Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

[strittmatter]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Any of you folks can comment on this:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/5...Booming-School



Followed by 3 pics of orange oil booms sitting on beaches...

Narrated:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQ6rDWvnurQ 8:22 min.

[c1ue]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Any of you folks can comment on this:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/5...Booming-School

1. The booming is being run by a company that concentrates on drilling and booming is for pussies. Production employees were not invited because they would just cause trouble. This is a drilling operation so just f*** off.

1. There's not enough boom, rope nor anchor on this planet to properly boom the Northern Gulf of Mexico. There should be! It's not that much an expense! Really! It's not! They said they were ready! Having enough materials to perform f***ing proper f***ing booming, IS part of being ready! THEY'RE NOT READY! ARE THEY?

1. Governors, Senators, Presidents and most of all the Piece-Of-Shit-C*nt Media don't know what ******* proper f***ing booming LOOKS LIKE! So you can just lay a single line of neon-glo-orange boom out parallel to the shore, for miles, with anchor points every quarter-mile to where a good part of it washes up onto the shore like a huge, dead, orange nightcrawler... and they won't know the difference! Where it manages to stay off the bank, a little two-foot chop you would let your kids frolic in will send all the oil either over or under it! ALL THE OIL! ON THE SHORE! IN THE REEDS! ON THE BEACH! IN THE NESTS! OIL! So what! It's not gonna make CNN send a single correspondent to booming school, is it?

Followed by 3 pics of orange oil booms sitting on beaches...

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

GRG55, what is the incremental cost of drilling a relief well along with the main well, when examined in the context of an entire project like this? Does it raise the cost of the oil extracted by one percent, or by 50% or double it? Since a relief well is apparently the only truly effective remedy for a blow-out under sea, how much do we raise the price of a barrel of oil if we ALWAYS install them to be ready for the rare event when we actually use them? Thanks again for your amazing technical insights here.

[GRG55]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Worse than Exxon Valdez by a factor of 1.6x to 3.3x. Hope this works.

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/articl...spill/19491691

BATON ROUGE, La. (May 27) -- BP reported today that its "top kill" attempt to block the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico is proceeding as planned, though it could take more than a day before engineers can say whether it succeeded. Scientists said the gulf crude spill is the nation's worst, far larger in volume than the Exxon Valdez accident.

Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer, said the top kill procedure pushed some heavy drilling mud down into the well bore, as engineers try to overcome the upward pressure from oil and gas in the well. He said the company stopped pumping the mud late Wednesday night and performed pressure measurements. It resumed pumping this evening.

Scientists said they have determined that the spill is worse than previously estimated, with far more crude in the gulf than leaked into Alaska's Prince William Sound in the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident. Two groups of scientists used different methods and found that between 19 million and 39 million gallons of crude have leaked into the gulf so far, U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt said at a news conference today. Eleven million gallons of crude spilled in the Exxon Valdez disaster, which until now was the nation's worst oil spill. The world's worst spill happened at the end of the 1991 Gulf War, after Iraqi forces retreating from Kuwait sabotaged the country's oil reserves on land and at sea. Between 240 million and 520 million gallons spilled into the Persian Gulf, according to estimates.

This was always an extremely low probability of success action. But the political climate is driving everyone to be seen to be trying "everything" no matter how lousy the chances of it working...

Every engineer I know in this business understood early on, once all the efforts to close the BOPs failed, that the only reasonable probability of success method to cap this blowout is the relief well. Talk of "junk shots", top kills, nuclear explosives, sinking a battleship on the wellhead [here's a link to that fantasy suggestion], or pumping cement directly into the blowout wellhead is wishful thinking played out large in the international media.

[shiny!]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Worse than Exxon Valdez by a factor of 1.6x to 3.3x. Hope this works.

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/articl...spill/19491691

... The world's worst spill happened at the end of the 1991 Gulf War, after Iraqi forces retreating from Kuwait sabotaged the country's oil reserves on land and at sea. Between 240 million and 520 million gallons spilled into the Persian Gulf, according to estimates.

From reading these numbers, it seems that what happened in the Persian Gulf was far, far worse than what's happening now in the Gulf of Mexico. Does anybody here know how it effected the ecosystem there and what condition it's in now?

And I second the kudos for theoildrum.com . Lots of level heads and good technical information there.

[LargoWinch]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

This was the worst spill from the word "GO". I realize most are into finance here but from my Pet. Engineering perspective BP is a criminal enterprise.

To come to that realization one would need to dive into the discussion of this accident. Enough details from this accident AND previous involving BP will clear everything up nicely to come up with the conclusion I have drawn about this company.

I recommend http://www.theoildrum.com/

Perhaps, but this is not addressing the issue: excessive energy consumption in the western world.

[strittmatter]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Has anyone at oildrum commented on the fact that since they couldn't get the BOP to close in the first place, how in the world was/is the fluid being pumped supposed to travel downhole and not take the path of least resistance - which would be for it to flow right back out of the leaking pipe string along with the oil and gas, as it appears to be doing?

[thunderdownunder]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

You know the link - http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_inte...ov_stream.html - Its not pointed where it should be but its not working and never will using drill mud. (pressures look enormous).
The only thing left is Cement mixed with Methocel HD 56l (an expanding cellulose used commonly in grouting stressed cables). But it needs to be with a cement acellarent that is in abundance down there (salt). Methocel aids in the Lubrication so pumping pressures are far less and seals like "pepper in a leaking radiator"
To those who know the gauges that show the pressures being exerted during the current effort can be mathematically converted to tell you Flow rates (like a tire gauge and yes I don't believe it - they are telling fibs - thats one angry mess down there).
Final answer is to bury the whole floor in 20,000+ton of low slump concrete via a huge gas operated Kibble or to snap off vertical and drive an over size 5000ft + caisson which has never been tried in the history of engineering. The answer is time over diminishing returns. Putting BP in charge is like asking banks to moderate their excess or putting pedophiles in charge of good looking children.
Its a mathematical cum engineering problem now - give them a go, they will stop it given enough time, resources and money. Yes I am aware of Time content but there is no other avenue left.
This is now the worst environmental disaster the World has ever suffered and Deer in headlights and buck passing time is over - let some unattached experts at it and give them unfettered access.
It has Failed and it is now time to get real, trained, and intelligent World engineers on the job, F%$K the cost they will solve it - I swear they will.
Bechtel, Hochteif-Leightons(these two are truly great engineers) BHP-Woodside (they are in the Gulf and are experienced in High pressure problems), Sinopec(Chinas best), Pemex (yes I know but they learnt from that and are close by), Valero (land based and close and very nimble on their feet) should do it. They are chosen carefully as each do something different needed and have vast numbers of very smart engineers.

[Shakespear]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

This was the worst spill from the word "GO". I realize most are into finance here but from my Pet. Engineering perspective BP is a criminal enterprise.

To come to that realization one would need to dive into the discussion of this accident. Enough details from this accident AND previous involving BP will clear everything up nicely to come up with the conclusion I have drawn about this company.

I recommend http://www.theoildrum.com/

[Ghent12]

Re: Update on BP's top kill efforts, now largest spill in US History

Now we're talkin'! This is quite the natural disaster, indeed.

[jtabeb]

Worse than Exxon Valdez by a factor of 1.6x to 3.3x. Hope this works.

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/articl...spill/19491691

BATON ROUGE, La. (May 27) -- BP reported today that its "top kill" attempt to block the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico is proceeding as planned, though it could take more than a day before engineers can say whether it succeeded. Scientists said the gulf crude spill is the nation's worst, far larger in volume than the Exxon Valdez accident.

Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer, said the top kill procedure pushed some heavy drilling mud down into the well bore, as engineers try to overcome the upward pressure from oil and gas in the well. He said the company stopped pumping the mud late Wednesday night and performed pressure measurements. It resumed pumping this evening.

Scientists said they have determined that the spill is worse than previously estimated, with far more crude in the gulf than leaked into Alaska's Prince William Sound in the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident. Two groups of scientists used different methods and found that between 19 million and 39 million gallons of crude have leaked into the gulf so far, U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt said at a news conference today. Eleven million gallons of crude spilled in the Exxon Valdez disaster, which until now was the nation's worst oil spill. The world's worst spill happened at the end of the 1991 Gulf War, after Iraqi forces retreating from Kuwait sabotaged the country's oil reserves on land and at sea. Between 240 million and 520 million gallons spilled into the Persian Gulf, according to estimates.