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JWC
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21 Mar 2011, 12:49 pm

First off, let me say that I work for an "evil oil company", and I'm sorry to disappoint; but oil companies are just like any other business. Our mission is to provide the best possible product to our customers. The "ins and outs" of gov't taxation and regulation have become such a tangled web that most of us in industry have trouble ensuring our compliance. Any discussion on this forum needs to recognize that no one person, including myself, knows enough about the myriad of situations responsible for gas prices and the state of the oil industry today.

It needs to be said that government involvement has only made the scenario more confusing, and the ultimate loser is the end customer. I was heavily involved in the gulf spill last year and the biggest obstacle faced was getting the Ken Salazar to actually approve any cleanup procedures. There were periods of time that we were simply forced to sit on our hands and wait; meanwhile, oil continued to flow into the GOM.

Most oil companies, especially the big ones, understand that they have nothing to gain and everything to lose by not keeping their customers happy.

In conclusion, do not believe what you hear about oil in the news (on the left or the right); ask someone who is actually involved.



number5
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21 Mar 2011, 1:13 pm

JWC wrote:
First off, let me say that I work for an "evil oil company", and I'm sorry to disappoint; but oil companies are just like any other business. Our mission is to provide the best possible product to our customers. The "ins and outs" of gov't taxation and regulation have become such a tangled web that most of us in industry have trouble ensuring our compliance. Any discussion on this forum needs to recognize that no one person, including myself, knows enough about the myriad of situations responsible for gas prices and the state of the oil industry today.

It needs to be said that government involvement has only made the scenario more confusing, and the ultimate loser is the end customer. I was heavily involved in the gulf spill last year and the biggest obstacle faced was getting the Ken Salazar to actually approve any cleanup procedures. There were periods of time that we were simply forced to sit on our hands and wait; meanwhile, oil continued to flow into the GOM.

Most oil companies, especially the big ones, understand that they have nothing to gain and everything to lose by not keeping their customers happy.

In conclusion, do not believe what you hear about oil in the news (on the left or the right); ask someone who is actually involved.


How are the people supposed to get any answers if "no one person, including myself, knows enough about the myriad of situations responsible for gas prices and the state of the oil industry today." ?

I don't buy it. You and your colleagues may not know, but the people running the show sure do. Why do you suppose there was such inactivity during the cleanup? Also, how is the cleanup actually done? Is it physical removal or simply chemical additives that force the crap to sink so everything just looks nice. (I'm not trying to be accusatory, I'm genuinely curious)



JWC
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21 Mar 2011, 1:28 pm

@number5:

What I'm trying to get at is that most of the points being made on both sides of this discussion do not grasp the truth of the issue. This is because of the dis-information from the media.

For instance, lost in all the hype over the environmental impact of the oil spill is the fact that around twice the amount of the oil spilled in the Exxon Valdez incident (I forget the specific figure) seeps into the GOM naturally every year.

As I stated in my previous post, most of the inactivity was a result on waiting for gov't approval for clean up methods.

A variety of different methods are used including chemical additives (they actually break the oil down into more environmentally friendly compounds) and skimming; which collects oil on the surface. The portion of the cleanup I was most heavily involved in required capping the wellhead and piping the oil into a production vessel that was used to contain/distribute the leaked oil.



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21 Mar 2011, 2:43 pm

As a biologist, I would like to note that physical remediation is the most environmentally friendly: capping the well, sucking up as much of the leaking oil as possible, and skimming. It is heavily debated whether pumping dispersants into the plume harmed the environment more than it helped it.

JWC, a major problem seemed to be a lack of ROVs/robots/human-piloted submersibles that could function at the depth of the broken well; do you know if there is any movement towards making such tools more available for the next time this happens?



JWC
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21 Mar 2011, 2:53 pm

@LKL:

I'm not sure if ROV availability has specifically been addressed. I think that is included in the scope of the Helix Fast Response System. Basically, Helix and a few other companies have pooled their resources and made the equipment readily available to contain an oil spill in up to 10,000 ft of water.



AceOfSpades
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21 Mar 2011, 3:09 pm

pandabear wrote:
This means that the teabaggers are not only stupid racist Evangelical poo-poo-heads, but also homosexuals.
Wait you're 52? I'd expect to hear something like this after walking past an elementary school yard.



Inuyasha
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21 Mar 2011, 3:32 pm

AceOfSpades wrote:
pandabear wrote:
This means that the teabaggers are not only stupid racist Evangelical poo-poo-heads, but also homosexuals.
Wait you're 52? I'd expect to hear something like this after walking past an elementary school yard.


One's chronological age doesn't indicate their maturity, I've seen elementry school kids act more mature than pandabear is currently.



Vigilans
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21 Mar 2011, 4:02 pm

Inuyasha wrote:
AceOfSpades wrote:
pandabear wrote:
This means that the teabaggers are not only stupid racist Evangelical poo-poo-heads, but also homosexuals.
Wait you're 52? I'd expect to hear something like this after walking past an elementary school yard.


One's chronological age doesn't indicate their maturity, I've seen elementry school kids act more mature than pandabear is currently.


pandabear has an excellent sense of humor and is likely laughing his ass off because he wanted this reaction :)


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