It’s a Puzzle to me, too

Mark Schleifstein, stalwart reporter for The Times-Picayune, writes that the source of 30-mile oil spill in Gulf puzzles officials. Well, of course it does.

New oil slick falls upon Grand Isle

Photo by Jerry Moran / Stuart Smith oilspillaction.com

“We are working with our state and local partners to mitigate any further environmental impact ,” said Capt. Jonathan Burton, the federal on-scene coordinator for the response. Comforting words, eh?

Since the Obama administration bowed to Pollutocrat wishes, isn’t the puzzle how to hide the source of the catastrophe?

With anti-nuclear sentiment on the rise, Emperor Fossil wants to maintain an increase in dirty fossil fuel profits. That means avoiding any generalization of public disaffection. The Pollutocrats worry that environmental crisis after crisis might stimulate a push for clean, renewable energy despite their best efforts at corruption.

“More oil is spilled from the network of terminals, pipes, pumping stations and oil platforms every year [in the Niger Delta] than has been lost in the Gulf of Mexico.” And, does Big Oil let those people do anything about it. No. So, Bianca Jager, how come residents of the Gulf of Mexico think they are someone special?

After NRDC Media Coordinator Rocky Kistner relayed report of an oil spill near the Deepwater drilling site in Gulf of Mexico, there was a remarkable silence about it. A HuffPo update states “the Coast Guard has confirmed that oil is not coming from the Deepwater Horizon.” An investigation into reports of large oil slicks is continuing.

(Now is that an investigation into how the reports got out despite their best surveillance, or an investigation into the source of the oil?)

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This entry was written by jcwinnie, posted on 2011-3-22 at 1:24 pm, filed under energy, enforcement, environment, journalism, monitor, water and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Both comments and trackbacks are currently closed.

3 Comments

  1. jcwinnie
    Posted 2011-3-22 at 2:44 pm | Permalink

    “As the Obama administration “approved the first deepwater oil and gas exploration plan since last year’s Macondo oil well blowout,” notes Brad Johnson,”emulsified oil, oil mousse and tar balls from an unknown source were washing up on beaches from Grand Isle to West Timbalier Island along the Gulf of Mexico, a stretch of about 30 miles.”

    This new oil spill may be related to an offshore well plug and abandonment project conducted on Saturday. Meanwhile, Shell Offshore won approval to “seek drilling permits for three new wells 130 miles off the Louisiana coast”:

    The announcement by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement Director Michael Bromwich won praise from the industry and from Louisiana lawmakers who have been pressing the administration to reopen drilling in the Gulf.

    Further underscoring the environmental costs of oil, a shipwreck on Nightingale Island in the South Atlantic, is leaking 1,500 tons of heavy crude oil, threatening half of the world’s population of rockhopper penguins.


    Oiled rockhopper penguins rescued by Britain’s Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.
  2. jcwinnie
    Posted 2011-3-23 at 10:11 am | Permalink

    The Times Picayune is reporting that a Houston based company, Anglo-Suisse Offshore Partners, has taken responsibility for leaking Louisiana crude from a non-producing well that has contaminated Louisiana coastal beaches and wetlands and created a slick that spread for miles offshore.

    The  newspaper earlier reported that state officials had fingered work being done to the Anglo-Suisse’s non-producing oil well near Southwest Pass of the Mississippi River as the likely source, calling it a “well capping out of control.”  Anglo Suisse Offshore Partners  released a statement last night confirming it was the source of the spill, but that it was “surprised” that its dormant well could have released that much oil, according to the paper. The Times Picayune reported the well was being capped for permanent abandonment and that the operators told the Coast Guard it had been leaking only small amounts of oil.

    In three reports to the Coast Guard since Friday, the company had reported that less than 5 gallons of crude had escaped. But state Wildlife and Fisheries agents traced the oil to the Anglo-Suisse well at its Platform E facility on Monday afternoon and found a crew on a boat trying to close in the well with a remotely operated submarine.

  3. jcwinnie
    Posted 2011-3-23 at 10:17 am | Permalink

    Guess we can expect lengthy high-level discussions on The Oil Drum about the challenges of using a remote controlled submarine to cap an oil well.

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  1. By Given to or marked by deliberate deceptiveness in behavior or speech – After Gutenberg on 2011-4-20 at 9:48 am

    [...] the catastrophe and afterward, the Obama administration urged public trust for BP, the other Pollutocrats* (like the non tax paying Exxon that keeps saying they will stop financing deception about climate [...]

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