that, especially since they would not have had a clear idea of what would happen in the event of a serious leak at that depth.
Of course not, but it wouldn't be the first time that a large organization was able to convince itself of something without proper evidential support.
Albatross wrote:
And lets' be clear - they DIDN'T know what would happen for certain. If they had of known, they would have had an effective contingency plan, and we wouldn't be having this converstaion.
Oh absolutely. I'm not suggesting that the accident was intentional, nor am I suggesting that it has been allowed to expand to its current severity. I'm only suggesting that some of the reasoning behind decisions made with respect to certain safety measures may have been less than sound for reasons that aren't what one would consider above board.
Albatross wrote:
I can't see them betting their American market on some vague notion of a short-term increase in crude prices. It would make for a *passable* Tom Clancy novel but that's about it.
Its not the sort of thing that you make money on, its the sort of thing you expect to blunt an overall loss; ie. "If this thing fails, we won't be screwed because of this process."
Albatross wrote:
And Brent crude (amongst others) is down for the quarter, a dip the start of which coincides with the Deepwater Horizon explosion.
Yeah, I'm not suggesting that rising oil prices would lead to a profitable situation, only that it might serve as a rationale for taking greater risks.
ChaplainofAmon wrote:It's ok though i'd rather have stayed ignorant to the facts if I could go back, it would save a lot of sleepless nights thinking how im going to provide for my kid when society breaks down.
I can see that you're generally worried about this, so I'll temper the dismissive tone I displayed earlier.
I DO want to examine a few things though:
Then explain why the rig was drasticly understaffed, none of the onboard crew were engineers. Explain why the crews had to sign papers keeping them quite from the press.
Explain why Bin Laden's family were allowed to fly out of the USA, Why Henri Paul had drugs and alcohol in his system when he was allegedly teetotal and transporting a high-value VIP, why shots appeared to originate from the grassy knoll...
Do you see what I'm getting at here? This is a common reaction to crisis - to see conspiracy where there isn't one. It was an accident.
As for the theory being too ridiculous, they've successfully tested the technology to do such a thing.
Isn't in normally a common theme that when crude prices go up, gas prices go up? Not sure what the rest of the US is like but in Mn gas prices have been dropping quite a bit (kind of steadied themselves the past week but for a couple of weeks fuel prices were dropping nearly a dime a week.
That's like the lamest conspiracy theory ever. Worst than the idea 9/11 was a Bush insider job. LOL. I suppose next people will say Tupocs death is a conspiracy, that he faked it to be able to live in Jamaica under a new identity and create raps with Elvis.
Albatross wrote:Do you see what I'm getting at here? This is a common reaction to crisis - to see conspiracy where there isn't one. It was an accident.
Sure, but there’s accidents and there’s accidents where poor company safety protocols greatly increased the likelihood of catastrophe.
Albatross wrote:Do you see what I'm getting at here? This is a common reaction to crisis - to see conspiracy where there isn't one. It was an accident.
Sure, but there’s accidents and there’s accidents where poor company safety protocols greatly increased the likelihood of catastrophe.
Yes, of course. But the suggestion that they somehow did it on purpose? Puh-lease.
Goliath wrote:Not all of the blame can be attributed to BP, and none at all to Britain as a whole.
Well. duh.
It's all Obama's fault.
Amen to that.
What's worst is that several BP gas station owners have reported vanadalism. It's no surprise people are so narrow minded as to think the owners of BP gas stations are to blame.
God, I hate this countries population sometimes (actually most of the time, this example doesn't do much to reinstill my faith in society as a whole).
Pot, meet kettle.
Seriously, I'll let you know when I stop laughing.
Fateweaver wrote: I suppose next people will say Tupocs death is a conspiracy, that he faked it to be able to live in Jamaica under a new identity and create raps with Elvis.
Geez.
Nah, Tupac is in South America with Lefteye, working for the CIA. Elvis lives in a rest home in Texas... fighting mummies and stuff.
With recent disclosures of BP internal e-mails from the ongoing investigation there have been several revelations that really make BP indefensible. While my previous posts backed up BP with my experience in the oilfield and how nobody knew exactly where fault laid, I have to retract my support for BP given this latest information.
That aside, my choice in where I buy gas has more to do with where it comes from. I submit the following:
Are you aware that the Saudis are boycotting American products? In addition, they are gouging us on oil prices.
How about leaving American Dollars in America and reduce the import/export deficit?
An appealing remedy might be to boycott their GAS. Every time you fill up your car you can avoid putting more money into the coffers of Saudi Arabia . Just purchase gas from companies that don't import their oil from the Saudis.
Nothing is more frustrating than the feeling that every time I fill up my tank, I'm sending my money to people who I get the impression want me, my family and my friends dead. The following gas companies import Middle Eastern oil:
Shell..................................... 205,742,000 barrels
Chevron/Texaco...................... 144,332,000 barrels
Exxon /Mobil.......................... 130,082,000 barrels
Marathon/Speedway.............. 117,740,000 barrels
Amoco................................... 62,231,000 barrels
7/11 stores and CITGO oil is imported from Venezuela by Dictator Hugo Chavez who hates America and openly avows our economic destruction! (We pay Chavez's regime nearly $10 Billion per year in oil revenues!)
The U.S. currently imports 5,517,000 barrels of crude oil per day from OPEC. If you do the math at $100 per barrel, that's over $550 million PER DAY ($200 BILLION per year!) handed over to OPEC, many of whose members have abysmal human rights records and some who advocate violence against the US. It won't stop here - oil prices could go to $200 a barrel or higher if we keep buying their product..
Here are some large companies that do not import Middle Eastern oil:
Sunoco..........................0 barrels
Conoco/ Phillips..........................0 barrels
0ASinclair.....................0 barrels Phillips
BP.................. 0 barrels
Hess................................0 barrels
ARC0...............................0 barrels
Maverick........................0 barrels
Flying J...........................0 barrels
Valero...........................0 barrels
Murphy Oil USA *.........0 barrels
*Sold at Wal-Mart , gas is from South Arkansas and fully USA owned and produced.
*Not only that but they give scholarships to all children in their town who finish high school and are legal US citizens.
Most of the electrical generation in the US comes from Coal, Natural gas, and Nuke plants. Water and wind generation also make up a good protion of the power generation. Pertoleum plant only make up about 1% of the total.
The problem with Hydro is the need for flood plains behind the generation dam.
Wind has a ton of potential, as seen in Allentown, PA and Atlantic City, N.J., for example. Unfortunately, there are people that could benefit from wind that are of the "Not in my backyard/vista" mind frame. The proposed Nantucket wind farm is one such case.
About 70% of the oil this country uses is for transportation, almost half of that is in the form of gasoline with another quarter used for diesel type fuels.
Hybrids go a good way toward cutting that thirst, but are more expensive to buy.
Electrics are not yet efficient enough to be viable outside of cities. Limited range and speed are the major hurdles still for electrics.
Tyras wrote:With recent disclosures of BP internal e-mails from the ongoing investigation there have been several revelations that really make BP indefensible. While my previous posts backed up BP with my experience in the oilfield and how nobody knew exactly where fault laid, I have to retract my support for BP given this latest information.
What emails? I havent read them, and cant find them.
Tyras wrote:With recent disclosures of BP internal e-mails from the ongoing investigation there have been several revelations that really make BP indefensible. While my previous posts backed up BP with my experience in the oilfield and how nobody knew exactly where fault laid, I have to retract my support for BP given this latest information.
What emails? I havent read them, and cant find them.
I think that he's quoting those emails that are often forwarded. Kind of like chain mail in a way.
I am going to fill up at bp as much as possible. The last thing we need is them to go completely bankrupt. Thats 90,000 people out of work, from the last figures I heard.
Also, there was outrage at bush for katrina, because somehow its his fault. "george bush doesnt care about black people".
Tyras wrote:With recent disclosures of BP internal e-mails from the ongoing investigation there have been several revelations that really make BP indefensible. While my previous posts backed up BP with my experience in the oilfield and how nobody knew exactly where fault laid, I have to retract my support for BP given this latest information.
What emails? I havent read them, and cant find them.
I think that he's quoting those emails that are often forwarded. Kind of like chain mail in a way.
Tharts obvious, but forward where. Tyras implies they have been leaked and are fairly damning. The press would be all over them if this was so.
I grappled the shoggoth wrote:I am going to fill up at bp as much as possible. The last thing we need is them to go completely bankrupt. Thats 90,000 people out of work, from the last figures I heard.
Also, there was outrage at bush for katrina, because somehow its his fault. "george bush doesnt care about black people".
Where the hell is the outrage at obama.
I take it you haven't been reading the thread or watching conservative press.
Kilkrazy wrote:The USA consumes about 20% of the oil production and actually controls (within its borders) about 2% of the reserves.
Cutting back on oil use would be a good thing from strategic as well as balance of payments considerations.
Outside a few urban areas such as Manhattan, Americans are highly dependant on cars to get around.
If cars are gradually replaced with hybrid or electric vehicles that will help as long as electricity generation is not done by oil burning.
Hydrogen is the ticket: either in fuel cell fom or burning. thats the only way and we can do it now.
*Start mandating:
1. All cars and transports will have above by 2015.
2. Set up the infrastructure now via existing private stations.
3. start tolling up power generation to accomodate the hydrogen splitting. It doesn't matter how we generate the power, as that can change. It matters that the power is generated.
Kilkrazy wrote:The USA consumes about 20% of the oil production and actually controls (within its borders) about 2% of the reserves.
Cutting back on oil use would be a good thing from strategic as well as balance of payments considerations.
Outside a few urban areas such as Manhattan, Americans are highly dependant on cars to get around.
If cars are gradually replaced with hybrid or electric vehicles that will help as long as electricity generation is not done by oil burning.
Hydrogen is the ticket: either in fuel cell fom or burning. thats the only way and we can do it now.
*Start mandating:
1. All cars and transports will have above by 2015.
2. Set up the infrastructure now via existing private stations.
3. start tolling up power generation to accomodate the hydrogen splitting. It doesn't matter how we generate the power, as that can change. It matters that the power is generated.
Hydrogen is 'free' fuel and non polluting, but it costs a lot of energy to create. This is often overlooked by its proponents. Hydrogen is also very difficult to store, it normally requires high pressure containment which is expensive and dangerous.
A far better option if to burn commercially grown plant oils in addition to mined oils. Many plant oils burn in a diesel engine with minimal filtering and the technology is tried and tested. 'Small Oil' however cannot compete with 'Big Oil'.
Ultimately the US has to use less energy and that can only be achieved by lifestyle change. The average American and Canadian will travel far further on non essential journeys and burns more energy in heating even compared to other developed nations. Domestic consumption is the real issue, but its one thast politicians are not willing to address. Oil is too cheap, long journeys too casual, public transport, especially rail is underused.
Kilkrazy wrote:The USA consumes about 20% of the oil production and actually controls (within its borders) about 2% of the reserves.
Cutting back on oil use would be a good thing from strategic as well as balance of payments considerations.
Outside a few urban areas such as Manhattan, Americans are highly dependant on cars to get around.
If cars are gradually replaced with hybrid or electric vehicles that will help as long as electricity generation is not done by oil burning.
Hydrogen is the ticket: either in fuel cell fom or burning. thats the only way and we can do it now.
*Start mandating:
1. All cars and transports will have above by 2015.
2. Set up the infrastructure now via existing private stations.
3. start tolling up power generation to accomodate the hydrogen splitting. It doesn't matter how we generate the power, as that can change. It matters that the power is generated.
Hydrogen is 'free' fuel and non polluting, but it costs a lot of energy to create. This is often overlooked by its proponents. Hydrogen is also very difficult to store, it normally requires high pressure containment which is expensive and dangerous.
A far better option if to burn commercially grown plant oils in addition to mined oils. Many plant oils burn in a diesel engine with minimal filtering and the technology is tried and tested. 'Small Oil' however cannot compete with 'Big Oil'.
Ultimately the US has to use less energy and that can only be achieved by lifestyle change. The average American and Canadian will travel far further on non essential journeys and burns more energy in heating even compared to other developed nations. Domestic consumption is the real issue, but its one thast politicians are not willing to address. Oil is too cheap, long journeys too casual, public transport, especially rail is underused.
Its not economically feasible. To fuel the US economy, everyone would starve.
Hydrogen economy is workable with proper power supplies. Everything else is someone's trippy way to gain control.
Kilkrazy wrote:The USA consumes about 20% of the oil production and actually controls (within its borders) about 2% of the reserves.
Cutting back on oil use would be a good thing from strategic as well as balance of payments considerations.
Outside a few urban areas such as Manhattan, Americans are highly dependant on cars to get around.
If cars are gradually replaced with hybrid or electric vehicles that will help as long as electricity generation is not done by oil burning.
Hydrogen is the ticket: either in fuel cell fom or burning. thats the only way and we can do it now.
*Start mandating: 1. All cars and transports will have above by 2015. 2. Set up the infrastructure now via existing private stations. 3. start tolling up power generation to accomodate the hydrogen splitting. It doesn't matter how we generate the power, as that can change. It matters that the power is generated.
Hydrogen is 'free' fuel and non polluting, but it costs a lot of energy to create. This is often overlooked by its proponents. Hydrogen is also very difficult to store, it normally requires high pressure containment which is expensive and dangerous.
A far better option if to burn commercially grown plant oils in addition to mined oils. Many plant oils burn in a diesel engine with minimal filtering and the technology is tried and tested. 'Small Oil' however cannot compete with 'Big Oil'.
Ultimately the US has to use less energy and that can only be achieved by lifestyle change. The average American and Canadian will travel far further on non essential journeys and burns more energy in heating even compared to other developed nations. Domestic consumption is the real issue, but its one thast politicians are not willing to address. Oil is too cheap, long journeys too casual, public transport, especially rail is underused.
Its not economically feasible. To fuel the US economy, everyone would starve. Hydrogen economy is workable with proper power supplies. Everything else is someone's trippy way to gain control.
Hydrogen is a gakky faux technology that is unproven, untested, and unworkable with current techology (hence its absolute abandonment). Simply battery power will replace oil, thats it. No giant infrastructural change is needed, no (non lithium) mineral or oil reserves are needed, and we already have the technology. In the last decade battery tech has improved several orders of magnitude and it will keep doing so.
Hydrogen was just a boondoggle funded by the auto companies so that they could look like they were doing something. They knew it was a failure of a technology insofar as largescale transportation power is concerned, and as predicted it's faded away and been replaced with all electric already.
Now take everything I just said about hydrogen. Make my paragraphs twice as harsh and mocking and then replace hydrogen with biodiesel.
Kilkrazy wrote:The USA consumes about 20% of the oil production and actually controls (within its borders) about 2% of the reserves.
Cutting back on oil use would be a good thing from strategic as well as balance of payments considerations.
Outside a few urban areas such as Manhattan, Americans are highly dependant on cars to get around.
If cars are gradually replaced with hybrid or electric vehicles that will help as long as electricity generation is not done by oil burning.
Hydrogen is the ticket: either in fuel cell fom or burning. thats the only way and we can do it now.
*Start mandating:
1. All cars and transports will have above by 2015.
2. Set up the infrastructure now via existing private stations.
3. start tolling up power generation to accomodate the hydrogen splitting. It doesn't matter how we generate the power, as that can change. It matters that the power is generated.
Hydrogen is 'free' fuel and non polluting, but it costs a lot of energy to create. This is often overlooked by its proponents. Hydrogen is also very difficult to store, it normally requires high pressure containment which is expensive and dangerous.
A far better option if to burn commercially grown plant oils in addition to mined oils. Many plant oils burn in a diesel engine with minimal filtering and the technology is tried and tested. 'Small Oil' however cannot compete with 'Big Oil'.
Ultimately the US has to use less energy and that can only be achieved by lifestyle change. The average American and Canadian will travel far further on non essential journeys and burns more energy in heating even compared to other developed nations. Domestic consumption is the real issue, but its one thast politicians are not willing to address. Oil is too cheap, long journeys too casual, public transport, especially rail is underused.
Its not economically feasible. To fuel the US economy, everyone would starve.
Hydrogen economy is workable with proper power supplies. Everything else is someone's trippy way to gain control.
Hydrogen is a gakky faux technology that is unproven, untested, and unworkable with current techology (hence its absolute abandonment). Simply battery power will replace oil, thats it. No giant infrastructural change is needed, no (non lithium) mineral or oil reserves are needed, and we already have the technology. In the last decade battery tech has improved several orders of magnitude and it will keep doing so.
Hydrogen was just a boondoggle funded by the auto companies so that they could look like they were doing something. They knew it was a failure of a technology insofar as largescale transportation power is concerned, and as predicted it's faded away and been replaced with all electric already.
hydrogen fuel cells have been used for freaking decades.
Isn't he cute! Talking like batteries are worthwhile. You're so cute, yes you aww yes you aww!
hydrogen fuel cells have been used for freaking decades.
Fraz, I know you're an unrepentant and somewhat experienced troll so I'm just going to copy paste something I posted then make fun of you.
They knew it was a failure of a technology insofar as largescale transportation power is concerned, and as predicted it's faded away and been replaced with all electric already.
hydrogen fuel cells have been used for freaking decades. Isn't he cute! Talking like batteries are worthwhile. You're so cute, yes you aww yes you aww!
Do you drive a space shuttle to work fraz? Do you? I don't. I don't think most people do. When you're going to troll me try and use your fething brain instead of telling me I'm cute (Thank you) and then giggling and posting two totally worthless links.
Do you know what this is fraz? Of course not. Otherwise you wouldn't of posted your post. This is a car that gets 240 miles on a single charge using a battery. Batteries go in all kinds of things.
For instance batteries power this. This is a portable computer. You can take it anywhere and it will be able to work for hours without being plugged in. It doesn't even need to replace or refil it's fuel cells, it runs totally off of electricity! Your grandkids might have one, you should ask if you can look at it. Don't touch though! You wouldn't want to break it.
Do you know what this is fraz? THIS IS THE GOD DAMN SPACE SHUTTLE the same thing that you linked me too! It's also not a car! Do you know that lion batteries power more things in the ISS than hydrogen cells? Did you know that while they have a lower power density they don't explode? They also can be recharged by things like the sun, nuclear power, or coal and they don't need special stations which are inherently dangerous! Hydrogen cells are great when you need significant power density and output with low fuel weight and have a significant enough cooling system to control the reactive heat generated by the inefficiency! Such systems being highly technical and expensive outside of the necessity of a totally revamped national infrastructure for refueling! Something consumer model cars don't have! And something the american national infrastructure never will!
Each fuel cell power plant is 14 inches high, 15 inches wide and 40 inches long and weighs 255 pounds.
Thats just the power plant, one of three, not the sizeable cooling system or the physical mechanics required for refueling or purging (weighing more than a car itself)! It's like you don't even read your own fething articles and have no idea what the hell you're talking about! It's cute when grandpa wants to talk about electronics.
Fuel cell efficiency is limited because "the energy required to isolate hydrogen from natural compounds (water, natural gas, biomass), package the light gas by compression or liquefaction, transfer the energy carrier to the user, plus the energy lost when it is converted to useful electricity with fuel cells, leaves around 25% for practical use... For comparison, the 'wind-to-wheel' efficiency is at least three times greater for electric cars than for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles."[3] The efficiency of the vehicle's engine does not take into account the efficiency at which hydrogen is produced, stored, and transported today. Fuel cell vehicles running on compressed hydrogen may have a power-plant-to-wheel efficiency of 22% if the hydrogen is stored as high-pressure gas, and 17% if it is stored as liquid hydrogen.[4] In addition to the production losses, some of the electricity used for hydrogen production, comes from thermal power, which only has an efficiency of 33% to 48% resulting in emission of carbon dioxide.
For further study lets look at the pure inefficiencies of hydrogen vehicles! Like how the fuel cells fall apart when used in cars! Or how they are significantly less efficient than batteries (assuming you have the titanic infrastructure for distributing the hydrogen)!
While I'm at it lets dispell the "newness" argument you laid down in your first sentence. This is a battery operated electric car from 106 years ago.
This is the ev-1. Its battery weighed over 3 times what the tesla roadsters did. It got roughly a third the mileage on a charge and has half the horsepower. It's just over a decade old. Looking at trends in efficiency and technology electric battery storage and output became about 12 times as capable in 12 years. Thats a one to one improvement per year. With those numbers the electric vehicle field is looking at having a 300 pound battery and 720 miles on a charge with 600 horses by 2020. Given current and dramatic improvements in battery density of Li-on batteries (Which are on their way out as lithium is replaced) it's likely that could well happen.
Batteries are expensive, don't hold a charge to be sufficient for real distances (300 or more miles), and brilliantly toxic.
You can use hydrogen now. Electric cars stilld on't have the range for daily use at an economic level. Nnnn wrong answer. Thank you for playing.
Sorry about that, I edited and added two more paragraphs before I saw your post. Try again.
Also, how the feth do I use hydrogen now? Where am I gonna get the hydrogen fraz? I don't think it comes out of the hose at a gas station and I certainly can't plug my (non existent) hydrogen vehicle into the wall. Are you just being intentionally trollish or do you seriously have absolutely no idea what you're talking about? Cursory research will show you they are already cheaper, more efficient, less environmentally destructive, longer lasting, and significantly safer. Cursory research will also show you that they have improved significantly over the last fifteen years while hydrogen cells have not.
But you haven't done your research. You're just spouting off something you saw on a commercial once.
Also how the hell was newness my argument? Are you drunk?
Batteries are expensive, don't hold a charge to be sufficient for real distances (300 or more miles), and brilliantly toxic.
You can use hydrogen now. Electric cars stilld on't have the range for daily use at an economic level. Nnnn wrong answer. Thank you for playing.
Sorry about that, I edited and added two more paragraphs. Try again.
Also, how the feth do I use hydrogen now? Where am I gonna get the hydrogen fraz? I don't think it comes out of the hose at a gas station and I certainly can't plug my (non existent) hydrogen vehicle into the wall. Are you just being intentionally trollish or do you seriously have absolutely no idea what you're talking about? Cursory research will show you they are already cheaper, more efficient, less environmentally destructive, longer lasting, and significantly safer. Cursory research will also show you that they have improved significantly over the last fifteen years while hydrogen cells have not.
But you haven't done your research. You're just spouting off something you saw on a commercial once.
Show me a commercial - else you're trolling yet again without facts or support.
You can't get electrical hookups either.
Batteries are expensive, don't hold a charge to be sufficient for real distances (300 or more miles), and brilliantly toxic.
You can use hydrogen now. Electric cars stilld on't have the range for daily use at an economic level. Nnnn wrong answer. Thank you for playing.
Sorry about that, I edited and added two more paragraphs. Try again.
Also, how the feth do I use hydrogen now? Where am I gonna get the hydrogen fraz? I don't think it comes out of the hose at a gas station and I certainly can't plug my (non existent) hydrogen vehicle into the wall. Are you just being intentionally trollish or do you seriously have absolutely no idea what you're talking about? Cursory research will show you they are already cheaper, more efficient, less environmentally destructive, longer lasting, and significantly safer. Cursory research will also show you that they have improved significantly over the last fifteen years while hydrogen cells have not.
But you haven't done your research. You're just spouting off something you saw on a commercial once.
Show me a commercial - else you're trolling yet again without facts or support. You can't get electrical hookups either.
Not sure what you're on about as far as commercials go considering were talking about the future and not a single one of the technologies being discussed will be established in the next decade (oils still cheap and realistically no one cares where the gas comes from).
Seriously. You just don't know what you're talking about.
The battery field is one of the most active engineering fields on the planet today with air zinc batteries (contested against nanoscale altered Li-ons and a few others) set to totally replace traditional Li-ons..
To be fair Fraz the Battery power car (based upon a Lotus I believe) went into production this year and was featured on Top Gear as well.
It is also worth noting that they went through tree of them during testing because the batteries either failed or didn't last even half the time stated by the manufacturers.
Hydrogen will produce the most similar results to petrol, electric is still too limited.
Hybrids still seem like the first best step to a new cleaner power source to me.
Frazzled: -1 (The argument presented was so poor, that it merited a deduction.)
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ShumaGorath wrote:Cursory research will show you they are already cheaper, more efficient, less environmentally destructive, longer lasting, and significantly safer.
Those are all essentially self-evident, aside from efficiency, before research even begins. Safety, in particular, is a comparison between one system which requires regular infusions of a dangerous, difficult to contain element, and another in which the most volatile components are self-contained for factory level maintenance.
notprop wrote:To be fair Fraz the Battery power car (based upon a Lotus I believe) went into production this year and was featured on Top Gear as well.
It is also worth noting that they went through tree of them during testing because the batteries either failed or didn't last even half the time stated by the manufacturers.
Hydrogen will produce the most similar results to petrol, electric is still too limited.
Hybrids still seem like the first best step to a new cleaner power source to me.
Go Toyota! (if only they did brakes!)
500 not out! Well done me!
Technically it was released in 2008 (as was that episode of top gun if I recall) and the top gear guys either got a defective model or forgot to charge the car correctly because they were getting significantly under average with those vehicles (under the actual reported average which is 15-20% under the stated capacity of the company which is likely under ideal conditions). I love top gear, but they are far from a scientific or realistic testbed for vehicles (at least they didn't drive it across africa).
notprop wrote:To be fair Fraz the Battery power car (based upon a Lotus I believe) went into production this year and was featured on Top Gear as well.
It is also worth noting that they went through tree of them during testing because the batteries either failed or didn't last even half the time stated by the manufacturers.
Hydrogen will produce the most similar results to petrol, electric is still too limited.
Hybrids still seem like the first best step to a new cleaner power source to me.
Go Toyota! (if only they did brakes!)
500 not out! Well done me!
Exactly. in the future batteries may be just fine, and the same infrastructure can generally support (MORE POWER!!! MUAHAHAHA!!!). At the current time hydrogen most replciates autos and maintains the lifestyle and is here, now. Its the infrstructure network that is the key.
Until that is mandated its all irrelevant. Cap and tax won't do it-its not designed to.
Tyras wrote:With recent disclosures of BP internal e-mails from the ongoing investigation there have been several revelations that really make BP indefensible. While my previous posts backed up BP with my experience in the oilfield and how nobody knew exactly where fault laid, I have to retract my support for BP given this latest information.
What emails? I havent read them, and cant find them.
I think that he's quoting those emails that are often forwarded. Kind of like chain mail in a way.
Edit: Circulating drilling fluid prior to coming out of hole is standard procedure. Even on small terrestrial wells they do it, why sombody to decided against circulating on a well a mile beneath the surface of the ocean is beyond me. A long string casing string doesn't make the well all that more dangerous on it's own, but combined with the choice to essentially go without cetralizers makes the casing an accident waiting to happen. Why bother hireing a third party contractor if you're not going to take their advice? I'm not going to say that these companies don't try to pull one over on each other from time to time, but it's a simple thing to figure out how many centralizers one needs for a given distance. Six centralizers over the course of a well that is probably 15K or so feet in total measured depth (curved length of the well) is a joke. These amongst other decisions made would probably get more attention in the press if more people understood the jargon and what the function of the equipment and processes mentioned and risks for skimping on them, other than the obvious 11 deaths and the worst environmental disaster in US history anyways.
The OPEC gas stations portion of the e-mail did come from one of the forwarder e-mails, but it is accurate, so I included it, as it was relevent to the discussion when people are talking about how they choose where they buy their gas from.
ING GAME.
