Deepwater Horizon: Two Years On

 
photo credit James H “Rip” Kirby III/Surfrider Foundation

The 20th of April was likely a familiar date in the minds of many of the readers who frequent this blog.  That morning in 2010, an explosion occurred on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig drilling in the Gulf of Mexico that would lead to largest peacetime marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry.  For five months, crude oil poured into the waters of the Gulf.  Approximately 200 million gallons of oil and two million gallons of the controversial dispersant Corexit flowed into the sea, covering everything it touched - be that plants, animals or cleanup workers.

Two years on, what have we learned about the effects of such a large spill?  To be honest - not much.  British Petroleum (BP) has effectively bought up all the researchers in the area.  Scientists who have joined the research program are forbidden to publish, share or speak about their findings for at least three years.  Fingers crossed for some news next year?

Add to that the fact that the $500 million BP promised for 10 years of research in the area has been mostly absent.  A board of 20 people controls the grant money, and only $40 million has been dolled out - local politicians demanding most of it for their respective areas.

Many scientists feel that the lack of action is allowing precious data to slip away.

"Oil is a moving target; with every day of passing time, we get further and further from the acute effects of the oil and it becomes harder and harder to trace those effects," said Ian MacDonald, a biological oceanographer at Florida State University in Tallahassee.

"A number of people are worried that we are going to miss getting out in the field in the strengths and numbers we need to," adds Christopher D'Elia, dean and professor at Louisiana State University's School of the Coast and Environment.

In regards to fisheries, shellfish populations are still suffering severely.

"Has anyone found a successful spring spat set on their leases yet?  Is there any evidence that the long-awaited oyster industry recovery has begun east of the River or in the Barataria Bay area?" asks Mississippi-based oyster expert Ed Cake

Oyster fisherman Nick Collins added that there is nothing but dead shells in the Louisiana oyster beds - something that was also mentioned last year.

Another group of animals that have been highlighted post-spill are dolphins.  The number of beached dolphins after the BP spill - both alive and dead - has far surpassed the normal number of occurrences in a given year.  Many of those found alive have been underweight and suffering from anemia, lung and liver diseases and stress hormone deficiencies.  The particularly scary point to recognise from this is that dolphins are, like us, mammals, and the afflictions they have been exhibiting may reflect what could happen to humans after long-term exposure.

Let's not forget that the oil is - after all - still there.  BP is paying $179 million in tourism promotion and another $82 million in seafood testing and marketing.

"Many Gulf residents think BP just wants to close the book on the disaster.  That's unlikely to happen until the environmental bill is paid, and funds are set aside to restore Gulf ecosystem."

Tar balls are still being periodically reported on the beaches.  Although being supposedly harmless, a study at Auburn University has found them teeming with the bacteria Vibrio vulnificus, which is in the same family as the bacteria that causes cholera.  This is particularly threatening to individuals with compromised immune systems, diabetes or liver disease.

"Whether or not a specific Vibrio vulnificus is pathogenic matters not to the bacteriologist who is determining the relative levels of that bacterium in molluscan shellfish or in growing waters for management purposes, but it will matter to an at at-risk (immuno-compromised) person who should avoid exposure to V. vulnificus including those strains in BP's tar balls since he or she could find out too late that the strain encountered was, in fact, pathogenic--and deadly," says Cake.

The most recent posting I've seen on the BP catastrophe are the photos (also above) and video of Corexit absorbed into human skin.

"Worse, the toxins in this unholy mix of Corexit and crude actually penetrate wet skin faster than dry skin."

Bad news all around, I'm afraid.  Although BP would like you to believe the spill has been successfully cleaned up, the evidence proves otherwise.

"The herring fishery in Prince William Sound is only now beginning to recover - 22 years after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska...The oyster fishery in Mexico's Terminos Lagoon has not fully recovered 32 year after the 1979  Ixtoc-1 oil spill."

Keep that in mind.

Read more:
Lessons from Gulf spill slipping away
No Sign of Oyster Recovery Two Years After BP Oil Spill
BP's Corexit Oil Tar Sponged Up by Human Skin

BP Holds Gulf Spill Assessment ‘Financially Captive’ - Forbes

photo credit Getty Images

Honestly I really don't understand how this is legal, let alone morally sound. Why do we glorify business over everything else? Anyway...

"BP has been able to delay and deny efforts to assess the damage caused by its 2010 oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico because it controls the funding for those efforts, a Louisiana state official told senators today."

Basically, since BP is supplying the money, BP gets to decide what to do with it. Also - and here's the scary part - BP gets to decide when projects like cleanup and restoration are "done" or need "no further action".

BP's To-Do List (or Not-To-Do List...) includes the following: Leaving anchors in the water from oil booms, designating areas effectively "cleaned up", signing off on projects before they begin and delaying reviews and approvals of projects.

Garrett Graves, chairman of Louisiana’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, thinks that control should be stripped from BP and given to the public:

“I think that equation needs to be flipped over. I think the public needs to be in the driver’s seat. By being able to control the checkbook, you can control what’s in these workplaces, how the assessments are conducted [and] the timelines of the assessments.”

Full article here (Forbes)

Hands Across the Sand 2011 Summary

It's been a few days since the 25^th when people around the world joined hands in unity against offshore oil drilling, and to be honest I needed to not think about it for a few days.

This year was decidedly less spectacular than last. No doubt the lack of an environmental disaster this spring meant people easily forgot that this was an annual event.

Three people showed up in London - far less than I was expecting given the amount of effort I put into promoting it, the early press we got and the promises from other people saying they would be there. Was I disappointed? Well, yes. How could I not be? But do I regret doing it? Absolutely not. I did my best, and I would regret it more if no one did anything this year in London.

Forty US states and eighteen countries participated this year - a noticeable drop from last year following the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico. But the cause is still strong. This year in London we talked about what had been done since the spill, and what new information had come out. It's difficult because we're still researching, measuring and analyzing the effects of the spill and we don't really have a good understanding of the environmental implications just yet. We also discussed BP's shady tactics of buying out a number of researchers in the Gulf last summer...We won't be hearing from them for several years still.

I'd like to think this is a lull in the feelings of the people while we are still sorting out this mess, and when new information revealing the true amount of damage is brought forward, there will be more people with outreached hands drawing lines in the sand.

On a personal note, this was the first environmental event I've planned entirely by myself, and it was harder than I expected. Lessons were learned and I have some experience and ideas for the next event...which I'll be mentioning soon!

I'll leave you with our tiny but happy Hands Across the Sand demonstration this year in St James's Park, London:

One Year Ago - What has Happened since the Gulf Oil Disaster?

photo credit The Associated Press

It's been a busy week. The numerous religious holidays are upon us, but besides that we've had both Earth Day and the one-year anniversary of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster. But don't worry - it hasn't gone unnoticed. So for our dear Mother Earth, let's have a look at what exactly is happening one year after the blowout that led to the greatest environmental disaster in US history.

"As the one-year anniversary of the BP oil spill approaches, some scientists have deemed the health of the Gulf of Mexico as 'nearly back to normal,' though countless workers involved in cleaning up the aftermath of the disaster are reporting mysterious and unexplained illnesses."

The people employed by BP and related agencies to clean up the mess in the Gulf have been consistently reporting symptoms such as severe headaches, nausea, respiratory infections, trouble breathing, dizziness, constant cough, rashes and other ailments. Although BP will be quick to tell you there is no definite correlation between these symptoms and working at the cleanup sites - the trend is clear. People are sick.

"During the hot summer cleanup last summer, Andre [a cleanup responder] says planes would fly overhead spraying chemical dispersants that would drift over the workers, burning people’s skin and making it hard to breathe. Andre says he watched workers collapse from exposure to toxic fumes of the oil. Soon, Andre says he succumbed himself and spent days in the hospital with 'tubes and IV coming out of everyplace in my body.'"

To add insult to injury (literally), when Andre tried to ring BP about the $21,000 in medical costs they agreed to pay for, he found the line had been disconnected.

So where does BP stand on its response program? Ask Ken Feinberg, the man put in charge of dolling out the $20 billion set aside for claims against BP:

"The program is working in terms of money going out the door. We're spent! We're paid out! In the last seven months we're approaching $4 billion, including about $1.7 billion for Louisiana."

The people of Louisiana and other Gulf states, however, are not as satisfied. In a meeting with Mr. Feinberg himself, several voices stood out among the crowd:

"You know, Tony Hayward waned his life back, but everybody in this building wants their life back...You say you've paid so many people in Lafourche [Louisiana]? I don't know one of them."

"What about the people, myself included, that's lost everything that they had? Everything that they've worked for, everything that they took pride in? And you can't get no help from nobody, because there is none. Because ya'll tell everybody that everything's fine in the Gulf of Mexico. Don't worry about nothin'. Everything's gonna be back to normal...When in fact, you're sitting there lying to our faces."

"We had the best [shrimp] product in the world - Now we're known as an oil product!"

And talks of expanding offshore drilling are on the rise! Can you believe it?!

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told reporters "Some of the members of Congress are acting as though the Deepwater Horizon well oil spill never happened."

Says David Yarnold, president of the National Audubon Society, "In the wake of the Exxon Valdez spill off Alaska in 1989, lawmakers passed sweeping new laws raising the financial liability of oil companies, expanding cleanup demands and improving the strength of tanker hulls. This time, they’ve done nothing."

So the effects on the human population of the Gulf of Mexico are pretty clear...but are similar things happening to the marine life? The truth is, science doesn't know - and probably won't know for some time - but the people of the Gulf have their own observations.

"This is Dead...This is Dead...This is Dead..." says Nick Collins as he sorts through his oyster catches. "It's the biggest oyster kill in Louisiana history, probably in the Gulf Coast's history...And I wish I wasn't part of it, I wish I wasn't here."

Dead dolphins and turtles have been washing up on the shores in record numbers. Patches of seabed are smothered and dead. Oil continues to wash ashore. And yet it's been difficult to find data on the long-term effects and environmental impacts. LaTosha Brown, Director of the Gulf Coast Fund, describes it as "The Great Gulf-Coast Experiment" - and she's not half wrong.

So what needs to happen that hasn't happened yet?

"First of all, there has to be an acknowledgement that there hasn't been of the severity of the damage to the ecosystems and to the communities that rely on these ecosystems. Then, number two, if that happens, there has to be meaningful, sustained and community-informed response or decision-making about restoring - to the full extent of that impact - what needs to be done. And neither of those two mandates have been met or are really well on their way to being met," says Derrick Evans, Director of Turkey Creek Community Initiatives.

There is still oil in the Gulf. The disaster isn't over. We're beginning to get a clear idea of what is happening to the human life of the area, but it may still take years to understand the full environmental impacts. Don't let a few news articles or commercials tell you everything in the Gulf of Mexico is "back to normal." We are still fighting this battle. The residents are still fighting this battle. The marine life will continue to fight this battle for a very, very long time. Everything is not okay in the Gulf. A year on, and we've still got a hell of a lot of work to do.

More information & articles:
BBC World Service Assignment: Louisiana Deepwater - BP Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill
Gulf Oil Spill Cleanup Workers Report Mysterious Illnesses Year After Disaster - Huffington Post
A Year after the BP Spill, Drilling Discussion on the Rise - Miami Herald
Gulf Tides 12: One Year Later - BP Drilling Disaster - April 20, 2011 - Gulf Restoration Network

Oil-Spill Investigators: 'This was an Entirely Preventable Disaster' - Daily Comet

photo credit USCG

Just the headline breaks my heart.

Deep down I think we all knew it, but now it's proven. We could have avoided this. All of the death of marine life and all of the hardships of the people of the Gulf coast were avoidable.

"BP failed to keep a close watch on work done by the cement contractor at its doomed Macondo oil well, even though an audit had spotlighted problems with the firm, Halliburton Co., three years before the Deepwater Horizon disaster, according to the presidential oil spill commission."

The "root technical cause" of the BP blowout last April was found to be a "failure of the cement that BP and Halliburton pumped to the bottom of the well."

"The commission previously documented concerns about the stability of the nitrogen-injected foam cement used to seal the Macondo well before BP temporarily stopped work at the site. [Well sites are first drilled, then temporarily stopped in order to attach rigs.] A faulty cement job could allow channels or vulnerabilities for natural gas and oil to escape a well during the time between when it is drilled and when it is later hooked up to a production facility.

In 2007, BP commissioned an audit of Halliburton's work on a separate project that concluded the contractor's cement foam slurry had a tendency to become unstable.

'BP's own cementing expert described the "typical Halliburton profile" as "operationally competent and just good enough technically to get by,"' the report said."

Halliburton has not yet accepted the investigation's results.

Halliburton isn't the only one to blame, however. Accountability was spread across all companies involved including BP and Transocean. A combined lack of attention to warning signs, faulty equipment and poor communication caused this terrible disaster - all of which were entirely preventable.

Full article here (Daily Comet)

U.S. Gulf Coast Dolphin Death Toll Rises - Reuters

I haven't written about the spill in a while. Partially because I've been away, and partially because the reporters have been too. It's been almost a year now, and the spill has effectively slid back in the news and is not receiving nearly as much attention as it used to. Of course we all saw this coming, but it's been especially hard to find articles about the science of the spill rather than the business. Besides, Justin Bieber got a new haircut...who CARES about the Gulf Coast?

Anyway.

Dolphins have been dying in large numbers in the Gulf. The remains of 59 dolphins have been recovered from beaches along the coast...and that's not the most heartbreaking part of it. Half of them are babies.

This is about 12 times the normal number of dolphin deaths for this time of year.

"Although none of the carcasses bore outward signs of oil contamination, all were being examined as possible casualties of petrochemicals that fouled the Gulf of Mexico after a BP drilling platform exploded in April 2010, rupturing a wellhead on the sea floor, officials said."

I did read something not so long ago...I believe it was in Leviathan or, The Whale by Philip Hoare (which is a great book by the way), though I can't be sure. Studies have shown that the contamination in adult bottlenosed dolphins along the American coast are so high that most females will lose their first calf due to their own toxicity. Perhaps with the additional contamination the BP oil spill has caused in the Gulf, this statistic is rising even higher? What if no females can give birth to healthy calves this year...then what?

At least 29 of the dead dolphins have been positively identified as bottlenose dolphins.

"The latest wave follows an earlier tally of 89 dead dolphins - virtually all of them adults - reported to have washed ashore in 2010 after the Gulf oil spill.

Results from an examination of those remains, conducted as part of the government's oil spill damage assessment, have not been released, though scientists concluded those dolphins 'died from something environmental during the last year,'" said Blair Mase, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) spokeswoman.

I think it's pretty obvious what they're suggesting.

Full article here (Reuters)

Mexico Expected to Sue BP Over Oil Spill in Gulf of Mexico - AOL News

Good. I was wondering when this was gonna happen.

"Three Mexican states, Veracruz, Tamaulipas and Quintana Roo, have already filed claims against BP, citing a similar list of grievances as their American counterparts: damages to fishing and tourism. Now the federal government may be joining that list, at least to reclaim the $35 million that it has spent monitoring the oil, the last remnants of which could hit Mexican shores this month."

Mexico probably knows what it's doing, too. The Ixtoc 1 spill leaked oil onto American shores and caused an international lawsuit in 1979. Mexico, however, claimed sovereign immunity and refused to pay. We'll see how it goes the opposite way.

Full article here (AOL News)

BP sees no 'Gross Negligence' in Gulf Oil Spill: New Chief - AFP

Really?

If the US Justice Department finds that BP is guilty of "gross negligence," fines the company has to pay would be dramatically increased. BP isn't worried. Now, is this because they truly believe they took all necessary precautions? Or is it because they slipped a bit of money into a few pockets when no one was looking? Just asking...

BP is currently working on changing their safety regulations.

""I wouldn't describe it as an admission of anything," Bob Dudley said in an interview posted on the newspaper's website."

Mmmkay. Whatever you say, boss.

Full article here (AFP via Google)

Panel Wants BP Fines to Pay for Gulf Restoration - NY Times

What else was it going to pay for, sheesh? Fines for environmental degradation should pay to restore the environment? What a novel idea!

"In a report to be presented Tuesday in New Orleans, Ray Mabus, the Navy secretary and a former Mississippi governor, will urge Congress to create a Gulf Coast Recovery Fund to oversee the restoration efforts."

Crap, that doesn't already exist? Because I'm pretty sure I gave them $30.

Seriously though, I'm pretty shocked this hasn't come into being sooner. I guess I just assumed that it had, I guess I just assumed that the money paid by the fines would go back into restoring the affected areas...but I guess not.

“The gulf took the risk and the gulf took the damage and the money should be dedicated to going back there,” Mabus said.

This part I thought was interesting:
"The [Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force] will begin the longer-term tasks that the recovery fund is intended to address, with a particular emphasis on public health concerns, including many cases of stress and depression brought on by one of the worst environmental disasters in American history."

Obviously I've been focusing on the environmental impact of the spill - as we should. But I hadn't given much thought to the depression the people in the Gulf states must be feeling. Honestly, I'm depressed about it over here in London, thousands of miles away. I've never even been to the affected areas. I simply can't imagine what it must be like for those people. If it were my home, I'd just fall to pieces.

Here's a dick move if I ever saw one:
"BP has pledged as much as $20 billion to compensate those who lost their property or livelihoods as a result of the spill, but has not committed to gulf restoration projects that go beyond the immediate impact of the spill. Company executives said recently that their willingness to contribute to such work would depend on their continued access to oil and gas beneath the gulf waters."

Oh, okay. They'll help out, as long as they can continue to go after the oil that caused all these problems in the first place. Obviously, they still don't give a shit. Seriously, what happened to common human decency? Why is money the driving force of all things now? Didn't cutting costs and cutting corners lead to the blowout...Twice?

Full article here (NY Times)

Where You Can and Can't Dig at the Beach - BuzzFeed

Alright, so BuzzFeed might be my guilty procrastination pleasure...but sometimes I do find legitimate stuff on there!

Check out this video from ABC News 3 when reporter Dan Thomas tried to build a sandcastle on a Florida beach affected by the BP oil spill.

It's illegal to dig in the sand. Yep. It's illegal to dig in the sand. It's illegal to dig in the sand. Are you serious? Apparently it's also illegal to film in a public park. No home videos, folks. And quit that sand castle nonsense right now.

The federal government has made a law saying BP cleanup workers can't dig more than six inches into the sand...even though in the video you can CLEARLY see oil remains after that depth. They're considering maybe extending that depth to 18 inches. Maybe.
With rules like this, the spill will never be cleaned up. Thanks, Feds.

Video here (BuzzFeed)

Deepwater Horizon: The End of the Beginning - Nature

Ding dong, the well is dead. It's a relief, but it's definitely not over - although people would love to think so. As time has gone on from the day of the explosion, less and less news sources have been covering the event, and it's been difficult to find articles that continued to focus on the environmental tragedies rather than the business ones. But anyway, here we are today. As of 18 September, the well is sealed.

“We can finally announce that the Macondo 252 well is effectively dead,” said the National Incident Commander, Admiral Thad Allen. “Additional regulatory steps will be undertaken but we can now state, definitively, that the Macondo well poses no continuing threat to the Gulf of Mexico.”

No continuing threat - but the oil that's already there will still present a problem for years to come. "The End of the Beginning" is very appropriate.

Full article here (Nature)

The Gulf Spill Cocktail

photo credit Liquor Snob

Is it too soon for this? I had to share.

I found this here while Stumblin' around the web, but it's actually a great marine bio blog too. Here's the recipe:

"GULF SPILL

1.5 Blueberry juice oz
.5 oz Kahlua
.5 oz Chocolate liqueur (I prefer Godiva)
3 Blueberries
Sand colored sugar, like raw or demerara

optional:
Bar spoon chocolate sauce to make extra chocolatey! If you're an addict, and chocolate is your poison, might I suggest CHOCAGAVE. This stuff is amazing and sort of healthy (considering that it is chocolate sauce!)

Rim the glass with sugar that will symbolize sand.
Shake all ingredients over ice and strain into glass.
Float blueberries on top to symbolize dead sea creatures.
Cheers!"

Personally, I think the blueberries look more like tarballs, which is a nice touch.

Will I be trying this? Maybe, if I can afford the ingredients. (hah!)

DeepSeaNews put it best: "Sometimes you have to laugh so you don’t cry."

Link here (Liquor Snob)

Gulf Seafood With a Side of Oil Dispersant? - National Geographic

photo credit Ali Sanderson/Expedition Blue Planet

A short article with a good quote:

""This is the safest seafood in the world. It's like flying after 9-11," remarked the Lafourche Parish President's husband over dinner with Expedition Blue Planet last Friday night. His reasoning: The catch coming into shore here is probably more thoroughly tested than anything being imported into the state."

Full article here (National Geographic)

Toxic Oil Found Deep on Gulf Seafloor? - National Geographic

photo credit USF

So, we've been hearing that all the oil that was "supposed" to be on the surface has likely been pushed down to smother the seafloor thanks to dispersants like Corexit. This is bad news considering much of bottom life is at or near the base of the food chain and is sedentary, meaning creatures cannot move to a less contaminated environment.

"Tiny deep-sea creatures are showing a "strong toxic response" to hydrocarbons, an ingredient of oil, according to preliminary results released Tuesday by the University of South Florida (USF)."

Sediment samples were taken from an important ecological site near the Deepwater Horizon wellhead.

"By shining ultraviolet light on the samples, the team indirectly detected hydrocarbons in the sample that seem to have the same fluorescent fingerprints as oil from the wellhead, which was capped July 15."

The team also took healthy specimens of bacteria and phytoplankton and exposed them to water samples from the surface and from the deep. The Phytoplankton, which have a slight natural glow, showed "enormous reduction" in light upon exposure to the deep-water samples. The bacteria showed similar results when exposed to the surface samples. It is not yet clear why they show opposite reactions.

"It's possible, for example, that different species have different reactions to the toxic effects of oil and chemical dispersants,” says David Hollander, a USF chemical oceanographer.

Hollander emphasized that his team's observations are preliminary: "I hope they don't get misconstrued as scientific fact."

Full article here (National Geographic)

Microbes Ate BP Oil Deep-Water Plume: Study - Reuters

photo credit Reuters & Hoi-Ying Holman Group/Handout

Okay, wait wait wait.

I literally JUST posted this article about how the plume is still there. Not five minutes later, someone sends me this article saying it's been magically eaten. No wonder people are so confused with the news in the Gulf.

So, this article says it's gone. Yay! Granted, it is about two months after the initial study from the other article I posted. Scientists did say the microbes are "infamous for being unpredictable."

This article says that the microbes have "degraded the hydrocarbons so efficiently that the plume is now undetectable."

Here's a weird quote:

"Another factor was the consistency of the oil that came from the Macondo wellhead: light sweet Louisiana crude, an easily digestible substance for bacteria, and it was dispersed into tiny droplets, which also makes it more biodegradable."

MMMMM, OIL! POUR ME A BIG OLE MUG O' THAT! Delicious.

Finally, here's some clarification:

"These latest findings may initially seem to be at odds with a study published last Thursday in Science by researchers from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, which confirmed the existence of the oil plume and said micro-organisms did not seem to be biodegrading it very quickly.

However, Hazen and Rich Camilli of Woods Hole both said on Tuesday that the studies complement each other.

The Woods Hole team used an autonomous robot submarine and a mass spectrometer to detect the plume, but were forced to leave the area in late June, when Hurricane Alex threatened. At that time, they figured the plume was likely to remain for some time.

But that was before the well was capped in mid-July. Hazen said that within two weeks of the capping, the plume could not be detected, but there was a phenomenon called marine snow that indicated microbes had been feasting on hydrocarbons.

As of Tuesday, there was no sign of the plume, Hazen said."

Alright, that settles it. Job well done, little guys!

Full article here (Reuters)
Original article here (National Geographic)

Giant Underwater Plume Confirmed—Gulf Oil Not Degrading - National Geographic

photo credit Cameron McIntyre/WHOI

I'm beginning to feel the "Isn't this over?" sentiment. Not just because I want to stop thinking about it - because I actually want it all to be OVER. I want all the little fishies to be happy. Unfortunately, it'll be a long time from now...

Scientists at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) have discovered a 22-mile-long, 650-foot-high pocket of oil that's been hanging out at 3,600ft for months.

"The oil plume's stability is "a little unexpected," study leader Richard Camilli, of WHOI's Applied Ocean Physics and Engineering Department, said at a Thursday press briefing in Washington, D.C.
"We don't have any clear indication as to why it set up at that depth.""

The oil-eating microbes everyone thought would be gobbling it up haven't been working as hard as we would all like.

"Counting on microbes to quickly clean up an oil spill is "like asking a teenager to do a chore. You tell them to do it on a Friday, to do it when it's most advantageous, and they do it on a Saturday,"" says Christopher Reddy, marine chemist at WHOI.

The oil remains.

Now for more bad news: It's on the move.

"The plume has already fanned out a considerable distance from the BP wellhead, [Ruoying] He, [physical oceanographer at North Carolina State University] noted. At the time of the survey, the plume was migrating about 4 miles (6.5 kilometers) a day southwest from the spill site, according to the study."

With all the trouble that's been focused on protecting our beaches in the aftermath of the spill, little has been devoted to protecting the deep sea and the ocean as a whole.

Says Robert Carney, biological oceanographer at Louisiana State University: "We are badly in need of new ideas."

Full article here (National Geographic)

BP Oil Spill: Barack Obama Dives into Safety Debate with Gulf of Mexico Swim - The Guardian

photo credit Reuters & Pete Souza

"As a result of the clean-up effort beaches all along the Gulf Coast are clean, they are safe and they are open for business," Obama told reporters. "That's one of the reasons Michelle, Sasha and I are here."

'Bams and the fam fam visited Florida for a special Gulf holiday this week in order to prove the Gulf states are a safe vacation spot again. The states have been suffering from a large decline in summer tourism as a result of the spill.

I'm all set with a Gulf summer vacation, but I'd like a few more of these photos.

Mmmmmm, giiiirl...
All hail the Chief. :P

Full article here (The Guardian)

Allen: 'Our First Goal is to Do No Harm' in Gulf - CNN

There are a lot of things I could say about that, but I just won't.

So, we're still working out to bottom kill, yeah? Figuring out whether we'll remove the blowout preventer and replace it with a new one, or invent a whole new thing to make the current one okay. What a mess...

"Once crews get their marching orders, it will take them about four days to prepare, drill the final 50 feet of a relief well and intercept the main well. Then, the "bottom kill" process of plugging the well from below will begin. Allen said Wednesday cementing will require another several days."

When that's done maybe I'll stop finding gray hairs on my scalp. I'm only 24, sheesh!

Gulf fishing is reopening again, which I think is okay - for now. It's been tested and apparently it's safe to eat. I wouldn't chomp down on jumbo shrimp if you're pregnant or anything, but for the rest of us I think it's proven to be fine - for now. Emphasis on "for now." The thing is, oil still remains in the ecosystem. As we just learned, it's not "mostly cleaned up" as some government officials would have you believe. So, as the oil continues to enter the food chain, the Gulf fish will need to be continually tested for contamination. I have a suspicion we will find that some time from now, the Gulf fish will not be safe to eat. But for now, okay. I'm willing to trust the government assessments on this one - for now.

This is only in the re-opened waters, mind you. Twenty-two percent of federal waters still remain closed due to possible contamination.

In other news, Wednesday was the deadline for people and businesses to submit their damage claims to BP. BP will no longer accept claims (which I think is BS, because we still don't understand the spills impact), but will direct them to Kenneth Feinberg, who is in charge of the $20 billion escrow account (which is better than nothing).

"This facility is going to be much more generous, much more efficient, and much quicker than BP," says Feinberg.

Full article here (CNN)

Gulf Oil Spill: University Study Contradicts Government Estimates, Up To 79% of Oil Could Remain - Huffington Post

photo credit Huffington Post
(I mean really, does it look like it's mostly cleaned up??)

Ahhh, back from my glorious relaxing holiday...back to thinking about the spill. I leave these thoughts at home while I'm away, but they're always there to greet me upon my return!

So remember that post I made before about how the White House energy advisor, Carol Browner, said that the oil spill was mostly cleaned up? Yeah, we knew that was a load of BS, but here's proof.

A group of scientists from the University of Georgia did a study separate from the government's assessment and found that 70-79% of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon event is still present in the ecosystem.

"The research team...said that it is a misinterpretation of data to claim that oil that has dissolved is actually gone or harmless."

"Charles Hopkinson, who helped lead the investigation, claims "the oil is still out there, and it will likely take years to completely degrade." The UGA marine sciences professor, and director of the Georgia Sea Grant, added, "We are still far from a complete understanding of what its impacts are.""

Thank you, and sheesh! Obviously we're not gonna clean up 205 million gallons of oil in 100 days. That would be great - that would be a miracle! - but it didn't happen.

To finish, here's a pretty big quote, but I think it's important:

"Whether a glass is one-quarter full or one-quarter empty isn't exactly a matter of perspective. Why the discrepancy? According to a news release from UGA:

Hopkinson notes that the reports arrive at different conclusions largely because the Sea Grant and UGA scientists estimate that the vast majority of the oil classified as dispersed, dissolved or residual is still present, whereas the NIC report has been interpreted to suggest that only the "residual" form of oil is still present.

Hopkinson said that his group also estimated how much of the oil could have evaporated, degraded or weathered as of the date of the report. Using a range of reasonable evaporation and degradation estimates, the group calculated that 70-79 percent of oil spilled into the Gulf still remains. The group showed that it was impossible for all the dissolved oil to have evaporated because only oil at the surface of the ocean can evaporate into the atmosphere and large plumes of oil are trapped in deep water."

Full article here (Huffington Post)

BP Oil Spill: Obama Administration's Scientists admit Alarm over Chemicals - The Guardian

photo credit Reuters

Scientists are finding that almost two million gallons of Corexit were used to disperse the BP spill. The trouble is that no one knows what the long term effects will be. The EPA has recently come under fire for allowing BP to use such massive quantities of dispersant in the first place, and for allowing the company to ignore their advice to cut dispersant use by 75% back in May.

Says Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat who introduced a ban-on-dispersants bill passed by the House of Representatives last week: "[The EPA] have fallen down on the job very substantially because they allowed BP to use dispersants. Even when they told BP not to use dispersants they allowed BP to ignore their advice."

According to the article, the EPA as a whole wasn't even involved in these decisions.

"Other than a few people in the united command, there is no involvement from the rest of the agency," says Jeff Ruch, the executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. He adds that several toxicologists he has spoken with were deeply concerned, particularly about where the EPA was getting their information. "The concern was the agency appeared to be flying blind and not consulting its own specialists and even the literature that was available," he says.

Reports last week suggest the dispersants have entered both the ecosystem and human food chains via blue crab larvae. But if that's not how the dispersants end up killing us - don't worry. They still will.

Full article here (The Guardian)