Long before the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, caught fire, sank and loosed a gusher of oil that would flow into the biggest environmental disaster in U.S. history, the oil industry knew that -- in the now famous words of the Apollo 13 astronauts -- "Houston, we have a problem."
As oil drilling in the new millennium moved increasingly into deep waters off the North American and European coasts, oilfield workers recognized they were operating with less and less of a safety net. Shear ram technology needed to make blowout preventers into failsafe devices capable of preventing catastrophic blowouts was, they knew, lagging behind the rest of oilfield technology.
A U.S. Minerals Management Service study had demonstrated as much in 2002. A more thorough study in 2004 had only served to underline the weaknesses. By 2005, Oklahoma City-based Devon Energy Corp., then a force in offshore drilling, had begun working with Houston-based Cameron, the major producer of blowout preventers, to develop new and better shear and seal technology for wells.
Why the technology never made it into the oil patch is unclear. Nobody in the industry wants to talk about it at this juncture, though development reportedly is continuing. What would come to be called the alternative well kill system -- or AWKS -- is now being spearheaded by Chevron in partnership with Cameron. Devon began phasing out of offshore drilling earlier this year.
Ironically, it signed a $7 billion deal in March to sell its offshore assets in Brazil, Azerbaijan and the Gulf of Mexico to BP. Only about a month later BP was in charge of the Deepwater Horizon rig that blew up in the Gulf. London-based BP, the major player in the Alaska oil business, has ever since been battling to shut off an undersea volcano spewing beneath the sunken rig and deal with an oil slick that has grown to more than two times the size of the Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound.
Cleanup and containment costs, at last report from BP, were approaching $1 billion and are expected to grow to orders of magnitude beyond that. This might all have been avoided if there had been a working, failsafe blowout preventer a mile deep on the ocean beneath the Horizon. There was a blowout preventer. Why it didn't work hasn't been fully determined, but the reasons why it might not work were known well before the Horizon accident.
Chevron noted in a presentation to the Norway Arctic Workshop in Tromso in January 2009 that existing BOPs have weaknesses. The company said in a PowerPoint presentation that it was working with Cameron on the AWKS to develop "simultaneous shear and seal capability on a broad range of tubulars -- unlike current shear rams." Everyone in attendance at the meeting knew what that last phrase meant.
A mini-study done for the MMS in 2002 and a lengthy "Shear Ram Capabilities Study" completed two years later had concluded that some of the new higher-grade steel being used in drill pipe couldn't be cut and sealed by existing rams. The study also noted the inability of existing rams to cut and seal pipe if there were tools inside, or slice through welded joints where sections of pipe were joined.
These inherent weaknesses in existing BOPs were the reason many Arctic nations -- although not the U.S. -- required oil companies to keep a second drill rig on location when drilling in case a relief well was needed to seal a blowout. BP, it should be noted, did not have a second rig on site in the Gulf of Mexico. BP has one there now, drilling a relief well. Everyone involved with the Gulf spill says a relief well is the only sure way to cap BP's undersea gusher. The relief well is expected to be completed in August. There is no telling how much crude could be washing around in the Gulf of Mexico by then -- or making its way into the Gulf Stream with potential oil spill consequences for Florida and the entire U.S. East Coast.
The reason BP failed to have a second drill rig standing by in the Gulf when the Deepwater Horizon was drilling is simple -- money. A drill rig costs about a half million dollars per day, according to oil industry officials. These costs are the reason that, although Shell planned to drill in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas off Alaska this summer, none of the oil companies holding leases off the Arctic coast of Canada planned any drilling.
Rev. Chuck Freeman: Hearing the Prophetic Call in the Gulf Oil Disaster
I posted this to my Blog if anyone is interested in reading.
Just traded e-mail with a CNN reporter and also passed this along to him.
http://gil-gilsmusic.blogspot.com/2010/06/open-letter-to-president-re-gul-oil.html
http://nbyslog.blogspot.com/2010/06/world-exclusive-man-united-glazer.html
BP likely did not have a good well design and did not even follow their own procedures, but requiring oil companies to have two of these rigs on every well is not a serious solution to the problem.
Canadian regulations require the CAPABILITY to complete a relief well in the same season as they drill their working well.
https://www.one-neb.gc.ca/ll-eng/livelink.exe/fetch/2000/90463/589151/594086/594087/594075/A1R6K9_-_National_Energy_Board_to_Review_Northern_Drilling_Policy.pdf?nodeid=594076&vernum=0
"Same season relief well capability is the ability to drill a relief well in the same season in which the original well was drilled. The practice is intended to help control a blowout and reduce the impact of hydrocarbons being released into the Arctic Ocean. The NEB regulates these drilling activities under the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act."
The oil companies have been lobbying Canada's NEB to remove the requirement for same season capability, in other words, should a blowout occur in the north, it could flow for a year before a relief well could be drilled. Their complaint is that this regulation would effectively require them to predrill the relief well and even then if the main well blew out at the end of the season (which is when a blowout would occur - when the bore reaches the reservoir) even a predrilled relief well still couldn't be completed in the same season. I think this is the source of your confusion.
But to reiterate, no simultaneous well has actually been drilled under this requirement.
the oil industry has used these centrifuge'es for years, for themselves of course. they can seperate water and oil at 200-600 gallons a minute !! a few dozen/hundred of these machines these would help trememdously a dozen could fit easily on one ship .
why does Washington sit on its ass!!??
please check out these machines for yourself and try to get the info to whomever you can
Just curious.
These centrifuges belong to the oil industry, not the government. So why is the oil industry sitting on it's ass? If it would work, they'd be all over it, since they're losing money with each barrel of oil that's leaking into the gulf.
backyard,.. was that with, or w/o responsible practices factored in?
Remember how cable tv was first promoted as commercial free? Funny how we're told
we're getting more for less and the exact opposite is true. Kinda like the family values
mantra being exploited by politics,.. the "Beast and the Harlot"?
By the way, where are all those Operation Rescue protesters for the unborn of the
gulf shores? Can't they find a "big oil" office?
The conference call will go like this: "Hey guys, BP here....listen, we've gotta pay for this cleanup. Any of you have a problem with tripling the price at the pump? Didn't think so---thanks, see you in the Caymans."
BP did have a drill rig standing by in the gulf. It was on location within a week and the first relief well spudded on May 2. It is now at around 13,000 feet and planned to intersect the well at 18,000 feet
A second relief well was started on May 16 and is at around 9,000 feet.
called standby. Ambulances and fire engines are on standby, they are deployed when needed.
Drilling a relief well if it is not needed is just drilling another hole with the potential to blowout
Once the riser is cut the flow could increase.
http://www.bp.com/genericarticle.do?categoryId=9033657&contentId=7062491
BP did start work on TWO relief wells, as requested by the feds -- but the second has been shut down to cannabalize parts from it for the primary well kill effort.
see here: http://www.upstreamonline.com/live/article216214.ece
quote: BP has stopped drilling one of the relief wells to intercept the blown out Macondo bore so it can ready the rig's blowout preventer (BOP) to go on top of the crippled Macondo BOP.
Transocean boss Steve Newman told analysts today that Transocean semi-submersible rig Development Driller II had stopped drilling while BP tries a top kill to try to halt the flow of the Macondo well.
BP spokesman David Nicholas told UpstreamOnline that the rig was stopped so its BOP would be ready if needed.
end quote
President Obama needs to order BP to spend whatever money it takes to get another blow out preventer on site, to re-start work on the second pressure relief well. A recent blow-out off the coast of Australia required five pressure relief wells to successfully shut it down.
There is no more important operation in the Gulf now than these TWO pressure relief wells. Some other well should have been shut down and used for parts.
Demand BP spend the money required to restart work as soon as humanly possible!
Next worst company = only 7-9 safety violations in Gulf
BP is incompetent to drill oil. Louisiana should be preparing a class action suit right now to file and get damages to their state and economy. The EPA is incompetent....the US goverment has deregulated the regulators.
but, big oil is over. watch www.TED.com for great new info.