Gulf coast oil spill

[Pete Zicato]

Maybe this is some passive aggressive shit on the part of the brits. I think they're still pissed over the tea we wasted.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by tw

The leak will not stop until that relief well finally locates and then drills into the original well some 16000 feet below the ocean's bottom.

I've been hearing/reading that this is nowhere near a slam dunk solution either. You heard any more on it?

[lookout123]

I think Bush did it.

[Stormieweather]

No no no no no no no....you have to blame Obama. He's the guy in the White House. Nothing ever happened before his term that he isn't responsible for. Every single issue in the economy, environment, education, finance, politics, world government, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and the leaks in my roof are Obama's fault. Get it straight!

Plus it's very stylish right now to hate Obama.

[lookout123]

Originally Posted by Stormieweather

Plus it's very stylish right now to hate Obama.

True. I'm just waiting for Kanye to announce that Obama hates black people.

I'm just glad he's looking for an ass to kick. It shows he has his priorities straight.

[lookout123]

If your idea is to stick a banana in the end of the pipe... they already tried.

[squirell nutkin]

It worked on my neighbor's car...

[lookout123]

I know, I know. It seems like a failproof plan that's why I emailed it to them. all I got back was some bureaucratic gobbeldygook form letter with a handwritten "don't you think we already tried that, dumbass?!?" on the bottom.

There was also the voicemail from Obama wanting to schedule my asskicking, but I just deleted that.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by lookout123

It seems like a failproof plan that's why I emailed it to them.

So what you are saying is that I can stop buying all the gum in Pennsylvania.

[squirell nutkin]

Originally Posted by lookout123

I know, I know. It seems like a failproof plan that's why I emailed it to them. all I got back was some bureaucratic gobbeldygook form letter with a handwritten "don't you think we already tried that, dumbass?!?" on the bottom.

There was also the voicemail from Obama wanting to schedule my asskicking, but I just deleted that.

No man is a prophet in his own country.

[ZenGum]

I have heard from unreliable sources that one possible technique is to detonate a nuclear bomb several hundred meters below the sea floor within a few hundred meters of the well. The shock and blast should crumple the pipe and re-fuse the rock, sealing the leak. Allegedly the soviets did this once, but on land. I haven't done any research of my own to check this. Aint gonna happen.

[classicman]

WASHINGTON — Actor Kevin Costner told Congress on Wednesday that he has a solution to ocean oil spills: a machine that separates oil from water.

Costner said he has spent more than $20 million for the patent and development of the machines since 1993 because he was inspired by the Exxon-Valdez oil spill in 1989.

Costner said he had a hard time initially getting anyone interested in buying the device and that tests performed for the Coast Guard, private companies and other government agencies drew no response.

“My enthusiasm for the machine was met with apathy,” said Costner.
That has recently changed.
The machines — marketed by Ocean Therapy Solutions — are like vacuum cleaners that suck up the oily water and separate the pollutants through a centrifuge.

BP recently put in an order for 32 of the machines to help clean up the Gulf of Mexico, according to Ocean Therapy Solutions CEO John Houghtaling, who said the 32 machines could process 6 million gallons of water a day.

Costner said “that as long as the oil industry profits from the sea, they have an obligation to protect it.” The actor told the House panel that the cleaning devices “should be on every ship transporting oil, they should be on every derrick, they should be in every harbor.”

He stressed the economic importance of having effective cleaning processes, noting that the oil spill that began April 20 has led to a moratorium on offshore drilling and put many workers in the oil industry on the Gulf Coast out of work.

He said he hopes that a device like his might persuade the government to lift the temporary ban.

“There's 33 platforms that are shut down,” said Costner. “We can put Americans back to work and bring into the 21st century the technology of oil spill recovery.”

After the hearing, Pat Smith, COO of Ocean Therapy Solutions, said recent tests have shown that the machines can separate the water and the oil with 99.9 percent efficiency.

Link
I know the Gulf is just a teeny bit larger than 6mil gallons, but it doesn't need to do the whole gulf just the polluted part which admittedly is growing every moment. If these could help... get 'em going.

[Happy Monkey]

This shows the scale.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

This shows the scale.

Awesome link.

So to make some wild assumptions based on the chart: Since the bottom of the well is 18,000 feet deep, and water pressure at 18,000 feet deep is roughly 500 ATM, we can assume that the oil pressure coming up out of the well is at 500 ATM. (I'm assuming that rock weighs the same as water here. Although clearly it weighs more.)

The water pressure at the blowout preventer is 150 ATM, so the pressure difference between the leaking oil and the water at the bottom of the ocean is 350 ATM. Or more likely more than that.

So how do you contain 350 ATM? A scuba tank is pressurized at 204 ATM, so if you can visualize the thickness of a scuba tank wall, if you doubled that, it ought to be strong enough. I'd quadrupole that, just to be on the safe side. So that's how strong whatever you are using has to be. But how to you cut off the stream from a fire hose nozzel?

[squirell nutkin]

Originally Posted by glatt

But how to you cut off the stream from a fire hose nozzel?

There are a number of plumbing tricks to cap water gushing from pipes, whether they would scale up is another question.

One device is a valve with a barbed fitting that slips over a pipe while the valve is open. once it is in place the valve is closed. The greater the pressure the deeper the barb grabs.



Another technique is to cut threads around the outside of the pipe, screw an open valve on and then close the valve. Like shutting off a hose with a nozzle:


There are a couple more possibilities.