26% is “residual” oil which is “either on or just below the surface as light sheen and weathered tar balls, has washed ashore or been collected from the shore, or is buried in sand and sediments;”
Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Suggestions: Prize May be Awarded for Oil Spill Solution.
June 28, 2010 – Francis Beland, a Vice-President at the XPrize Foundation, announced today that the group may offer a $10 million XPrize for a smart idea for an oil spill solution to the Deepwater Horizon oil leak. In the past the XPrize people have offered similar awards for coming up with awards for private spaceflight or ultra-efficient automobiles. [click to continue…]
Here at BP Oil News we’ve gotten almost two thousand suggestions for ways to plug the Gulf oil leak or mitigate the damage from the Gulf oil spill. Here’s a link to some of your oil spill suggestions. And here’s a link to a page with many more oil spill suggestions. Many of the suggestions are contained in comments, but some oil spill suggestions were sent in using our contact form. Because of the volume of suggestions, we would like to request that future suggestions be submitted via comments to this post. And if you have suggestions about how the President should deal with the oil spill, please post your comments under the article “We need a New Deal for the Gulf Coast.”
Here are some oil spill suggestions we’ve already received via the contact form: [click to continue…]
Deepwater Horizon Response: Is the Medicine (Corexit) Worse Than the Disease?
BP came under criticism weeks ago for using Corexit(R), a highly toxic chemical oil dispersant, in huge amounts to try to break up the oil gushing from its well in the Gulf of Mexico. Some scientists argued that there are less-toxic, more effective dispersants available. Other scientists argued we should use no dispersants, as the damage from the dispersants may do more harm than good. As we reported May 20,2010, Corexit is carcinogenic, mutagenic, and highly toxic, and scientists are concerned about its effect on marine life. Corexit is banned in Great Britain. [click to continue…]
Late Wednesday the EPA gave BP 24 hours to choose a less toxic chemical dispersant to break up the BP oil spill, the Washington Post reported. The decision came hours after Congress heard testimony from company executives and scientists on the high toxicity of Corexit, and the relative ineffectiveness of the chemical against the type of crude leaking into the Gulf. Once the EPA approves the new dispersant, BP will have 72 hours to begin using the new dispersant. [click to continue…]
We’ve had several more suggestions to fix the oil leak or limit the damage from the BP oil spill. If you want to join in the conversation, the quickest way is to post a comment. You may also send your suggestion to us using the Contact Form on this page.
Laura writes:
Hi – I had a thought while doing the dishes… I had an oil mass in the water of my sink and added the dish soap. Immediatly after, the oil moved away from the soap. I know they are using the boui system to keep the oil from getting to the coastline…. would it be possible to add soap to that containment barrier and it would then deter it from coming in?
Additionally, if there was a way to do this, maybe the boui and soap could be dragged around oil spill area(s) to get the oil more contained and use a water suction process to get the oil up? I’m sure there are alot of ideas coming in… maybe this could work? [click to continue…]
60 minutes had some compelling reporting last night about the Deepwater Horizon explosion and the Gulf oil spill. Among other things, they interviewed BP employee Mike Williams, Chief Electronics Technician aboard the Deepwater Horizon. Williams said a pod that operated the blowout protector was not operating properly before the explosion on the oil rig. Williams also said that before the explosion someone discovered chunks of rubber in the drilling fluid and reported it to a supervisor. Apparently someone had drilled through a seal. Williams asked the supervisor if this was out of the ordinary and the supervisor said “No big deal.” Williams said he thought, “How could it not be a big deal? There’s chunks of our seal now missing.” Here is last night’s 60 Minutes episode:
Deepwater Horizon response
Today, Fox News interviewed Doug Suttles, BP’s Chief Operating Officer. Although Suttles tried to put a positive spin on it, he revealed that the giant straw that the company has inserted into the well is siphoning off only about 1,000 barrels of oil per day. Here’s the video:
One expert is calling on the U.S. government to nuke the Gulf oil spill. Christopher Brownfield, in an article at The Daily Beast, suggested that the government use nuclear or conventional explosives to “destroy the well and put the matter to rest.” Brownfield has experience with nuclear weapons; he’s a former nuclear submarine officer, an Iraq veteran, and a visiting scholar on nuclear policy at Columbia University. Brownfield says CNN reported last Thursday that the Russians used nuclear explosives on four separate occasions to seal runaway oil and gas wells underwater.
According to CBS News, at least one Russian newspaper has urged the U.S. to use nuclear explosives. What do you think of the use of nuclear explosives to close the BP oil well?
UPDATED (see last paragraph and new link) – A reader named Bart wrote and said BP should consider using a proven method utilizing ground bagasse (a byproduct of sugar production from cane) infiltrated with ammonia to broadcast over sensitive wildlife areas where oil is washing ashore. According to Bart, the bagasse preferentially absorbs the oil and within a matter of weeks the hydrocarbons, with the aid of natural microbes and the nitrogen source, break down, eliminating the problem. Bart says it seems as though BP should welcome solutions such as this one. Bart tells us that CNN broadcast it on the news today, and says BP appears to be ignoring attempts to alert them to this additional remediation method. Finally, Bart said BP should be reminded by everyone possible to employ all available methodologies.
Thanks Bart. As I’ve said before, I’m a lawyer and don’t know enough about oil spill remediation to know a good idea when I see one. But we have readers who do know the subject matter. If anyone else has an idea that’s not being used, please send it along to us.
UPDATE: Bart sent us an email with an article discussing the use of bagasse to clean up oil. Here’s Bart’s email:
“Check this article describing the usefulness of bagasse (not to mention the huge quantities produced as a byproduct of sugar production) in clinging to oil while repelling water (hydrophobic quality). A CNN spot was even a further modification of the bagasse- it had ammonium and microbial agents also embedded in it to speed up the conversion to small-chain hydrocarbons and eventually organic mulch, just what we will need in the sensitive ecotypes of coastal Louisiana and Mississippi.
What do you think of the feasibility of finding some organization to try this preemptively in a test area to prove to the corporate types that they should be purchasing all of this treated bagasse they can get their hands on and hiring crop dusting planes to be at the ready for the moment any of these oil slicks hit the bayous? Would that be too proactive for our society? (Link to bagasse article).
Shortly after publishing five unsolicited suggestions for dealing with BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill, we received another suggestion. Keith Schulz contacted us, gave us permission to post his name, and made the following suggestion:
“I work in the industry as a technical specialist and have an idea I would like to present. I am suggesting using a device we use called a clock spring to seal off the leak. This device is a spiral wrapped piece of metal which could be wrapped around the leak site and either slow or stop the oil from escaping. We have used this device for repairs on our pipelines and have had success. Please E-mail or call me if I can help assist.”
Keep sending ideas of ways to deal with the Gulf oil spill, and we’ll keep posting them. (here is a link to a picture of the Clock Spring Keith sent us):
