Scientists: Oil leaking up to 2.52M gallons daily

AP on Yahoo ^ | 6/15/10 | Pat Henry - ap

[NormsRevenge]

NEW ORLEANS – Scientists provided a new estimate for the size of the Gulf oil spill on Tuesday that indicates it could be worse than previously thought.

A government panel of scientists said that the ruptured well is leaking between 1.47 million and 2.52 million gallons a day of oil. That is an increase over previous estimates that put the maximum size of the spill at 2.1 million gallons per day.

"This estimate brings together several scientific methodologies and the latest information from the sea floor, and represents a significant step forward in our effort to put a number on the oil that is escaping from BP's well," Energy Secretary Steven Chu said in a statement.

The latest numbers reflect an increase in the flow that scientists believe happened after undersea robots earlier this month cut off a kinked pipe near the sea floor that was believed to be restricting the flow of oil, just as a bend in a garden hose reduces water flow. BP officials has estimated that cutting the kinked pipe likely increased the flow by up 20 percent.

[Dusty Road]

One tenth of America's daily needs, drill ten more and we're covered. I'm not buying these leak estimates for a second! I suspect BP’s original estimation will come closer to being the actual flow rate.

[silverleaf]

don’t confuse barrels with gallons

some estimates describe the leak in terms of barrels, others use gallons which sounds lots worse

I’m sure the dum dum press is not careful about this

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

There are 42 U.S. gallons in a barrel; 55 in a drum. In Canada (pre-metric) a 55 gallon (U.S.) drum held 45 Imperial gallons.

[21twelve]

Because then the leak looks WAY bigger. Just like with “global warming” and CO2 - it is always in tons of CO2. 2,000,000,000 tons of CO2 looks like a huge problem. Expressed as 0.4 % of the atmosphere - not so much.

NOT to minimize the awful effects of this oil leak - but I imagine that they are trying to make it look as bad for BP and “Big Oil” as possible.

[Trust but Verify]

I was reading that earlier and had to stop. Ominous doesn’t come close to describing the possible destruction if that thing cannot be stopped or worse, if that thing collapses on itself and opens up the seabed. I don’t think most people can get their minds around such a calamity.

[Dusty Road]

Thats a drum.

[21twelve]

Here’s a good article from 2009 about the first of its kind deep water rig (BP). Amazing the difficult conditions and the technology required to overcome it. They are producing lots of oil with no problem at this site (Thunder Horse) - with flow rates of up to 50,000 barrels/day per well (and multiple wells from one rig).

http://www.offshore-mag.com/index/article-display/7929620548/articles/offshore/volume-69/issue-12/top-5_projects/thunder-horse__first.html

EXCERPT:

“One of the most obvious challenges for BP was the location of the project (Thunder Horse Project, 2009) in ultra deepwater in a region notorious for both loop currents and the menace of hurricanes. A new generation of drilling rigs, such as the derrick rigs on the Discoverer Enterprise drillship and the PDQ had to be designed for these extremes.

The project also had to deal with reservoir temperatures up to 270º F (132° C), pressures up to 18,000 psi (124 MPa), and reservoir flow rates of up to 50,000 b/d of oil per well.”

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

I just saw your post; & I checked my figures about Imperial gallons in a drum— you are closer than I was in #23. I was going on memory; where, I guess we always just rounded down & called them “45 gallon drums”. (45.797 gallon drum, just doesn’t roll easily off the tongue.)

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

“Because then the leak looks WAY bigger. Just like with “global warming” and CO2 - it is always in tons of CO2. 2,000,000,000 tons of CO2 looks like a huge problem. Expressed as 0.4 % of the atmosphere - not so much.”

I completely agree with your point. In fact, the exaggeration about CO2 is an order-of-magnitude greater; it being only 0.04% of the atmosphere.

[SaraJohnson]

You are right. The EPA made pretend the air was not dangerous in New York during the Twin Towers attack and clean up and it was very dangerous, actually. I think that deception is going on with this oil spill and clean up. That is scarey!

[21twelve]

Thanks. (I’m surprised I was only a decimal point off!) I should be careful when I’m just tossing numbers out there like that and say “or something like that”. Although I bet I’ve done stuff like that 1,000,000 times and no one ever notices or says anything. ;)

[Ditter]

I thought I had heard it was different than a 55 gallon drum but I couldn't remember if it was more or less. Oh course they want it to seem as bad as possible. I am really sick of all the dooms day talk done just to keep us hysterical and asking for Big Daddy Government to take care of us.

[penelopesire]

That site is run by a bunch of eco snots, so not sure I would trust it. That is what I am comforting myself with for now anyway. It read like a really bad sci-fi movie. If it gets that bad, we should just nuke it.

[NormsRevenge]

..the oil well core could collapse and release the entire oil supply uncontrolled.

—

Can we make it wait until October. :-)

[NormsRevenge]

like a bad sci-fi movie..

Members of the media photograph U.S. oil company executives before they testify on the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico during a House Energy and Commerce hearing on Capitol Hill, June 15, 2010. REUTERS/Larry Downing

[aruanan]

I thought I had heard it was different than a 55 gallon drum but I couldn't remember if it was more or less.

42 gallons in a barrel of crude.

[USFRIENDINVICTORIA]

The number is “seared in my memory” (/kerry) — because I like to mention it when “debating” fanatical warm mongers. Most people think it's a much, much greater proportion of the atmosphere. It's been (IIRC) 20 times greater in the past; so your figure was right at some times in the planet's history.

[Bean Counter]

Amazing stuff, and it demonstrates that this technology really is the “tip of the spear” for the Nation’s energy needs.

It also reinforces the extreme conditions that this oil is produced from, and how close to the edge of disaster this whole industry operates on a regular basis. We civilians take all of this for granted, and I admit I had no idea how complicated all of this is until this disaster occurred. I’ve learned more about offshore drilling in the last 2 months than I ever imagined I would want to know, and the people out there running this have my deep respect.

The industry is going to change again because of this, in ways we could not have envisioned without this disaster. Thunder Horse worked out, and that encouraged exploring at the Macondo site, but the Macondo reserve may well be too difficult to develop with existing technology; but that only means that there is already a bunch of engineers who are trying to figure out how to do this better.

It’s how all industry progresses.

[verity]

In the 4 sentences you posted, the word estimate was used 4 times.

I am overwhelmed with the certainty of Chu's report.

[668 - Neighbor of the Beast]

Heckuva job, Barry!

Biden warned us that something like this would happen. Have faith. 0bama will roll back the oceans like he promised, in his own good time, and then he'll fix that leak with his mighty middle finger.