Consequences and lots of hidden oil still remain
Leatherback turtles are among the species to encounter sub-surface oil from BP's exploded well
<Update: Today, even as President Obama declared the BP oil spill all but over (thank God he didn't declare "mission accomplished"), a Senate subcommittee hearing on dispersants opened. Almost immediately, Sen. Frank Lautenberg gave a dire warning:
Relief workers and wildlife in the gulf have become unwitting participants in a dangerous science experiment...There are enough warning signs about the risks of the dispersants to know that we need more federal testing.>
And so....more than three months after it started...BP's exploded oil well....is plugged. The biggest unintentional oil spill in history has been staunched.
This news comes as White House energy advisor Carole Browner assures us that 3/4's of the spilled oil has been disappeared through the processes of evaporation, skimming, burning, microbe-eating and dispersal. "The vast majority of the oil has now been contained, it’s been skimmed, Mother Nature has done its part, it’s evaporated...So I think we’re turning a corner here."
Time to start celebrating?
Sure, let's throw a party for all those hard-working people in the Gulf whose livelihoods and lifestyles have been disrupted and even destroyed by this disaster. And while we are at it, let's have a memorial for the uncountable numbers of birds, turtles, mammals, fish and microscopic life forms slaughtered by the spill's toxic, suffocating impacts.
But, let's not spend too much time tooting the vuvuzelas.
And let's especially not believe that the end of the disaster is in sight. There's just too much oil out there that's out of sight -- dispersed through miles of water columns, huddling on the bottom, still coming ashore.
If Browner's estimate is right, that means something like 500,000 gallons of crude is yet to be dealt with -- not to mention those many milllions of gallons dispersed in what may be one of the world's greatest chemistry experiments. The New York Times spotlights the issue with these chilling words:
That dispersed oil now hovers, diluted in the water column, posing a challenge for scientists to track and measure the subsea plumes. Mapping the long-term effects of the nearly 2 million gallons of dispersant used by BP PLC may well be equally difficult, given the array of unanswered questions that surround the products' rapid breakdown of oil droplets and their chronic toxicity.
In other words, while dispersants may have helped spare the Gulf's birds, the chemicals are likely shifting dangers to other species lower in the food chain.
Earthjustice, which helped force EPA to reveal what makes up the dispersant chemical mix, will continue pushing to get to the bottom of this issue, and of course is continuing a variety of litigation efforts aimed at preventing another BP disaster.
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I wonder if Earthjustice's "litigation efforts" will be thrown out as the documents filed don't seem to know the name of the company they are suing. It's BP, guys, not British Petroleum, a company that ceased to exist 12 years ago.
Earth certainly does need a good lawyer, and it doesn't look like Earthjustice is it.
shut the fuck up bitch
BP seems to ignore one very important area that deserves compensation and that is "Quality of Life" that has been destroyed by this disastrous oil spill. I have lived here for 22 years, planned to retire here in a Condo on the Gulf Waterfront and now my dreams and plans, everything I've worked for, has gone down the tubes as a direct result to BP's negligence in the Gulf of Mexico! Accident my ass, they ignored safety precautions, took short cuts, were very greedy to get at the black gold. Now, not only is my quality of life severely damaged, but I have to contend with the environmental damage that hampers me from walking the beach (I don't want to breathe toxic air), swimming in the water (nor swim in polluted water), fishing is out, and eating seafood caught in the Gulf (don't want to eat tainted seafood)! And last, but not least, they have murdered 11 humans and countless marine life!! They are getting away with murder!!!! Yes, I'm fuming mad!! We will collect the "black gold" now on our beaches and they will come in after the so-called cleanup and drill again for the black gold that will make all of them filthy rich!! DO THEY THINK WE'RE STUPID!! Every single citizen of Bay County and all of the other counties affected by this disaster deserve compensation.
As of yesterday and today, there are MASSIVE amounts of dead fish floating up on shore in Biloxi, MS. The hotels, Hard Rock and Beau Rivage, hire boats to clean them up in the morning, but by noon they float in again. Beyond the breakwater there are SEAS of them. I have pictures if you are interested.
Thanks for your observations keep us (me) informed on whats really happening down there, because I don't believe a word they are saying! Sorry but 200 million (at one estimate) gallons of oil and dispersant don't just quickly dissipate. One only has to look at the Exxon Valdez spill which was minor in comparison to realize that the effect of this is, and will be unbelievable.
You sir are full of ligumes. Oil when dispersed rises to the surface and simply loses cohesion with other molecules of oil. It does not hover below the surface, it can not. It is of lighter specific gravity than water. It must rise. If you pop an air bubble, the resulting smaller air bubbles must rise by a similar action. You use a dispersant when you do your laundry, when you wash your dishes. Soap is a dispersant. Don't believe it? Put a teaspoon full of oil in a dishpan and try to make it "hover" beneath the surface. Put some soap on it. It loses cohesion and adhesion and becomes dispersed over the surface of the water.
Individual human beings, you included, put more oil into the rivers, lakes and oceans each day, than BP did in total during the spill. You put more dispersants into the water than BP as well. When you wash your driveway, wash your car, wash your boat or airplane, wash your dishes or clothing you put oil and dispersants into the sewage system, or the storm drainage system and it makes its way to the ocean.
Stop beating up BP for an "accident". Worry much more about the "dead zones" in the gulf of mexico caused by your "intentional" discharge of polutants much worse than oil each day.
Dan Apted
dan@alaskapelletmill.com
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