From the Guardian:
BP’s behaviour in the Gulf is appalling. But our thirst for oil is the real issue
“As this piece is written, act one of the Gulf of Mexico tragedy continues, agonisingly, to unfold. We, the people of the region, keep hoping to leave behind the terrifying explosions and ghastly loss of human life, the dread invoked by black jets billowing endlessly from below and the floating oil spreading over an ever-growing area.
(snip)
At this point, three weeks into the calamity, BP had yet to release any video images of the oil gushing from the stricken well. Pressure from journalists eventually pried loose a single, 30-second clip, along with a statement from BP professing surprise that anyone was even interested and the certainty that no one looking at the images could possibly tell what the flow rate was. Not so, it turned out.
Several scientists were able to estimate flow rates at between 40,000 and 100,000 barrels a day. Suddenly a great many people were highly interested in video and other information. Threat of congressional subpoena – a very powerful writ in our system – forced BP to produce more video and eventually the live feed from the bottom we can now see at bp.com. The gusher video went viral.”
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From ABC News:
BP’s Top Kill Effort Fails to Plug Gulf Oil Leak
“The most ambitious bid yet to stop the worst oil spill in U.S. history ended in failure Saturday after BP was unable to overwhelm the gusher of crude with heavy fluids and junk. President Obama called the setback “as enraging as it is heartbreaking.”
The oil giant immediately began readying its next attempted fix, using robot submarines to cut the pipe that’s gushing the oil and cap it with funnel-like device, but the only guaranteed solution remains more than two months away.”
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From Global Research:
Ten Things You Need (But Don’t Want) To Know About the BP Oil Spill
“How the owner of the exploded oil rig has made $270 million off the disaster, and nine other shocking, depressing facts about the oil spill.
It’s been 37 days since BP’s offshore oil rig, Deepwater Horizon, exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. Since then, crude oil has been hemorrhaging into ocean waters and wreaking unknown havoc on our ecosystem — unknown because there is no accurate estimate of how many barrels of oil are contaminating the Gulf.
Though BP officially admits to only a few thousand barrels spilled each day, expert estimates peg the damage at 60,000 barrels or over 2.5 million gallons daily. (Perhaps we’d know more if BP hadn’t barred independent engineers from inspecting the breach.) Measures to quell the gusher have proved lackluster at best, and unlike the country’s last big oil spill — Exxon-Valdez in 1989 — the oil is coming from the ground, not a tanker, so we have no idea how much more oil could continue to pollute the Gulf’s waters.
The Deepwater Horizon disaster reminds us what can happen — and will continue to happen — when corporate malfeasance and neglect meet governmental regulatory failure.”
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From Raw Story:
Energy expert: Nuking oil leak ‘only thing we can do’
“As the latest effort to plug the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico meets with failure, the idea of nuking the immediate area to seal the oil underground is gaining steam among some energy experts and researchers.
One prominent energy expert known for predicting the oil price spike of 2008 says sending a small nuclear bomb down the leaking well is “probably the only thing we can do” to stop the leak.
(snip)
His idea echoes that of a Russian newspaper that earlier this month suggested the US detonate a small nuclear bomb to seal the oil beneath the sea. Komsomoloskaya Pravda argued in an editorial that Russia had successfully used nuclear weapons to seal oil spills on five occasions in the past.”
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The blunders and profit of this disaster are so disheartening. Might nuclear power save the spill? I can’t imagine it working and yet I’ve read several stories of Russia doing this successfully. Still it’s hard to wrap my head around. If only Hunter S. Thompson were still alive-I like to think he’d write a hilarious, dark story about this disaster.
Posted by Vixen as News at 11:47 PM CDT