Are there any companies out there better suited to plugging the leak than BP themselves? If there's anyone better suited to do the cleanup it's a shame they're not being given the chance.

I'm also wondering what kind of liability a company faces for this type of fuck-up as you'd think that the long-term cleanup would bankrupt a company like BP.

IMO, this type of fuck-up should demand expropriation of the property and rights away from the people who caused the problem. But then, who do you give the oil to? Some other turd company who's likely to do the same thing later on.

It'll be interesting to see how much money BP has to bleed in comparison to the damage estimates.

And their subcontractors .. including.. wait for it.. Halliburton.

Speaking of Halliburton, I just watched "The Yes Men Fix the World" - a behind the scenes/documentary about the Yes Men's various political/corporate pranks a couple of weeks ago. It was funny, but would have been much funnier if not for the seriousness of the subject matter.

Maybe one day they'll put out an apology on behalf of BP. And pledge the funds BO will no doubt short-change the people affected by the spill.

The whole spill made me immediately think of the Union Carbide chemical disaster in Bhopal India also featured in the movie. There's no comparison in terms of immediate loss of life, but the long-term effects may be just as catastrophic, if not more so.

The Trans-Alaska Pipeline, partly owned by BP, shut down on Tuesday after spilling several thousand barrels of crude oil, drastically cutting supply out of Alaska's oilfields.
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64P04U20100526?type=domesticNews

I really worry about the lack of definition/specificity for "several thousand," "secondary containment" and "containment area." The first could mean 3000 just as easily as it could be 50000. The second and third (they use both terms in the article) may well just be a clear-cut parcel of land surrounding the primary storage tank just as easily as it could be a natural pond/lake inhabited by wildlife. Nothing reported implies this "secondary containment" is any type of secure container.

This sidebar link was encouraging:

I wouldn't get too excited about the possibility of criminal punishment. U.S. offshore drilling is regulated by the Minerals Management Service, and it's quite clear that eight years of government run by oil tycoons turned that agency into a laughing stock that had no interest in enforcing regulations:


Inspector General’s Inquiry Faults Regulators

So, not only did the MMS rubber-stamp the oil companies' inspection reports, but they were wanking on the job (literally!), accepting bribes, and showing up to work under the influence of crystal meth. With regulatory capture like that, it's a wonder we don't have a Deepwater Horizon spill every year.

To directly answer your original questions... No, there's nobody else out there who can do this better than BP. And BP isn't really equipped to do it, either. Nobody bothered to make sure there was a way to clean up a mess like this.

Regarding damages, BP is in theory responsible for all of the cleanup of the spill, however, they'll probably just end up paying for the cost of making the oil that's on the water go away. This is why they've focused so much on using dispersants, going so far as to ignore government directives to stop using a toxic dispersant. BP wants the oil to be out of sight, and out of mind.

Aside from the direct spill cleanup, a law passed in 1990 in the wake of the Exxon Valdez spill limits BP's liability to a paltry $75 million. Congress is trying to remove that cap now (talk about closing the barn doors after the cows are gone) but obviously BP would be subject to the $75 million limit that was in place when the accident occurred. Good for them, bad for us.

I would think that 75 BILLION would be a lot closer to the actual costs. And even that's probably too low. I'm a fair person, so I'd probably set up a payment plan for them if I had the power to do so. Let's say an even 20 billion per year to be split by all the municipalities around the gulf with another 10 billion to be spent on clean-up efforts by BP themselves.

There really needs to be a bigger deterrent to issues like this beyond the minor PR inconvenience. 75 Million is chump change. That's the kind of money you drop on the floor and don't even bother stopping to pick up if you're this large and wealthy a company.

The liability cap only applies if BP did not break any laws while drilling. That is why the stakes are high for a criminal preceding to happen and be successful.

For you conspiracy theorists:

BP did this on purpose to force out the smaller actors.

I'll go back to not watching the news now.

Well, maybe a prosecution isn't so far-fetched after all.

WASHINGTON — A top BP worker who was aboard the Deepwater Horizon in the hours leading up to the explosion declined to testify in front of a federal panel investigating the deadly oil rig blowout, telling the U.S Coast Guard he was invoking his constitutional right to avoid self-incrimination.

I had to chuckle at this part: "...said the higher costs to operate in the Gulf could be prohibitive for smaller players."

As if the higher regulatory costs will come out of the oil companies' profits. No, you and I get to pay those costs at the gas pump.

tanstaafl.

Where's TigerJimmy in this thread? Maybe the government should deregulate the whole oil industry and just let these clowns do what they want. Maybe the crude is actually good for the fish. And imagine how much smoother everything will slide through you when coated with the delicious black gold.

You can try to bait in TigerJimmy but I don’t think you’ll find anyone on any side of the political fence (that isn’t a total nut) that will argue that any good will come from any of this.

Although of course the level of damages will be hugely bigger this time round, and I assume the cleanup will be done to higher standards (if possible). There's still an open contaminated pool at Bhopal that local kids swim in.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
*sigh*

My personal solution. Frozen assets. Liquidation. BP should be completely dissolved, every job lost and every dollar recovered. They shouldn't be allowed to sell olive oil door to door, let alone operate any heavy machinery. Bleed them until there's nothing left, every cent used to cover the costs of cleaning this shit up. If anything's left over put it into a fund for continued environmental protection and recuperation in the area, not to mention health bills for the residents affected by this travesty.

And then oil prices go through the roof (because it becomes too expensive to run an oil company) and the global economy collapses. We've got to ween our civilisation off oil before we can do anything like that.

Cold turkey is never pleasant. With oil, it'll be a whole lot worse.

Not to mention that it'd be hard for the US government to dissolve a British corporation. Yeah, they could dissolve their US assets, but that wouldn't do much more than put a bunch of Americans out of work.

I think a better solution would be to install systems at every gas pump that recognize bumper stickers. If some Excursion pulls in with a "Drill baby drill" bumper sticker on it, the owner gets to hear all the current news including damage to American businesses that mentality is causing while they wait on their 50 gallon tank to be filled.

It's really sad to see that this same disaster is occurring 31 years after the IXTOC 1. Clearly nothing meaningful was done properly to ensure a similar disaster wouldn't happen again. 31 years is a long time for safer drilling solutions to be developed, and for some reason, they weren't. As Rachel's segment pointed out, all that has changed is pushing the problem further under water. I hope more news segments pick up on this, and start asking BP and the others involved why there hasn't been an investment into better disaster prevention methods.

Much as I hate trial-by-mass-media, there have been multiple reports making out that actually fairly reasonable engineering solutions for disaster prevention are routinely deployed these days, including on Deepwater Horizon, and that the proximate cause of the current disaster (like Chernobyl) is human hubris ignoring or compromising those engineering solutions.

Peter

Media has it's place in getting things into peoples minds, and then their representatives minds, for better or worse. I think in this particular case, people should be asking why the newer engineering solutions weren't either in place, or followed. Why were things left to get to this point, instead of an inspection finding problems early? Why is it taking so long to try alternate solutions? Engineering safety solutions is only part of the issue, clearly there was a huge regulatory failure on this situation as well.

To me, if a company is going to be allowed to work at that depth in the ocean, they should be mandated to ensure that not only are proper procedures being followed on the rig, but that emergency equipment is nearby in case of a complete failure onboard. A "top hat" device should have already been ready and sitting on standby somewhere in the gulf, possibly stored at one of the many locations needed for oil refining. If ultimately relief wells are the best solution, then ensure they can be drilled quicker, possibly by pre-drilling a little bit and keeping the alternate sites ready to be brought online quickly.

When your drilling rig topples over and sinks into the ocean, how exactly does one finish drilling the relief well?

Brace and bit?

Obviously you keep a spare drilling rig on hand...;)

Apparently, yes. Found this article talking about how the Canadian government mandates a relief well to be finished in the same season as the main well for any drilling in the Beaufort Sea.

First something funny


And yet another BP blunder, continuing to cover the issue up instead of dealing with it.

BP buying internet search ads for "oil spill"

Haha, I liked that comic. This strip is great as well, and this week he's doing a BP theme (though today's is a bit of an in-joke for readers of the strip).

Damned Great Old Ones!!!