Oooh man, still no word from BP other than "going as planned." I did however watch CNN bash Obama and BP for quite some time yesterday, and happened to see a guest scientist on the show who was trying to explain how this top kill mud pile thing works, and why it's not actually terrifying that they stopped pouring mud for a bit (in a sentence or two). It flew right over the host's head, but I'm pretty sure I got the gist of what he was attempting to explain. The basic idea is that the mud is getting shot down the pipe to overpower the pressure of the oil in hopes that the hydrostatic forces of the mud and oil will reach equilibrium... buh? Yea, that's actually more words than he used, and if you're like Campbell Brown you're asking, "so why doesn't the oil just come flying out again once you stop pouring mud?"
Sciency Junk! :D If I'm not mistaken, this system loosely resembles the fundamentals of the hydraulic press in reverse. The weight of the ocean and ocean floor is pushing down on a reservoir of oil which has a very narrow escape route. The pressure at that route is not that great in comparison to the weight of the ocean floor, but still immense as we've seen. If the ocean floor SINKS say an inch, then the oil in the pipe must RISE by that same inch multiplied by the ratio of the surface area of the oil reservoir divided by the surface area of the hole in the pipe. HUGE multiplier. The distance the oil has risen is multiplied by the cross sectional area of the pipe, which equates to a MASSIVE volume of oil! And if I'm not mistaken the velocity has the same scaling factor.
If you can start to push that stack of oil back down, it works like a hydraulic press where it requires less force over a greater distance to push the larger mass a small distance. Due to the narrowness of the tube, it's conceivable that the force needed can be provided by just the mass of the mud pile in the pipe. If that mud pile gets large enough, then the system will reach equilibrium. They pumped for HOURS before taking a break, so there's a lot of mud the oil must fight to come back out. This means it won't come flying out all at once, but will slowly accelerate because the pressure of the oil remains the same, but as more mud comes out less mass is being used to force the oil down. Interesting o.o
I would assume they paused to take a measurement to estimate how much further they need to push the oil down, and also to refill on mud. If the length of the pipe is shorter than the calculated required length of mud, then they may as well try something else. But so far everything is "going as planned."
Unrelated Tax Junk: Check out this article by Derek Thompson. He had a great article on Hillary's comment about raising taxes. Good perspective and intelligent comments too! I weighed in on a few of them, and you should too!... but Dad, try to keep it brief on other people's posts! Here's the link: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2010/05/hillary-clintons-unfortunate-defense-of-higher-taxes/57427/?success#toggleBio
Have a good weekend!
~Yasu
13 comments:
I'm going back to another post, and leave this one to the experts, of which Obama must be the highest authority, as he's been on the job since day ONE! LOL!!! Un'fricken believable!
Why are all the SAVE THE EARTH folks all pissed off? Oil is from the earth! So the earth takes a shit....no big deal! It's been doing this for millions and billions of years! Did you know that all those unrecyclable plastic bottles...whoa is me! End of the world! Well, they found this bug that actually eats plastic....so if we learned to eat the bug like how 3rd worlders eat ants and roaches, then we will be contributing to a greener earth...unless our shit becomes unrecyclable! Deep frying the plastic bug might be a better idea than paying Al Gore for his ridiculous tax on CO2 emissions!
Disclaimer: We are NOT the first country to have a major oil spill.
Wayne Yasuhara
Why is not being the first country to have a major oil spill justifying tremendous damages to the environment that could (and should) have been prevented? Oil is from the earth, but it does NOT belong in the ocean.
Actually that grimey stuff leaks out of the ocean floor all year long, and even more barrels than what we have blowing out of that pipe right now. The big difference is that the stuff that leaks out all year long is widely dispersed.
Just missed throwing up my "How to Fix" the oil leak, and BP stole my idea! Basically, drop some huge metal mesh tube over the leak, let it come up to the surface, and then suck it into super tankers.
For future reference, they need to have a perimeter wall of floats, or buoy's with a tight metal mesh netting that drops say 20 feet below the surface, keeping the spill in say a one mile radius of a spill, and then getting super tankers on site to suck it up.
I can't believe these guys are so lame!
Wayne Yasuhara
haha yea, volcanoes are natural too, but I aint going fishing in one! btw, the natural oil seeps vary widely in consistency, and the reason most disperse naturally, such as those at Coal Oil Point, SB, is because they are primarily composed of lighter hydrocarbons such as natural gases, ethane, propane, butane, etc. as opposed to the heavier hydrocarbons that primarily make up crude oil. If you want to see a natural seep with a consistency closer to what we're seeing out of the Gulf you should think LA BREA TAR PITS! Not exactly what we'd like the Gulf of Mexico to look like.
Also, it's not a bug that eats the plastic, it's a combination of microbes. We'll uuh NOT be eating that... also their use is not even remotely commercialized, and probably for the best considering what would happen if they break loose and spread uncontrolled.
I'd rather be on the "save the earth" side than the "screw the earth" side, but hey, if you care to spread the anti-environment campaign, there's already another post dedicated to that.
Nothing wrong with "Save the Earth" program, as long as you're not being suckered into paying Al Gore. The modus operandi of the Democratic party is to play the "bleeding heart" card, while sucking up cash all along the way, and never improving anything. Case in point the inner cities. We can't even solve the problem of the "poor" in our own country.
Disclaimer: Repoobs haven't done shit either, but they aren't the "bleeding heart" party either.
Also, no one with half a brain is interested in destroying the enviroment....Repoobs or Libs. No benefit to that. But the fact remains that oil is the crude of choice right now, and the economy needs oil to survive....case in point, nothing gets delivered without first filling that gas tank.
We wouldn't be drilling out in the boonies if not for crazy "Save the Earth" fools that run around in motor boats harassing people. ie. Green Peace.
Alot of "Green" hypocrites driving cars, turning on lights, buying bikes with rubber tires, buying pre-packaged foods delivered by BIG trucks! Come on man! How 'bout working within the current system?
Step one: Work with the fuel of choice until technology catches up. Drill closer to shore and set up emergency perimeters. The reason we're drilling so far out is because of the loons. But even that shouldn't of been a problem. I solved it in five minutes, so you would think BP with billions on theline would have something in place incase of a massive blow out.
Regarding oil seeping from ocean floor. There's plenty of heavy grade oil seeping. Some gets dispersed through the ecosystem, and some thich stuff settles on the ocean floor. There's a constant oil sheen on the waters of the Gulf that can be seen from outter space, and that's without an oil spill.
Saudi Arabia had a big oil spill....brought out super tankers and sucked it all up.
Wayne
Yasuhara
While on the subject of "Screw UP'S" I hope that MASSIVE government spending loon Obama doesn't come out today and say the economy is getting better just because we've created all those short term GOVERNMENT census jobs. That's gonna get wiped out soon. In May they created only 27,000 private sector jobs....after all that stimulus? Unbelievable!
What's the purpose of the Census anyway? Shouldn't that be a state or city thing? Also, how are the numbers gonna be right if you have 30 illegals living in a house not submitting a Census survey? Frick'n waste of time and money...as usual!
Last gripe for the day...."Why have elections if they're going to bribe the candidates so as not to run?"
Why always with the Al Gore!?! Did you know that the government has contracts with Ford to purchase law enforcement and government vehicles? How about that school districts have money allotted to them for the purchase of computers, largely funding Steve Jobs and Bill Gates? How about weapons contracts given to Lockheed Martin!?! Did you know that all of them have money held by banks who received bailouts!?! o.O Yes... all very shocking I'm sure (sarcasm). WHY is there a conspiracy theory that the libs are trying to make Al effing GORE, of all people, a wealthy man? Who cares about Al Gore!?! He is the most obscure politician ever... oh except for all the other people I haven't even heard of in the whole CCX Emerald Cities whack job conspiracy. That's the DUMBEST shit I've ever heard! Oh, there's a bank that holds their investments, and you say it got bailed out by the government?? NOoooo, you don't say! A BANK got BAILED OUT by the government last year? Get the hell out.
And do you guys even hear/smell/taste the hypocritical garbage that comes spewing from your mouths? "There's nothing wrong with 'save the earth,' we just believe it's invincible. Global warming is a fake, there's no over fishing, oil spills are natural, dumping plastics is just fine, cap n trade's a conspiracy, surely over population is not a real problem... but we love the environment too." And of course the hypocrisy is justified by afore mentioned retardo conspiracy theories. You guys are out of control!
"Can't even solve the problem of the poor in our own country." Do you realize how difficult a problem "solving" poverty is!?! Few places in the world have done it effectively, and they all have higher levels of socialism than would be acceptable in this country. Really good point man, the libs should just kill themselves for being the ineffective bleeding hearts that they are. Give it up and give in to the 'we don't give a shit about the poor or the planet, blame it on the immigrants' party.
...and again, PLEASE limit gripes to Relevant gripes only! Poverty is already one degree of separation away from relevant. Employment and the dem primaries scandals are WAY out in left field. I do appreciate you separating them though, will make it easier to delete irrelevant gripes in the future!
btw, still waiting for your response to the 1+2+3=no bueno post in "American Turmoil".
Here's the deal, we need oil in a Capitalistic society. Oil fuels economic growth. Without oil the Global economy collapses....plain and simple! Propellars on hats do not work! There is a time gap between when oil is replaced by propellar hats. As in there's a gap between when the Left destroy's the country, and we all run around happy as clams in those cute propellar hats!
Never let a crisis go by without making things worse! New commission will cap drilling offshore, eliminate thousands of oil jobs in America, as oil companies pack up and head for South Africa. Again, why are we drilling so far offshore where shit is hard to fix? Because loons don't want to see oil rigs off shore. If all loons go caveman, don't drive cars, don't use electricity, and stop drinking bottled water, then us Capitalist pigs wouldn't have any shortages!
If we were drilling in ANWAR then we wouldn't have oil spills in the ocean. If we were drilling closer to shore we could handle a crisis better.
Why Al Gore? Poster loon for enviromental causes. Currently in hiding. What else is new?
Hey! The whole post just on oil and the enviroment! Not bad!
Wayne Yasuhara
ps: William Ayer's, Jerimiah Wright, ACORN, Stimulus plan to no jobs, 13 trillion in debt, rigging election's, lack of response to oil spill while setting records for playing golf....at what point does the Left even begin to scratch their heads? Amazingly addictive that Kool Aide!
LOL, I thought for a second you had sprung a case of irrelevant-rant-tourettes in that PS. Man, you were ONE PS away from making it all the way through. B- for effort. D- for answering any actual problems. I'll repeat them for you:
1) We don't have the reserves. Even drilling now is no promise of a future beyond about 15-20yrs before we seriously start to lose leverage. And that's assuming good ties. The oil shortage of the 70's was a perfect example of what happens when we piss off people with oil. "Drill baby drill" in ANWAR is a bandaid, not a solution.
2) We need to support the transition away from oil because like you said, the world runs on oil... right NOW. We need to get alternative technologies rolling immediately. Electric cars will need charging, means we need more generation stations. It's a whole new industry, why do we fight it so much? If you want to talk about conspiracy theories how about the fact that oil companies have been buying up and burying slick new technologies that would hurt their business for decades. How about the fact that all those free market supporters really mean they support the free market players that are there now. The guys smearing climate change are hired by the oil companies the same way those "cigarette researchers" are hired by Philip Morris. How about that the only reason BP is even allowed to operate in the US is because they're in tight enough with the government and are so intertwined in our market that they can be allowed to have egregious safety failures. We're so deeply dependent on this company making upwards of $50mil in profit per day and control our economy and future. Seems a bit more consequential than Al Gore's misconstrune energy bills.
3) What's the conservative plan for raising awareness and incentive? This to me is the most damaging aspect of conservative paranoia. Where does incentive and awareness come from in the conservative scheme? What is going to motivate us to move away from oil?
I'm not scared of ACORN, could give a shit what Bill Ayers is doing, and have NO idea who's playing golf (...who the eff is playing golf!?!). It's the thousands of whack jobs who are too busy with BAD conspiracies (not even decent conspiracies!) who concern me. But let's hear some solutions man.
Why do we need solution's? The whack job drones on the Left obviously don't ever think about the future past next week! Let's blow all the bread we can today! Who gives a rats ass about tomorrow?
Note: One in three Greeks work for the government. Our Leftist ideal is to do better than the Greeks! Bigger government! That's the cure all to end all! YAZOO!!
Watch this! I will solve the economic crisis, and poverty in five minutes. I'll even throw in world hunger for Pete's sake!
1. Economy....give everyone with a house a 4.5% thirty year fixed mortgage. Let the banks submit statement of loss to the government. Also, 4.5% on any first time home purchase for the next 12 month. (Then back to market rate.) Banks got billions and didn't do squat....so mandate the 4.5%....divide percenatge of decrease in foreclosures by adjusted interest rate, and send the banks a check the difference.
Ditto that on credit card bills, 4.5% across the board for the next 18 months. Then back to market rates.
Ok! Solved the economic crisis! People will have money to spend, bills will get paid off, and people will go on vacations. Oh! and with all those new homes, you're gonna need appliances, furniture, yardwork, etc.
note: Above, we have the government involved, working with the banks without a government takeover of the banks. Get in, solve the damn problem, and get out.
Cap all new spending by the Feds, and cut out wasteful spending.
2. Poverty? No problem! First do an inner city summit, create excitement like they did with the President's physical fitness program back in the 60's. First objective....clean up the inner cities. Get trash and clunkers out of front yards....create a positive enviroment. Create a coalition between government and private sector to build a all inclusive training center in every major city. Private sector can receive tax credits for any contributions from instructors, to equipment.
Joe unemployed no skillz walks through the front door....he wants tro be an electrician....go to bldg C room 4.....Maria wants to learn how to build websites...go to computer class in Bldg D room 5....nursing, art, photography, house painting, carpentry, mechanics, accounting, tax preparer,.....almost any trade you can think of....for FREE! The private sector will hire directly from the centers. Retirees with any job skills could be hired to teach. You don't need to be living in the hood to go to the Center, open to all comers.
Expand the private sector, and slowly scale back redundant government jobs, SEIU union's etc. Get to a point where you have a SURPLUS in the Federal government....put it in the bank and spend the interest! Reduce people's taxes as surplus builds.
Get rid of national health care, limit lawyer awards, limit malpractice awards, sell insurance across all states, give tax credits to those companies that perform well, etc.
Reduce fossil fuel consumption by creating a electro-magnetic rail system, and I-pod (independent mover) rail. Individual pod cars on a rail....just jump in and go wherever that Pod is heading...for FREE! Rails can be just above road level or at road level. Nuclear energy might be the answer to running the rail system, or electrical, or solar?
This post is too lonf to solve World Hunger! Sorry!
Wayne Yasuhara
....Ok! World Hunger! Man! Can't believe I have to solve all the world's woe's in one night!
Simple....build water desalianation plants off the coast of every ocean side country....up and down the coast. Pump fresh water through aquaducts....GROW! GROW! GROW! So much new growth that those countries will thrive and prosper. Also, offset whatever we lost in the rain forest to date through the greening of Africa.
Build schools, educate people, control birth rates through knowledge, and common sense.
Note: Be it hunger, the economy, or poverty, the goal should not be systematic control of populations, but rather teaching people that they can be productive contributors to society by exhibiting free will, and a desire to do something for themselves and others. FREEDOM, and DEMOCRACY! NOT GOVERNMENT CONTROLED SHEEPLE living under a hypocritical political class.
Wayne Yasuhara
sooo... what you're saying is you do not have a solution for the 3 things I asked for?
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