U.S. Was Not Ready For Major Oil Spill

[Omaha Steve]

Source: Wall Street Journal

By JEFFREY BALL, STEPHEN POWER and NEIL KING

Crude gushing into the Gulf of Mexico and washing ashore in Louisiana is exposing how ill-prepared the U.S. has been to respond to a major offshore oil spill.

In the fight to limit environmental damage from the month-old spill—which is on track to rival the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in size—BP PLC executives, government officials, and scientists are learning as they go, even though the industry has been drilling in the Gulf for decades and has 77 rigs operating there, according to ODS-Petrodata, a research firm.

The Environmental Protection Agency says it is still assessing the ecological effect of the 600,000 gallons of chemicals that BP has sprayed into the Gulf to break up the oil so far. As of Sunday, the agency and BP were locked in a standoff over whether to continue using the same chemical dispersant.

Some scientists researching the spill don't have the right instruments to measure the spill or to study its impact. Maps that federal officials are using to identify priority areas to protect from spreading oil are outdated. And the Coast Guard says the country lacks enough plastic piping, or "boom," to keep the incoming oil away from the coast.

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704904604575262703867624266.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular

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Getty Images

A BP crew removes oil from a beach Sunday in Port Fourchon, La. The company said the amount of oil being siphoned from the leak has declined.

[dgibby]

1. If we weren't prepared,

then we shouldn't have issued the permits to drill, and we sure as hell shouldn't have waived the environmental impact requirements.

[gateley]

2. Yes. Someone else posted a while back that if we don't know how to stop

a gusher at 5,000 feet, we shouldn't drill 5,000 feet. Period.

[CLANG]

7. You treehuggers and your basic math, Foiled again!!

:rofl:

[madchick44]

25. Since when is the US government in the business of pumping oil?

Of course the government wasn't prepared. It's the job of the oil companies to be prepared and all those folks who don't want those companies regulated. Free market is only free for those making money in it. The rest of us are screwed.

[boppers]

8. Again with the EIS.

How, exactly, would such a document have made *any* difference, whatsoever? Do environmental impact statements have some magical "blowout stopping power" that I'm not aware of?

[goforit]

3. OMG!!! WTF!!!....We know how!!1 BP refuses outside Co. involvement!!

[BrklynLiberal]

4. The extent of the chaos and deceit around this disaster is mind-boggling...

[ixion]

5. "Whoever could have foreseen...[insert patently obvious problem here]"

:eyes:

Whatever.

[PSPS]

6. "is on track to rival the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in size"

In the fight to limit environmental damage from the month-old spill—which is on track to rival the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in size—BP PLC executives, government officials, and scientists are learning as they go, even though the industry has been drilling in the Gulf for decades and has 77 rigs operating there, according to ODS-Petrodata, a research firm.

Apparently, the WSJ depends on BP for ad revenue.

This volcano has already spewed well over ten times the Valdez into the gulf, and we'll get another Valdez worth every two or three days for an indefinite period of time, perhaps until the field is exhausted.

[CLANG]

9. Not true.

I have it on impeccable authority that BP is now capturing 100% of the estimated 5000 barrels a day.
:sarcasm:

[boppers]

11. Valdez was 37,000 tons.

This is between 21,000 and 340,000 tons.

For comparison purposes, out last big mexican gulf spill was Ixtoc I, 454,000-480,000 tons, gushing from June 3, 1979 to March 23, 1980.

[No Elephants]

20. 21,000 and 340,000? That's some range. Besides, how do we know how many tons? We've been lied to

over and over. Raised my trust issues, the lying has.

21,000 and 340,000. You're funny.

[boppers]

24. It *is* quite the range, isn't it?

There isn't a whole lot of consensus on the total amount yet.... heck, there isn't consensus on the daily average, even *with* the different measurements being employed.

[ShamelessHussy]

10. not to mention the perpetrators - The Big Oil Industry

fuck off M$M _|_

[intheflow]

12. No kidding!

More than half the country was totally delusional or oblivious to the actual dangers of drilling for oil in the ocean. I know so many people who still don't believe it's as bad as it is because they don't understand anything about ecology or ecosystems. It doesn't surprise me that after 30 years of Republican majorities the country is completely clueless about what should be done now that a worst case scenario has happened. It makes me shudder to think what would happen if we were ever nuked or even carpet bombed. But then, I felt that way after 9-11 and Katrina, too.

[BarbaRosa]

13. Like the US is prepared for anything,

except for another war.

[No Elephants]

21. We haven't done well in wars in quite a while, either.

[Lagomorph]

27. That's mainly due to mission creep.

We took out Iraq's army in a couple weeks. If we fought like World War 2, their cities and infrastructure would have been utterly destroyed with millions of casualties. We should have left them to make their own future.

The case they sold to us was "get Bin Laden". They've done everything but that.

[scentopine]

14. The US Govt. said oil drilling is safer than ever, so safe we'll open up the eastern seaboard...

don't tell me someone wasn't telling the truth here in a rush to give big oil a big fucking gift!

[XemaSab]

15. Paging Sherlock Holmes....

:P

[dixiegrrrrl]

16. My only pleasure about this spill

has been watching the stock prices for BP, Hal, and RIG ( TransOcean) sink down, down, down.
BP esp. has lost about 1/3 of price.

[Javaman]

17. correction. BP wasn't prepared. We didn't create this mess.

they did via their negligence.

[No Elephants]

22. BP didn't issue permits to itself.

[Javaman]

23. right.

we owned the wells. we paid off the inspectors, we looked the other way when safety people told us it wasn't safe.

You have some wild imagination there.

[krkaufman]

18. The opening sentence is an odd one for the WSJ ...

How ill-prepared "the US" was for an oil spill? Shouldn't the emphasis have been on private industry's lack of preparedness? Yes, the government wasn't prepared but that has been the WSJ's point of view for decades now, that the government should just leave all this to private industry.

[krkaufman]

19. "amount of oil being siphoned from the leak has declined"

Shouldn't there be some independent source corroborating this data? As has been widely discussed, it is in BP's interests to say the siphoning number is off, because they don't want to admit to the actual volume of oil pouring from the pipe. I'd think the siphoning number would be eminently easy to verify, given the captured oil must be getting collected.

[Lagomorph]

26. That seems to be fairly obvious...

...these reporters need to get out of the office and look around some....

Talk to the people who would have to do the job and stay away from the "experts".