Thread: Oil and natural gas drilling in U.S. waters

Originally Posted by tsptalk

Sounds good to me. What's the catch?

Government set to unveil offshore drilling plan

"(Reuters) - The Obama administration is expected to announce by Wednesday its updated plan for oil and natural gas drilling in U.S. waters, including whether to allow exploration for the first time along the U.S. East Coast."

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I seem to recall Teddy Kenedy didn't want wind turbines on the east coast becuase it would be an eye sore for him and his boating buddies living on the coast. This makes me chuckle a little

Originally Posted by tsptalk

Sounds good to me. What's the catch?

Government set to unveil offshore drilling plan

"(Reuters) - The Obama administration is expected to announce by Wednesday its updated plan for oil and natural gas drilling in U.S. waters, including whether to allow exploration for the first time along the U.S. East Coast."

More

Yeah I thought the same thing. It sounds real good on the surface, but the devil may be in the details. He'll have to get the EPA to fall in line or will he default to the EPA's ruling. I'll wait and see. It would be a boom to our economy and decrease our dependance on foreign oil from our enemies.

Flashback...

The project will probABLY BE HELD UP IN COURTS FOR YEARS..ALL THE WHILE THE GREENIES ARE FIGHTING THIS PLAN...WE'LL STILL BE BUYING opec OIL..

IMO..This is the SINGLE most intelligent thing President Obama has done to-date for our Country.


..AP - Shaking up years of energy policy and his own environmental backers, President Barack Obama threw open a huge swath of East Coast waters and other protected areas in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico to drilling Wednesday, widening the politically explosive hunt for more homegrown oil and gas

This is the kind of blown out of proportion BS like Global Warming hoax was, that will tug at the heart strings of the malinformed..

His support for exploratory drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas north of Alaska, for example, drew outrage from the Center for Biological Diversity as a threat to polar bears. "Short of sending Sarah Palin back to Alaska to personally club polar bears to death, the Obama administration could not have come up with a more efficient extinction plan for the polar bear," said Brendan Cummings, the center's senior counsel.

..What a crock of bear scat.

I can't believe the flip-flop on his campaign promises....
There should be a list on this one....Nother thread, sorry!

Drilling? He campaigned for the environmentalists and no drilling....

Wow, here in California, they're interviewing all the tree huggers and they're like, "No way, Not Here, Even if it is the president!"

Hahaha, They're really trying hard here in California not to try to call for his head yet!

"The agency said in its monthly Oil Market Report that world oil demand would reach an average of 86.60 million bpd this year, up from 84.93 million in 2009."

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/pro...13&id=11403510


Will be interesting to see how this affects the markets...similar to 2008?

Shrug. Virginia has been rallying for this (at least for natural gas drilling) for a long time, through both Republican and Democratic administrations. There is evidence of large natural gas deposits off of the Virginia/Delmarva coast. And if you don't want to *see* it, it can be put offshore far enough that you have to go out in a boat to see it.

Alaska has the problem that much of its untapped coastline is in national wilderness or national parkland. Giving away national owned land at little cost turned into a fun punching bag issue for the last Administration. Why get involved? It's not like there aren't places in Alaska already available to tap oil/gas out there, it's just hard to get to. Alaska is NOT running out of available places to tap.

California, yesterday's leader in enviromental issues, site of the biggest (or at least long term consequences) oil spill mess is not going to be interested in oil drilling so why offer it?

Sounds like a pragmatic solution to me...

Since we haven't yet started a unique thread for the major oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico- I think this is probably a good time and place to hijack the thread from Oil and Gas in US Waters in General- to a specific thread to capture some of the Gulf Oil Spill that is growing.


A really good source of hard data and photos/maps is over at the NOAA website.

Here's a map that outlines what we're dealing with so far:

spill-map-04-28-10.jpg

And this summary from NOAA yesterday:

Deepwater Horizon Incident, Gulf of Mexico Mississippi Canyon 252 Overflight
taken 4/26/2010 at 11:26 am Updated each evening
Situation: Tuesday 27 April


Responders were again unsuccessful in using Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) to trigger the blowout preventer (BOP), a series of valves that sits at the well head. Additional options are still being developed to trigger the BOP. The Unified Command is also considering using controlled burning to control oil floating on the surface.

Construction has begun on a collection dome that will be deployed to the sea floor to collect and funnel oil as it escapes from the well, a method that has never been tried this deep before. The first rig to be used for drilling a relief or cut-off well arrived last night, several more are planned – a relief well would take several months to complete.

Current NOAA efforts are focused on: gathering more information about the spill, planning for containment, and readying for environmental assessment and response. Natural resource damage assessment (NRDA) activities are now underway.

• Edge of area with visible oil is now 21 miles from the nearest point of land- SW Pass at the tip of the Mississippi River Delta.
• Weather forecast to be favorable (5-10 kts from the north) on Wednesday for in situ burning, dispersant application, and skimming operations. This wind will take the floating oil offshore.
• Winds are forecast to become strong (20+ kts) and blow from the southeast on Thursday, which will tend to push surface oil towards shore.
• The latest NOAA oil-spill trajectory analyses do not indicate oil coming to shore over the next 72 hours. However protective booms (or floating barriers) are being deployed in sensitive areas. The effects of oil on sensitive habitats and shorelines in four states (LA, MS, AL, and FL) are being evaluated should oil from the incident make landfall in appreciable quantities
• NOAA’s Assessment and Restoration Division (ARD) brought together more than 20 Federal and State natural resource trustees today to discuss natural resource damage assessment efforts
• ARD is evaluating concerns about potential injuries of oil and dispersants to fishes, human use of fisheries, marine mammals, turtles, and sensitive resources

Media Inquiries NOAA media inquiries, please contact: Keeley Belva at keeley.belva@noaa.gov or 301.713.3066.
For response inquiries, please contact: Joint Information Center (JIC) at 985.902.5231 or 985.902.5240.
Background
The incident involves a deepwater drilling platform approximately 50 miles southeast of Venice, Louisiana. An explosion and subsequent fire damaged the rig, which capsized and sank on April 22, after burning for hours. It is unclear how much of the estimated 700,000 gallons (approximately 16,700 barrels) of #2 fuel onboard burned before it sank. The rig is owned by Transocean and under contract to BP. More Information about this Incident

• IncidentNews: Deepwater Horizon View the most up-to-date information on OR&R's IncidentNews site. [leaves OR&R site]

• The Louisiana Regional Restoration Planning Program Federal and Louisiana natural resource trustees have developed a statewide Louisiana Regional Restoration Planning Program to assist the natural resource trustees in carrying out their Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) responsibilities. [leaves OR&R site]

Visual Resources
Links to photo and video galleries related to this incident on other Web sites.

• USCG Deepwater Horizon Response Visual Information Gallery Photos and video of the Deepwater Horizon response, provided by the U.S. Coast Guard. [leaves OR&R site]

• NOAA Deepwater Horizon Footage A direct link to a large Quicktime format video file hosted on the National Ocean Service website. [leaves OR&R site]

• Timecode Slates for NOAA Deepwater Horizon Footage Required accessibility companion document describing images in the NOAA Deepwater Horizon Footage. Microsoft Word format. [leaves OR&R site]

• Imagery from NASA Earth Observatory Images of the affected area, captured on April 25, by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite, and the Advanced Land Imager on NASA’s Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite. [leaves OR&R site]

Downloads

• Deepwater Horizon Trajectory Map Cumulative for 22 April through 26 April 2010, including forecast for 27 April. Based on trajectories and overflight information.
  (Image format: PDF, size: 260.1 K)

Today's update:

Situation – Wednesday 28 April – Workers finished fabricating the containment chamber portion of the collection dome that will be deployed to the sea floor to collect oil as it escapes from the well. Work will now begin on the piping system that brings the oil to the surface for collection; this method has never been tried at this depth before. The first rig to be used for drilling a relief or cut-off well is on site and should begin drilling approximately ½ a mile from the well head on Friday. The relief well will not be complete for several months.

Responders are still figuring out new ways to use Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) to try to trigger the blowout preventer (BOP), a series of valves that sits at the well head. These efforts will continue concurrent with the collection dome and relief well(s). Good weather today allowed for both skimming operations and aggressive aerial application of dispersants - over 50,000 gallons of dispersant have been applied to the surface oil in the last two days. Patches of surface oil were captured with fire-retardant boom and ignited (in situ burn).

Current NOAA efforts are focused on: gathering more information about the spill, planning for open water and shoreline remediation, and readying for environmental assessment and response. Natural resource damage assessment (NRDA) activities are now underway.

§ Winds are forecast to become strong (20+ kts) and blow from the southeast starting tomorrow and continuing through the weekend, which will continue to push surface oil towards shore
§ NOAA oil-spill trajectory analyses indicate that oil continues to move towards shore.
§ 100,000’ of oil-containment booms (or floating barriers) have been deployed as a precaution to protect sensitive areas in the Louisiana area.
§ The effects of oil on sensitive habitats and shorelines in four states (LA, MS, AL, and FL) are being evaluated should oil from the incident make landfall in appreciable quantities
§ NOAA’s Assessment and Restoration Division is evaluating concerns about potential injuries of oil and dispersants to fishes, human use of fisheries, marine mammals, turtles, and sensitive resources
§ Baseline aerial surveys to assess marine life were conducted today with personnel from NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), these will continue as needed

If they don't get those valves closed- we're talking about 42,000 gallons a day continuing to flow into the Gulf of Mexico FOR SEVERAL MONTHS AT LEAST, while they try and drill a relief well to reduce the pressure of the oil flowing out. Understand that even AFTER they get a relief well in place, it could take MONTHS MORE before the pressure is reduced, and the flow of oil out of the existing well slows.

Folks- we are talking really, really, really big spill into the Gulf of Mexico here.

Bad, bad stuff.

IF they can't get those valves shut off in the next couple of days, I seriously think we are going to be looking at the real potential of becoming worst oil spill in the history of drilling- Making the Exxon Valdez pale in comparison.