Oil spill: Gulf of Mexico disaster 'growing by the moment'
The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has tripled in size in 24 hours. Company officials remain confident that they can contain it before it hits land, but environmentalists are increasingly doubtful.
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Deeper exploration, harder cleanups
A blowout on the Ixtoc I rig in 1979 off the coast of Mexico spilled 33,000 barrels of oil a day, threatened the coast of Texas, and took nine months to contain. Technologies and techniques for containing oil spills have improved since then, but challenges have also increased.
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The current incident demonstrates the risks and degree of difficulty of the global gambit to go ever further afield into the earth's deep crevasses to find oil. Trying to shut off a well 5,000 feet below the ocean surface has never been done.
"The depth complicates everything," says Robert Bryce, author of "Power Hungry: The myths of 'green energy' and the real fuels of the future." "This is a disaster that appears to be growing by the moment."
Shut out of more traditional exploration fields in developing countries, Transocean, the driller, and BP, the field developer, are at the forefront of efforts to expand the search for hydrocarbons.
Early reports were that BP workers using four remote-piloted subs had managed to jam the 5,000-foot "riser" from the well to the surface, These reports were wrong, with the Coast Guard saying Monday that the leak was not contained, but had, in fact, tripled in size in 24 hours.
The riser is now crumpled like an old garden hose in the Mississippi Canyon, leaking crude from at least two places, and feeding a spill that now measures 80 by 42 miles, more than six times the footprint of Los Angeles.
Attempts to stem the flow will focus on using another semi-submersible rig to drill a "relief" well to depressurize the main wellhead so it can be capped. The company is also already building a kind of "sombrero" dome to contain the oil. BP is also increasing hydraulic pressure to emergency-trigger various valves at the wellhead site to stem the flow, but those efforts have so far been unsuccessful.
BP CEO Tony Hayward remained confident the company could contain the spill before it caused environmental damage. In a statement, Mr. Hayward said better weather “combined with the light, thin oil we are dealing with has further increased our confidence that we can tackle this spill offshore."
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