Sorry for the light posting—between travel and the constant stream of studies coming out on the oil spill, much of my work is going straight to the mainpage at Time.com. Like this one—a piece on a new study out in today’s Science#mce_temp_url# that has conclusive evidence of underwater oil plumes. And more worrying, the oil there is …
Energy
Oil Spill: BP Ponies Up for Mental Health
We’ve sent a lot of criticism BP’s way during the past four months of the oil spill, so it’s only fair to give notice when they do the right thing. After weeks of experts calling attention to the potential problems—and states like Louisiana asking for fund—BP announced that it would provide $52 million for behavioral health programs …
Oil Spill: Worrying About the Crude Beneath
Can A Killer Lake Solve Rwanda’s Energy Problem?
Residents living along the shores of Lake Kivu in central Africa have always appreciated – and feared – its power. In Swahili, the word mazuku, or “evil wind,” refers to pockets of deadly, odorless gas that seep from the lake, killing whatever happens to be in its path. Two hundred and fifty feet below the surface of Lake Kivu, …
Oil Spill: The Relief Well Is Coming…Someday
Maybe Thad Allen just can’t let go. A few days after telling reporters that the final stages of the relief well was likely to go forward this week, it seems we might all have to wait a while longer. Further pressure tests on the well now indicate that some amount of concrete leaked into the annulus, or outer casing, during the earlier …
Oil Spill: Environmental Reviews for Deepwater Drilling
The White House announced today that all new deepwater drilling will require environmental reviews. What’s that you say? You assume an activity as transparently fraught with danger and risk as deepwater oil and natural gas drilling, one where human or mechanical errors can lead to major environmental damage, that an activity like that …
Oil Spill: Measuring the Aquatic Effect
ON BOARD THE ARCTIC SUNRISE: I’ve always wanted to write that. I’m currently off the Dry Tortugas south of the Florida Keys, on board a Greenpeace ship. I’m here with a pair of marine biologists from Nova University who have hitched aboard the Arctic Sunrise to do a quick research study on sea sponges in the Tortugas. It’s part of a …
Oil Spill: Finishing the Relief Well—and the Oil Spill
How sealed does a well have to be before it’s considered sealed? That seems to be the question BP and its accompanying team of government scientists are grappling with as the active phase of the Gulf oil spill appears to enter its final days. Yesterday retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen announced that BP was holding off on finishing …
Oil Spill: Is the Well Already Killed?
For weeks now, retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen has been very clear: BP’s blown well would be considered fully fixed when the relief well was finally completed. “This well will not be killed until we do the bottom kill,” Allen said last week.
But it turns out that might not be true. As we reported yesterday, the final phase of …
Oil Spill: End of the Endgame, Beginning of the Claims Game
You know, I’m going to miss these almost daily updates of well-capping procedures performed by robots 5,000 ft. under the surface of the Gulf of Mex…
No, I’m not. If I never hear another piece of vaguely violent drilling jargon—top kill, bottom kill, static kill—it will be too soon. It’s gotten to the point where I’m hearing …