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Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Ed Jewett - 27-05-2010
Thanks, Mark. Despite the comprehensive coverage which has been educational for me (one of the reasons I do this stuff), I am not an expert. People like me tend to be generalists who go about poking under rocks. But my best sense on question #1 is "Yes, in all likelihood.." The loop current has been documented and mapped, and it is apparent that tendrils are already into that current. The Gulf Stream, of course, is a "conveyor belt" that brushes across some of the best (now mostly depleted ) fisheries on the North American coast and eventually reaches Northern Europe. If oil toxicity is gauged in parts per million and we are dumping gazillions of gallons or barrels of oil and gas (and the gas may be even more deadly than the oil), then this amplifies what some have called "an extinction event". I am not an environmental biologist; I just live on the planet.
On question #2, my best sense is "No"... I suspect the solution, however toxic it is or will be, will remain too aqueous to be ignitable. Flammability exists in high concentration, near the source, and I have seen some expressions of concern about the tankers carrying inbound imported oil having to unload in a potentially flammable scenario. But since the source is deep underwater and subject to current, I would think dispersal would disallow flammability in most cases. Someone else postulated the theory of a flammable cloud of oily water picked up by a super-hurricane and then being ignited, but I doubt that would happen either as I suspect extremely high winds along with the aqueous nature would prevent or snuff out any ignition. There is concern, however, for the pollution of land, waterways, lakes, and farms from oily rain delivered by some tropical storms; each would vary depending on their course and speed and the location at which they took the moisture off the ocean. Also of increasingly obvious concern is the health effects upon those people working closely with the muck and the oil and the birds; I just noticed some news at Google suggesting that workers' boats are being recalled now because of acute health effects (which, of course, might become chronic). I will now also post a very good article on the political implications of all of this.
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Ed Jewett - 27-05-2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
May 26 2010: Economics and the Nature of Political Crisis
![[Image: Heron1.jpg]](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_9ZzZquaXrR8/S_2RE-zggwI/AAAAAAAAF7I/C0REXOO1rpU/s1600/Heron1.jpg)
Gerald Herbert Eulogy For A Breaking Heart May 2010
“A young heron among oil-covered mangroves in Barataria Bay, Louisiana"
Ilargi: As we are witnessing our coasts, our economies, our societies and the world as we've ever known it crumble, shatter and evaporate, it's high time to look beyond today, and towards the white swans we all know are out there approaching but prefer not to see.
Somewhat ironically, it may be the disaster called Deepwater Horizon, a name that will for future generations not just be mentioned in the same breath as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, but many miles and way before them, that will tell the age old story of how an economical crisis driven too far inevitably must become a political one, once "our" politicians run out of excuses and, more importantly, other people’s money.
Those of you who're read me over the years are intimately familiar with the call, the prediction, the idea, the process, the cause and the effect. Those who haven't are welcome for the ride from here on in.
What we live today has long since ceased to be a financial crisis: it's all political now. A political apparatus that is wholly owned by the financial and corporate interests it’s legislated to control is bound to provide for a roller coaster that goes up and down for a while but must eventually end up in a place so down and deep and dark none of us have ever seen it, been there, nor would wish to . Which is where and why politics as we’ve come to know it is hell-bent to self-destruct. And what then?
Stoneleigh provides a peak into the inner workings:
Stoneleigh: On the Nature of Political Crisis
Given that we are facing not just a financial crisis, but a major political crisis, as Ilargi has pointed out many times, I thought it might be appropriate to explore the nature of politics - the art of the possible - in a little more depth . That will make the nature of political crisis much clearer.
To begin with, all human political structures, existing at all scales simultaneously, are essentially predatory. They exist to convey wealth and resources from the periphery to the centre, thereby enabling an enhanced level of socio-economic complexity. Each centre - whether municipal, regional, national or international - has its corresponding periphery – the region from which it can extract surpluses. (For more on this concept, see Entropy and Empire)
During expansionary times, larger and larger political structures -can- develop through accretion. Ancient imperiums would have done this mostly by physical force, integrating subjugated territories into the tax base by extracting surpluses of resources, wealth and labour. We have achieved much the same thing at a global level through economic means, binding additional polities into the larger structure through international monetary mechanisms such as the Bretton Woods institutions (IMF, World Bank and GATT, fore-runner of the WTO). The current economic imperium of the developed world is truly unprecedented in scale.
To simplify for a moment, one can build an analogy between layers of political control and levels of predation in a natural system. The number of levels of predation a natural system can support depends essentially on the amount of energy available at the level of primary production and the amount of energy required to harvest it. More richly endowed areas will be able to support -more- complex food webs with many levels of predation.
The ocean has been able to support more levels of predation than the land, as it requires less energy to cover large distances, and primary production has been plentiful. A predator such as the tuna fish is the equivalent, in food chain terms, of a hypothetiacl land predator that would have eaten primarily lions. On land, ecosystems cannot support that high a level predator, as much more energy is required to harvest less plentiful energy sources.
If one thinks of political structures in similar terms, one can see that the available energy, in many forms, is a key driver of how complex and wide-ranging spheres of political control can become. Ancient imperiums achieved a great deal with energy in the forms of wood, grain and slaves from their respective peripheries. Today, we have achieved a much more all-encompassing degree of global integration thanks to the energy subsidy inherent in fossil fuels.
Without this supply of energy (in fact without being able to constantly increase this supply to match population growth), the structures we have built cannot be maintained (see Joseph Tainter’s work for more on this).
However, while energy has been a key driver of global integration and complexity, the structures we have created do not depend only on energy. Because any structure with a fundamental dependence on the buy-in of new entrants, and therefore the constant need to expand, is grounded in Ponzi dynamics, these structures are inherently self-limiting (see From the Top of the Great Pyramid.
We have reached the limit beyond which we cannot continue to expand, there being no more virgin continents to exploit in our over-crowded world. The logic of Ponzi dynamics dictates that we will now experience a dramatic contraction, and that our financial structure, which is the most complex and most vulnerable part of our hypertrophic political system, will become the key driver to the downside during that period. Part of that contraction will be of our available energy supplies and ability to distribute energy to where it is needed, both of which will fall victim to many 'above-ground factors' in the years to come (see Energy, Finance and Hegemonic Power).
As a consequence, we will lose at least one level of political structure (predation), and likely more. We will simplify our 'food chains'. Certainly we will not live in the globalized world we have come to know, and maintaining central control at a national level may also be difficult in many places, although this will depend on many factors, not the least of which is scale. This has crucial implications for the long and vulnerable supply chains we have constructed in a world built on comparative advantage (where we make everything in the cheapest possible place and transport the resulting products over very long distances).
Our horizons will have to shrink to match our reach. The inability of any individual or institution to prevent this, or even to mitigate it much through top-down action, will be a major component of political crisis. What mitigation is possible will have to come from the bottom-up. While expansions lead to political accretion -forming larger and more complex structures- contractions lead to the opposite – division into smaller polities at lower levels of complexity.
To understand what this means in practice, we need to look at the psychological factors inherent in expansion and contraction.
Expansionist periods are optimistic times where the emphasis is on building economic activity and social inclusion. Trust -the most critical component of stable societies- expands, and populations move in the direction of recognizing common humanity. Old animosities tend to recede from the public consciousness and relative political stability can be achieved.
Whether a party of the left or right is in control, one will tend to see its more benign face during the early phase of a great expansion. On the right this might include elements of a 'can-do’ independent spirit, pride in self-reliance, thriftiness and frugality, tight-knit communities and effective self-regulation. On the left it could include an emphasis on the public interest, caring and sharing, public service to the collective, a concern to see no one left behind, a desire to protect through regulation, and preparedness to contribute time and resources to the common good.
Either of these constellations of characteristics is likely to deliver benefits and preside over a society whose institutions function relatively effectively. The structures which tend to be most stable are grounded in a form of social contract, where the process of wealth conveyance is muted to some extent, in order that the disparity between haves and have-nots is not too extreme, and the periphery gains something from the association despite their contribution of tithes.
The potential for social mobility is also important for acceptance by the less privileged. Under the favourable circumstances that accompany optimistic times, this combination delivers a political legitimacy which acts as a powerful stabilizing force.
Unfortunately, all human institutions tend to become progressively less functional as they age, and as periodic renewal, necessary to keep them healthy, ceases to occur. Transparency and accountability decrease, and the institutions become more and more bloated, sclerotic, self-serving and hostage to vested interests. By the end of a long expansion, socio-political institutions, including political parties, may retain their outward appearance and yet have largely ceased to function responsively in the way they once did.
At this point they go through the motions, but process becomes more important than substance. Many become corrupt and unreformable. This institutional decay constitutes a substantial component of political crisis in the latter days of imperium.
As expansion morphs into contraction, in accordance with the very exact same Ponzi logic that underlies our present financial crisis, institutions may collapse along with other higher order structures. While they are eventually to be replaced by something much simpler from the grass roots, to serve their essential functions, this does not happen overnight.
The psychology of contraction may well inhibit the formation of effective new institutions, even much simpler ones, for a long period of time. The psychology of contraction is not constructive, and leads in the direction of division and exclusion as trust evaporates. Unfortunately, trust – the glue of a functional society - takes a long time to build, but relatively little time to destroy.
Elites (top predators) will have a smaller peripheral pool from which to extract the tithes they have come to expect. No longer able to pick the pockets of the whole world, they will very likely squeeze domestic populations much harder in a vain attempt to maintain the resources of the centre at their previous level. This will be very painful for those at the bottom of the pyramid, who will be asked, told and eventually forced to increase their contributions, at the very moment their ability to do so declines sharply.
Whether the left or the right presides over contraction, we are most likely to see a much more pathological face emerge, and this will aggravate political crisis considerably. On the right this could be xenophobia, strict enforcement of tight and arbitrary norms dictated by the few, loss of civil rights, extreme poverty for most while a few live like kings, and fascism, perhaps grounded in theocracy.
On the left it could be forced collectivization, the elimination of property rights, confiscations, and a desire to punish anyone who appears to be doing relatively well, whether or not they achieved this legitimately through foresight, hard work and fiscal responsibility. In either case, liberty is likely to be an early casualty, and intolerance of differences is virtually guaranteed to increase.
Central authority, which is set to increase even as its legitimacy decreases, is very much a double-edged sword. While increased centralization may confer the power to ration scarce goods, which would be a public good if undertaken in the spirit of good governance, that spirit is likely to be noticeably lacking in years to come. We are far more likely to see pervasive corruption and a resurgence of the politics of the personal, where connections are everything.
That will aggravate the crisis of political legitimacy. Besides, powers and liberties taken, whether by popular consent or not, are never voluntarily given back to the people. They would have to be fought for all over again. Perhaps we will see that happen at some point in the future, but for now people seem all too prepared to trade liberty for security, which Benjamin Franklin described as a recipe for enjoying neither.
We have yet to see a full-blown political crisis in the US and elsewhere, but it is clearly coming. Argentina went through five presidents in a matter of a few short months at the height of its upheaval. The countries of the first world will likely experience much the same thing, primarily because there is simply nothing any politician can do to prevent the pain of depression, and not even much they can do to mitigate it.
The inevitable process of living through that period, which could last for many years, will probably consume many political careers, and indeed political parties. Leaders elected now have accepted the poisoned chalice. They are likely to go down in history as abject failures, no matter what they do.
My concern is that traumatized people will seek charismatic populist leaders representing extremist positions. Politicians of that stripe are adept at manipulating the herd in the direction of inflicting punishment on any group they happen personally not to like. Hitler comes to mind here. There can be no greater political crisis than repeating the mistakes of the past on the scale that implies.
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Peter Lemkin - 27-05-2010
Ed Jewett Wrote:Thanks, Mark. Despite the comprehensive coverage which has been educational for me (one of the reasons I do this stuff), I am not an expert. People like me tend to be generalists who go about poking under rocks. But my best sense on question #1 is "Yes, in all likelihood.." The loop current has been documented and mapped, and it is apparent that tendrils are already into that current. The Gulf Stream, of course, is a "conveyor belt" that brushes across some of the best (now mostly depleted ) fisheries on the North American coast and eventually reaches Northern Europe. If oil toxicity is gauged in parts per million and we are dumping gazillions of gallons or barrels of oil and gas (and the gas may be even more deadly than the oil), then this amplifies what some have called "an extinction event". I am not an environmental biologist; I just live on the planet.
On question #2, my best sense is "No"... I suspect the solution, however toxic it is or will be, will remain too aqueous to be ignitable. Flammability exists in high concentration, near the source, and I have seen some expressions of concern about the tankers carrying inbound imported oil having to unload in a potentially flammable scenario. But since the source is deep underwater and subject to current, I would think dispersal would disallow flammability in most cases. Someone else postulated the theory of a flammable cloud of oily water picked up by a super-hurricane and then being ignited, but I doubt that would happen either as I suspect extremely high winds along with the aqueous nature would prevent or snuff out any ignition. There is concern, however, for the pollution of land, waterways, lakes, and farms from oily rain delivered by some tropical storms; each would vary depending on their course and speed and the location at which they took the moisture off the ocean. Also of increasingly obvious concern is the health effects upon those people working closely with the muck and the oil and the birds; I just noticed some news at Google suggesting that workers' boats are being recalled now because of acute health effects (which, of course, might become chronic). I will now also post a very good article on the political implications of all of this.
My graduate education is in Environmental Science and just to add to the answers above. Yes, some has and more will get into the Gulf Stream. Anything that gets into the oceans eventually disperses into the whole of the ocean system. However, the amounts, at this point, are such that the great effects will be in the Gulf [and bordering it in wetlands], with the effects tailing off [but less significantly so, the longer this leak goes on!] with greater distance from the source. Oil spills, not recorded in the MSM, are happening all the time and oil tankers regularly clean their interiors with sea water and dump the mix back into the ocean, etc. No, it will never be explosive and only if a largesurface slick forms can it be burned off or catch fire - even that is not too likely unless done deliberately or by lightning. Compounding this mess is the enormous use of surfactants to 'break up' the oil into blobs that float or sink and are seen as food by fish and plankton....so this lethal cocktail will be getting into the food chain and by a process of biomagnification in increasing concentrations as the top of the food chain is approached. [humans are often at the top]. For the Gulf at this point it is a catastrophe. Not yet for other places in the Atlantic or beyond...but that could change if the leak is not stopped. I've been watching the live cameras all day and NOTHING is changing at all. I think one can expect this to continue for another half year or more.....sadly. Wait until hurricane season to really mess-up the coast!!! The sea life is already ****ed!...and more so with each day.
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Peter Lemkin - 27-05-2010
I sit here, stomach about to vomit...listening to the President speak [albeit so glibly] but in total nonsensical bull about the spill and the USG's reaction to it. It is apparent, as expected, that the recent over-advertised 'top kill' was as fruitless as all attempts before to stop this spill.....I predict it will not be stopped until the New Year and it will be Obama's 'Waterloo'. [even though Iraq and Afghanistan and the Secret Gov't and its Banksters would better be his reason for exit stage right!]
...but he is a Company Man [in the two senses of that term!]...
and the leak/spill continues without stop...... http://www.energyboom.com/policy/watch-live-oil-spill-webcam-will-operation-top-kill-stop-oil
[as do the very forces who own and operate such things over the best interests of the nation, planet and the living things on it]. We will, IMO, have to terminate the Corporatocracy or it will terminate the Planet! It is THAT simple!...:afraid:
{pssst....don't tell anyone, but the leak is now much greater than before the 'top kill' attempt....nice going BP!...ataway....now try a nuke!....the 'next' option!...}
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Ed Jewett - 27-05-2010
Well, there you go... thank you, Peter. It sounds like quite a cocktail. :puke:
There are indicators that BP's top exec is saying that the Gulf will recover, despite indicators from the ExxonValdez incident to the contrary, and an earlier small spill near Cape Cod that has altered those wetlands Peter speaks of... 40 years later. they are finding oil deeply embedded into the marshlands... ANother factor not yet even considered is the extent to which the cocktail will alter DNA among the inhabitants of the biosphere.
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Keith Millea - 27-05-2010
Here is an 8 minute video that sums up much of how I predict people feel about BP and the Government response to this ultimate disaster.
WARNING
lenty of cussing.....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx8kMXufu3w
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Ed Jewett - 27-05-2010
Here is an MSNBC YouTube interview with Matt Simmons which suggests there is actually another leak not show in the famous live video feed ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDGAoU1H2gM&feature=youtu.be
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Peter Lemkin - 27-05-2010
Scientists to study deepwater Gulf "oil plume"
Tue May 25, 2010 11:39pm IST
By Matthew Bigg
PORT FOURCHON, La. (Reuters) - U.S. scientists will embark on a second mission on Tuesday to investigate whether a catastrophic Gulf of Mexico oil spill is damaging deepwater marine life and the surrounding environment.
Samantha Joye, a University of Georgia marine sciences professor who is part of the research team, said the two-week government-funded mission will focus on a plume of dispersed oil that she says is from the leaking BP undersea well.
The plume, which is roughly 20 miles (32 km) long, six miles (10 km) wide, and 100 feet (30 meters) thick, was discovered by the R.V. Pelican, a research ship, on its first mission.
Tests showed that about 30 percent of the oxygen in the plume has been depleted, which could threaten marine life -- mussels, clams, crabs, eels, jellyfish, shrimp and even sharks.
"It appears to be radiating from the spill site, so that's why we think it's a mixture of emulsified or dispersed oil, little oil fragments that are generated by the actual eruption of the fluid from the sea floor," Joye said in an interview with Reuters.
She said she was "99.8 percent sure" the plume, first spotted as "deep hydrographic anomalies", was spill-related and said it was quite possible that other, smaller, plumes existed.
"We need to go out there and track and map the plume features and see how they are changing with time. Is oxygen dropping and if so, how fast? Is it microbial activity that is causing that," Joye said.
Another unknown is the exact composition of the plume and the extent to which dispersants, sprayed and pumped into the water by BP to break up the oil, were changing its chemistry, she said.
London-based BP says it could try on Wednesday to shut off the well that has caused a major U.S. ecological disaster, threatening fishing communities in four states, and has also stirred a political storm since it blew out last month.
'DEAD ZONE' IN WATER?
Eleven scientists from universities in Mississippi, Georgia, North Carolina and California will embark on the Pelican, which will depart from Gulfport, Mississippi and join six other research vessels working in the Gulf.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has five such vessels in the area.
NOAA, a federal agency, said the Pelican mission's initial findings were premature, in what some critics said appeared to be part of a concerted effort to play down the environmental impact of the leak.
BP for weeks also maintained that determining the precise rate at which oil was gushing into the sea mattered little compared to its efforts to stop the flow, leading to criticism that it was trying to avoid accountability for what could be the biggest oil spill in U.S. history.
Images of oil washing onto beaches and coating entire islands in Louisiana's fragile wetlands, as well as those of birds covered in oil, have highlighted the environmental threat posed by the leak.
But undersea damage, though it remains invisible, could be equally costly, according to Joye.
One likely cause of the depleted oxygen in the plume is the increased activity of microorganisms chewing up the oil and gas in the water, and the danger is the creation of an anoxic, or dead, zone in the water.
"That would kill anything that can't run from it," said Joye, who said the scientists are racing to catch up with what was effectively a lost first month after the leak began.
Little if any light penetrates at depths of 2,625-4,593 feet (800-1,400 meters) where the plume is located. A further planned voyage in August and September will try to determine how far the plume has affected the food web.
------------------------------------------------
Much worse than you've been told...but 'ain't that always the case...
http://bit.ly/aTwy1g
(Editing by Pascal Fletcher and Paul Simao)
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Ed Jewett - 27-05-2010
Deepwater Horizon: This Is What the End of the Oil Age Looks Like
By Richard Heinberg
May 27, 2010 "Post Carbon Institute" -- Lately I’ve been reading the excellent coverage of the Deepwater Horizon Gulf oil spill at www.TheOilDrum.com, a site frequented by veteran oil geologists and engineers. A couple of adages from the old-timers are worth quoting: “Cut corners all you want, but never downhole,” and, “There’s fast, there’s cheap, and there’s right, and you get to pick two.”There will be plenty of blame to go around, as events leading up to the fatal rig explosion are sorted out. Even if efforts to plug the gushing leak succeed sooner rather than later, the damage to the Gulf environment and to the economy of the region will be incalculable and will linger for years if not decades. The deadly stench from oil-oaked marshes—as spring turns to hot, fetid summer—will by itself ruin tens or hundreds of thousands of lives and livelihoods. Then there’s the loss of the seafood industry: we’re talking about more than the crippling of the economic backbone of the region; anyone who’s spent time in New Orleans (my wife’s family all live there) knows that the people and culture of southern Louisiana are literally as well as figuratively composed of digested crawfish, shrimp, and speckled trout. Given the historic political support from this part of the country for offshore drilling, and for the petroleum industry in general, this really amounts to sacrificing the faithful on the altar of oil.
But the following should be an even clearer conclusion from all that has happened, and that is still unfolding: This is what the end of the oil age looks like. The cheap, easy petroleum is gone; from now on, we will pay steadily more and more for what we put in our gas tanks—more not just in dollars, but in lives and health, in a failed foreign policy that spawns foreign wars and military occupations, and in the lost integrity of the biological systems that sustain life on this planet.
The only solution is to do proactively, and sooner, what we will end up doing anyway as a result of resource depletion and economic, environmental, and military ruin: end our dependence on the stuff. Everybody knows we must do this. Even a recent American president (an oil man, it should be noted) admitted that “America is addicted to oil.” Will we let this addiction destroy us, or will we overcome it? Good intentions are not enough. Now is the moment for the President, other elected officials at all levels of government, and ordinary citizens to make this our central priority as a nation. We have hard choices to make, and an enormous amount of work to do.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25559.htm
Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster - Mark Stapleton - 28-05-2010
Ed Jewett Wrote:Here is an MSNBC YouTube interview with Matt Simmons which suggests there is actually another leak not show in the famous live video feed ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDGAoU1H2gM&feature=youtu.be
Last night I heard a report on the news which claimed Operation Top Kill has a 60-70% chance of success.
But after watching this interview one can only be pessimistic.