Thanks BP for ruining our beaches with oil

[spetsnazdave87]

 

 

Any bets that if this had happened in the UK it would have been a Gordon Brown photo op gone wrong?

 

Sue would probably have put him with a bigoted cormorant.

[ThaFlash]

Considering the OP's posts weren't labeled as being edited, I don't see how he could have implied that this was due to the British in any way. BP may not be technically British Petroleum anymore, but it's still BP; that's about as much of a "British" reference as I read in the first 2 posts.

 

But a UK corporation is still a UK corporation, and to be fair, that has nothing to do with the oil spill. A corporation is going to perform just enough safety backups to maximize their returns. It doesn't matter where the corporation is from when we have lower safety standards than Brazil.

 

I believe the mainstream name of this disaster is "Spill, baby, Spill"

[Desolation mkII]

Were even now America.

 

You pour our tea into the harbour, we wait 240 years, build up a suernational oil company and then dump a load of your oil in the harbour.

[hwagan]

On the bright side, i bet all the sea-birds will do epic 400 yard landing slides. Before dying of horrible oil poisoning.

[amateurstuntman]

I remember BP dumping millions of oranges into the Fourth to practice spill drills.

In fact I think I remember (a million years ago) learning in offshore engineering 1 at university that BP invented the oil absorbent boom that companies use to help contain these spills.

 

Any way.

 

Who cares.

 

This spill represents a tiny fraction of the ###### that is dumped into the world's oceans, the only reason it is in the news is that it is new and in a big blob.

[hwagan]

And it's also fairly shiney.

[AceOfSkulls]

if Bush/Cheney had'nt de-regulated the industry, then blocked a bill that was about putting the precautions in place to stop this kind of spill (things like acoustic switches). Then the precautions would have been mandatorily inplace like europe and there would be no oil spill.

[ThaFlash]

I remember BP dumping millions of oranges into the Fourth to practice spill drills.

This spill represents a tiny fraction of the ###### that is dumped into the world's oceans, the only reason it is in the news is that it is new and in a big blob.

 

And potentially permanently destroying the habitats of many protected and endangered species not to mention the possibility of the ending shrimping in the region.

[DesertFoxRomel]

I got a grand idea, why don't they place those orange floating barriers in a few hundred meters radius around oil rigs? And have some sort of gate system to let in and out ships? Better than placing MILES of that stuff around our vulnerable beaches?

[spetsnazdave87]

Problem is, they dont work in rough seas so theres no way to effectively contain it most of the time from what Ive read.

[Azulsky]

Ecological, Cultural and Economical Impact are going to be ridiculous unless they have a magic way to get the stuff out of marsh grass

 

Hit on the seafood industry is going to last for a generations.

 

Going to make Katrina look like an appetizer.

 

As soon as the river leaves flood stage the marshes will be at a higher elevation and there will be a serious water supply issue.

[Danke]

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/05/03/1611091/despite-oil-spill-texass-perry.html

 

Seems like the name British Petroleum is in the news still, and the folks at BP are in no rush to correct this. I would say if this does realy go bad the BP brand will quietly vanish and the Beyond Petrol brand will move to the forefront.

[Azulsky]

The Irony of it all is that Gulf Coast States are huge supporters of the oil industry. Houston is the epicenter of Oil & Gas.

 

 

I dont see how BP can afford to not be in a rush, they basically have everything on the line here.

[Stealthbomber]

And potentially permanently destroying the habitats of many protected and endangered species not to mention the possibility of the ending shrimping in the region.

There's a certain irony to the fact we've decimated a whole country over oil - and I'm talking about the american relationship with Kuwait here, rather than any speculation about the fate of Iraqi oil supply - (including it's population, infrastructure, habitat, wildlife, industry etc) during the Gulf war and you don't see many Americans being too concerned about it.

 

Seems like we weren't concerned about compensating anybody for wrecking a country half a world away. NIMBYism on a global scale.

 

Beyond that, all I ever seem to hear from fishermen is how they can barely scrape a living these days and how there's no money in it.

I can't help thinking that this disaster is really a nice little retirement package for all these fishermen rather than a true compensation for lost income.

 

I got a grand idea, why don't they place those orange floating barriers in a few hundred meters radius around oil rigs? And have some sort of gate system to let in and out ships? Better than placing MILES of that stuff around our vulnerable beaches?

FWIW, that wouldn't really help.

 

As well as bad weather wrecking the booms ever couple of months and causing a potential hazard for shipping (if the boom broke and floated away) it's very rare for oil rigs to actually be a cause of an oil spill.

Oil rigs have environmental rep's on board and if they see anything odd in the water they write a report and the company gets a big fine. As a result of this pollution from rigs is incredibly rare.

 

It might be worth considering this during a short-term operation using mobile drill-ships or semi-sub rigs but, even so, the same standards apply and, as a result, it's far more likely that a leak would occur sub-sea.

The problem there is that by the time subsea currents had stirred the oil up it might actually appear on the surface several miles from the point of the leak.

 

It's all about economics.

To be effective you'd have to deploy an oil boom for a radius of, say, 5 miles around a drilling operation that's 30 miles of boom you need to maintain and you'd need, roughly, at least one DP-equipped vessel per mile to hold it all roughly in position. At around $150,000 a day for a DP vessel that's gonna add around $4 million PER DAY to the cost of a single drilling operation in support vessels alone.

That is immediately going to make a large percentage of drilling operations economically unviable.

 

Then, looking at the bigger picture, let's say a spill like this has a 1% chance of happening. That's a hugely exaggerated estimate but let's go with it for the sake of discussion.

That means you're spending $396m a day on preventative measures that are never going to be needed.

Let's say the average short-term drilling operation lasts 2 months.

That's roughly $24 billion spent on preventative measures at any one time.

During this time (given our 1% likelihood of a spill) you'll have ONE spill.

Unless it costs more than $24 billion to clean it up and pay any compensation then it simply isn't worth the cost.

[Smitty619]

TIN FOIL TIME!!!

 

I don't have a link, but a Russian news agency reported that there is a media blackout about the real cause of the rig disaster....A North Korean sub blew it up.

 

Its also been reported in US media outlets that Obama is sending "SWAT teams" to many Gulf rigs.

 

And Texas beaches DO SUCK.

[catfishsalesco]

TIN FOIL TIME!!!

 

I don't have a link, but a Russian news agency reported that there is a media blackout about the real cause of the rig disaster....A North Korean sub blew it up.

 

Its also been reported in US media outlets that Obama is sending "SWAT teams" to many Gulf rigs.

 

And Texas beaches DO SUCK.

 

Point 1: The explosion was seen coming from the drill floor. Unless the north koreans have levitating torpedoes that can swim, then suddenly jump 40 meters into the air and detonate, I dont think thats likely.

 

Point 2: That is BP's ( Or is it halibuton's?) name for their disaster response teams. No mp5's and black kit there.

 

Point 3: I can believe that one

[ThaFlash]

There's a certain irony to the fact we've decimated a whole country over oil - and I'm talking about the american relationship with Kuwait here, rather than any speculation about the fate of Iraqi oil supply - (including it's population, infrastructure, habitat, wildlife, industry etc) during the Gulf war and you don't see many Americans being too concerned about it.

 

Seems like we weren't concerned about compensating anybody for wrecking a country half a world away. NIMBYism on a global scale.

 

Beyond that, all I ever seem to hear from fishermen is how they can barely scrape a living these days and how there's no money in it.

I can't help thinking that this disaster is really a nice little retirement package for all these fishermen rather than a true compensation for lost income.

 

 

 

 

Yeah, I have no problem if Kuwait and all the other Gulf Coast companies want to ruin their own ecology to sell us oil. Well, I do have a problem with it, but I care more about my country. Kuwait, UAE, Saudi Arabia and the rest choose their own fate, furthermore any suggestion of American influence on these countries cannot be made without realizing that British influence on these countries is just as profound and devastating if not more.

 

But I really don't see a correlation between an oil rig accident whatever it is you're talking about, maybe because you never really made it clear what you're talking about.

 

About the fishermen, it's not retirement if you don't have a retirement savings, at that point it's called unemployed. I wouldn't wish unemployment on a major part of your country's food industry, but I guess that's just a fundamental difference between our principles.

[Stealthbomber]

Yeah, I have no problem if Kuwait and all the other Gulf Coast companies want to ruin their own ecology to sell us oil. Well, I do have a problem with it, but I care more about my country. Kuwait, UAE, Saudi Arabia and the rest choose their own fate, furthermore any suggestion of American influence on these countries cannot be made without realizing that British influence on these countries is just as profound and devastating if not more.

 

But I really don't see a correlation between an oil rig accident whatever it is you're talking about, maybe because you never really made it clear what you're talking about.

 

It's not Iraqis that screwed up their country. It's allied troops operating under a directive from Dubyah who's allegiance to Kuwait and the oil they supply is one of the major underlying causes for the renewed hostilities.

 

As I say, we didn't seem too concerned about the livelihoods of Iraqi citizens prior to knocking the living sh*t out of the country.

 

About the fishermen, it's not retirement if you don't have a retirement savings, at that point it's called unemployed. I wouldn't wish unemployment on a major part of your country's food industry, but I guess that's just a fundamental difference between our principles.

I wouldn't wish unemployment on anybody.

I was just making the point that I can't help wondering if any affected fishermen might take the opportunity to exxagerate their claims a tiny little bit.

 

Course, with that in mind, the US government might be happy to encourage affected parties to milk the situation as much as possible in order to reduce future welfare payments as far as possible.

[ThaFlash]

At some point you need to own your own feces. Iraq had a screwed up country well before the first U.S. boot hit the ground. It might be worse now, but it's not like they ever protected their ecology. Your attempt at understanding U.S. foreign relations policy is laughable at best, without any sort of evidence and coherent analysis it's best to keep the Oil Rig Disaster (Spill, Baby, Spill) as an oil rig disaster and not related to the war in Iraq.

 

These fishermen that are going to be out of a job aren't getting a 401k plan from BP. They are being offered some compensation in return for providing their resources in the cleanup effort, that compensation isn't on the level of what they'd make in a good fishing season. And does anybody think that BP will be paying their bills in 10 years when the fishing industry is still not back to full strength in the area? In all likelihood the ecological impact is being exaggerated, because that's just the usual trend, but I'd really hope that's the case otherwise worldwide fish markets will be affected and the endangered species in the marshlands don't get welfare.

[GuzziHero]

I SOOOO want to get involved on the subject of US foreign policy, which I *do* have an understanding of, but this isnt the time or place. But to put it mildly, it is NOT pleasant.

 

I do see the US Govt to use this as a way to put more pressure on the citizens, as they sure as heck won't put any pressure on the despicable standards of their own industries, since they are constantly cutting back the EPA's power to do anything. Not that the EPA is very effective anyway. If Americans think the UN is a useless load of procrastination, wait till you see the EPA or, even worse, FEMA. If they had any idea how to control a disaster they don't show it because their very organisation IS a disaster.

 

Given how well the US agencies handled the New Orleans flood, I do not have any confidence in them whatsoever to handle this disaster correctly. They will probably farm out as much work at top dollar to their own paymasters in the usual suspect corporations, who will then fail to do anything right...just like in New Orleans.

 

Sorry America, I really have a lot of sympathy for your plight, especially when it comes to things like this oil rig situation.

[Stealthbomber]

At some point you need to own your own feces. Iraq had a screwed up country well before the first U.S. boot hit the ground. It might be worse now, but it's not like they ever protected their ecology.

I just find it a bit hypocritical that we've been busy annihilating a foreign nation for the last decade and nobody seems to be advocating reparations to them meanwhile, when a domestic accident occurs on US territory your government immediately adopts the classic american "ambulance chasing" mentality.

 

You're right though. At some point you do "need to own your own feces".

In this case that means acknowledging that you've happily allowed BP and other companies to run halfassed operations in the Mexican Gulf in return for cheaper fuel and now, when those halfassed safety measures have backfired on you, you're immediately trying to shovel your feces back to BP rather than, as you quite rightly say, owning it for yourself.

 

Seems that your grasp of responsibility is laughable too.

 

Your attempt at understanding U.S. foreign relations policy is laughable at best, without any sort of evidence and coherent analysis it's best to keep the Oil Rig Disaster (Spill, Baby, Spill) as an oil rig disaster and not related to the war in Iraq.

Well, please enlighten me.

 

These fishermen that are going to be out of a job aren't getting a 401k plan from BP. They are being offered some compensation in return for providing their resources in the cleanup effort, that compensation isn't on the level of what they'd make in a good fishing season. And does anybody think that BP will be paying their bills in 10 years when the fishing industry is still not back to full strength in the area? In all likelihood the ecological impact is being exaggerated, because that's just the usual trend, but I'd really hope that's the case otherwise worldwide fish markets will be affected and the endangered species in the marshlands don't get welfare.

Fact is that you're talking about a bunch of people who're just about scraping a living as fishermen.

Very soon it's likely they won't be able to make a living at it and they'll end up lumbered with big debts on the loans for their boats and living in poverty, which'll create a burden for the government.

 

For these people a big hand-out in compensation is a "get out of jail" card for a lot of them.

When you have a $250k loan for a fishing vessel that costs around $1,000 a day to run and you're only pulling in maybe $10k of fish per week things get kinda tight.

You probably won't be able to sell the boat for a good price and, even if you did, most of the money would go to repay the loan which'd leave you unemployed with little cash in an area where fishing is the only big business.

 

If you can convince BP that you're gonna lose £500k in revenue due to this oil spill you can pay off the loan on your boat, sell it off and still have plenty of money to relocate your family to any part of the USA where you think you have a better chance of employment.

Like I say, it's a "get out of jail" card for a lot of these people.

 

TBH, I've got nothing against people trying to put the squeeze on a big company.

The investors can afford it and, let's face it, you'll all end up paying for any compensation in higher fuel prices eventually.

What DOES seem a little petty and contemptible is for the US government to encourage people to take this action rather than be forced to support a community that is inevitably falling into poverty regardless of any oil spill.

[ThaFlash]

I get that you guys like to see America suffer, it's popular these days. But why are you so adamant about making everything somehow related to foreign policy? This is just like the Family Guy where Lois wins the Mayoral race by answering every question with "9/11".

 

This sort of thing doesn't even fly in discussions on Fox News:

"Well this oil rig disaster which is leaking oil into gulf is getting out of hand"

-"Yes Sarah, but I think we really know the root cause of all this and it goes back to '9/11'"

...yeah, that can't even work on Fox News.

 

But you, somehow in your mind it makes sense to relate an accidental explosion and oil spill to the war in Iraq? And then, somehow only American foreign policy since 2003 towards Iraq is relevant? You could be the on the same level of reasoning as Glen Beck.

[Stealthbomber]

I get that you guys like to see America suffer, it's popular these days. But why are you so adamant about making everything somehow related to foreign policy? This is just like the Family Guy where Lois wins the Mayoral race by answering every question with "9/11".

 

This sort of thing doesn't even fly in discussions on Fox News:

"Well this oil rig disaster which is leaking oil into gulf is getting out of hand"

-"Yes Sarah, but I think we really know the root cause of all this and it goes back to '9/11'"

...yeah, that can't even work on Fox News.

 

But you, somehow in your mind it makes sense to relate an accidental explosion and oil spill to the war in Iraq? And then, somehow only American foreign policy since 2003 towards Iraq is relevant? You could be the on the same level of reasoning as Glen Beck.

Just pointing out that your government seems keen to make BP pay compensation to everybody affected by the oil spill while, at the same time, not seemingly so committed to the same sort of support for those who's lives have been ruined in Iraq.

 

Not sure what the connection to 9/11 actually is though.

[Jon L]

I would just like to point out to you that the ecological impact of events like this can never be over-estimated. Yes there may only be a short period of time where the fishermen cannot fish, but if you then consider that the reason they cannot fish is because of the oil spill. Which has happened to kill a shed load of the fish. Meaning a smaller breeding population, leading to less fish to catch, equating to smaller returns for the fishermen.

 

I would also like to point out that the worlds fish stocks are over fished far beyond their regenerative capacity, so if some of the people affected by this can manage to use the event to get out of the struggle they face, more power to them. They are a small minority and as such get *froitcagio* over left, right and centre.

 

In the end the causes for this event are the shoddy way in which your fellows use their power to vote and protest. Your government like ours in the UK is full of mugs that cannot do the job they are paid to do. And the problem there is the system. The system corrupts all those within it, and degrades the good politicians into bad ones, and the bad into worse ones.

 

Regulatory and monitoring organisations need more power to find and stop malpractice. But they also need to be totally unbiased and incorruptible, as the major issue with many of them is they are to easily influenced by those they are supposed to be investigating.

 

 

My opinions are my own and are based on my degree studies and my own personal interest in the world in which we live. I make no claim to be an expert in any given field as i do not yet hold a degree. But I like to think that I can see the whole picture before I sit on either side of the fence.

[Jon L]

Just pointing out that your government seems keen to make BP pay compensation to everybody affected by the oil spill while, at the same time, not seemingly so committed to the same sort of support for those who's lives have been ruined in Iraq.

 

Not sure what the connection to 9/11 actually is though.

 

Well its much harder to ignore people that are A:in your own country and B: speak the language. But hey its what they have been doing for so many years so why change now. lol.