Posted on 05/13/2010 1:39:51 PM PDT by Clint Williams
An anonymous reader writes
"Here's a listing of several scientific and economic guides for estimating the volume of flow of the leak in the Gulf erupting at a rate of somewhere around 1 million barrels per day. A new video released shows the largest hole spewing oil and natural gas from an aperture 5 feet in diameter at a rate of approximately 4 barrels per second. The oil coming up through 5,000 feet of pressurized salt water acts like a fractioning column. What you see on the surface is just around 20% of what is actually underneath the approximate 9,000 square miles of slick on the surface. The natural gas doesn't bubble to the top but gets suspended in the water depleting the oxygen from the water. BP would not have been celebrating with execs on the rig just prior to the explosion if it had not been capable producing at least 500,000 barrels per day — under control. If the rock gave way due to the out of control gushing (or due to a nuke being detonated to contain the leak), it could become a Yellowstone Caldera type event, except from below a mile of sea, with a 1/4-mile opening, with up to 150,000 psi of oil and natural gas behind it, from a reserve nearly as large as the Gulf of Mexico containing trillions of barrels of oil. That would be an Earth extinction event."
I thought there wasn’t supposed to be that much oil off the US coast so we shouldn’t bother drilling... or so went the talking point.
Science Fiction
“BP would not have been celebrating with execs on the rig just prior to the explosion if it had not been capable producing at least 500,000 barrels per day — under control”
You can stop reading right there. Being generous, I would say the writer is confusing barrels with gallons. That is the intention of the press though. They have been consistently reporting the spill in gallons because it creates a horrendous number but previously spills were reported as barrels per day. If I weren’t being generous I would just declare the writer an idiot and move on.
The info I saw was implying the find was on the order of 100 million bbls. While a nice find, certainly not one that could spew 1 million bbls a day for this long. Science fiction from a non oil guy.
Somebody needs to cut off anonymous reader’s access to the Discovery Channel.
Now where have I heard this before? Oh yes, we support the troops it's the mission we question or some such variant. Now where's that picture of the protesters encouraging soldiers to shoot their leaders?
If only they hadn't wasted all that time protesting, they could have whipped up more alternative energy unicorns in their parents basements and we wouldn't be in this fix. ;-)
I wouldn't be surprised if it took out Venus too.
Stupid mankind!
Where does he get the 5ft. diameter from? I don’t think the drill holes are that big.
Factoid: If you assume that there is over 5,000 psi of downhole pressure at the BOP—and everything I have heard indicates it is probably substantially higher than that—then a 1/4 inch diameter hole is large enough to “leak” 5,000 barrels a day. That “leak” would probably cut off your arm if you passed it in front of it.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/6444 This has been posted some where..great article...Looks like the BOP may have closed except for a small leak..What is the diameter of the drillhole???
Another dumbass expert. There isn’t a well in the entire world capable of that rate.
Drill here
Drill now
Sue for damages
What is the point of posting information this bizarre and incorrect, when posting it here gives it much exposure and it will be repeated as fact by lazy, uninformed people? And posting it in the “news” forum, to boot?
Yes, five feet is just silly. I thought I saw somewhere from BP that this riser pipe is 12 inches. That’s why they are thinking of inserting a 6 inch pipe to start drawing off the oil instead of even using “Top Hat.”
If the leak is 5,000 bbl per day then we’re looking at 150 gallons per minute or 2.5 gallons per second. I’ve watched the video of the spill several times. The first 12 seconds show the extreme pressure and flow of the natural gas vs. the slow flow of oil (which looks like 1+ gallon per second). The second half of the video shows the gas moving inside the oil flow and making it look much more voluminous, though the BP officials say that the flow is staying very consistant. My estimate is around 2,000 barrels per day of oil. I’m not concerned about the natural gas.
Flying Piggies time, again.
They could fly. If certain things happen.
15K PSI would be more accurate.
From out his arse is my guess, I had seen that the bore pipe was 7 inches.
WERE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!!!!! DIE! DEAD!!!!!!!!!
One point might be to establish a written rebuttal on the internet posted in the comments. Otherwise the article is published without scrutiny.
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