Boston's Big Picture - Oil Spill in Gulf of Mexico | Hacker News Reader

Boston's Big Picture - Oil Spill in Gulf of Mexico

boston.com

26 pointsjashmenn13 comments

Apparently, BP has had underwater videos of the leaks form the start but won't release them despite the fact that they could help independent scientists and engineers better assess the situation and help to find solutions. Only a couple still images have been released so far:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/05/first-underwater-ima...

If US had any balls left whatsoever, it should seize all BP owned properties in this country and use it to pay for the damages it had caused.

Realistically, BP is going to get off with a slap on the wrist. Taxpayers will pay for the cleanup, and Gulf people will suffer for the decades to come.

Oh... life... you're so cruel sometimes.

I just wish Obama were down there leading the effort to clean this all up. There shouldn't be unemployed fishermen standing in line for handouts from the Catholic Charities. Everyone available there should be full tilt on cleanup. If I think there's anything the government should fund, it should be that (and then sue BP or whomever later).

I didn't see any BP branded work shirts on the workers setting up protections for the shoreline in the photos..

True. Most of the people doing the cleanup obviously aren't employees of BP. But my point is that there should be a lot more people (esp. people who can work on the water). Obama, simply by being there, could add a lot more weight to that effort.

How? He's a pretty skinny guy.

Him being there is him not working on something else. He didn't appoint horse ranchers to FEMA, he appointed experience professionals. They can do their job without him yanking them away to grandstand in front of cameras for politics.

I guess it's been a long time since anyone remembers what executive leadership looks like. Or can look like. Oh well.

Heh, well if you want an education, go run for some political office yourself and see what it's like to deal with real world limitations.

In the last few months he's secured chinese cooperation for sanctions against Iran, a generational nuclear disarmament treaty with Russia, a major health insurance reform bill, etc. Before that he led the stimulus and bailout effort which, while unpopular, does seem to have contributed to the fact that we're not in another great depression. In the next month or so we'll have financial reform and probably a crack at immigration reform after that.

It's not like he's sleeping on the job.

Marketed "executive leadership" consisting of a whole bunch of highly visible press conferences from the gulf might make you happier, but that's not leadership. Taking care of the parts he can help with in a 30 minute meeting in Washington and then spending the rest of his day attending to everything else in the country is leadership.

But yeah, I'm sure Ronald "I have no idea what's going on in my office but I have great stage props" Reagan was a much better leader.

That's a good point. Clearly, he shouldn't be there for press conferences. Perhaps I misspoke by implying his 'presence' would be helpful. I was thinking more along the lines of organizing the cleanup. If we have a national catastrophe that will affect the gulf for decades, maybe permanently, I would just think that this is where delegation should be suspended.

Obviously, I care about Obama and, perhaps not obviously, I don't think he's 'sleeping on the job'. It's just that sometimes in emergency situations, if the 'buck stops [with you]', you have to step up and make sure the job gets done as best as possible.

Environmental disasters are extreme circumstances. They call for extreme diligence because our habitat is being irrevocably damaged. It doesn't have to be Obama himself. But a lot can be excused with the rationale of 'real world limitations'.

Clearly, things are getting worse in the gulf. If you're a responsible executive, that's when you step in and manage it yourself. Or at least deputize yourself much more clearly and strongly. Maybe he's doing that behind the scenes. Hopefully.

Also, was just reading up on this more. But look at Salazar's history ('In 2006, Salazar voted to end protections that limit offshore oil drilling in Florida's Gulf Coast.')

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Salazar

Clearly, he is not qualified to head this effort.

Via:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/05/10/focusing-spill

Nor are other people at the table, e.g., Jim Jones (formerly on the board of Chevron).

Anyway, I love Obama. But I predict this becomes a classic case of not taking control of the situation coming back to bite him in the long run politically, and more importantly the environment...

Not sure how useful it is to have POTUS there long term. With all the secret service presence / entourage / media, it probably just creates more chaos to have POTUS there and hinders the operation.

In at least one picture, there is a shrimp boat towing booms.

Going full tilt on cleanup is probably not a good idea.

For instance cleaning up oiled birds may seem like the right thing to do, but the unfortunate reality is that even if you remove the oil from their feathers, the vast majority will die from shock and organ failure. Most experts believe the most humane course is actually to euthanize oiled birds. http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,693359,00.h...

The same goes for other forms of cleanup, for instance aggressively cleaning fragile areas such as marshes may cause additional damage for little if any benefit. Dispersants are themselves toxic, and overuse may cause more harm than good.

THE best thing to do in response to the Gulf spill’s landfall is ... nothing. Sure, larger oil concentrations can be sopped up, and large animals can be cleaned. But cleanup efforts can do only so much: evidence suggests that they reduce hydrocarbon concentrations only over the short term. And many responses have harmful side effects. Controlled burning spreads toxic materials and kills plants that retard erosion, thus hurting the very lands we’re trying to protect. Nutrient-rich detergents or active bioremediation — which encourages the growth of bacteria that can break down oil — can fundamentally disturb the ecological balance for decades.

Instead, we should recognize that nature can do many things far better than we can, and with less collateral damage. Oil is a natural byproduct of biological and geological processes; if left alone in coastal environments, wave action, the sun and microbes in the sediment will naturally break down hydrocarbons. Meanwhile, money saved can go to helping local economies deal with the loss of income, improving safety regulations and enforcement and developing a clean energy policy. — KEVIN M. YEAGER, assistant professor of marine sciences at the University of Southern Mississippi http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/11/opinion/11oped2.html

Surely, setting up booms to contain the oil (which is still flowing, and apparently will be for another couple of months until this relief well is done) would do much to limit the expanse of the spill.

This is not a completed oil spill. It is one growing by the day. Surely, containing the oil from spreading is at least something that should be attempted.

You say:

'In at least one picture, there is a shrimp boat towing booms.'

That is precisely my point. If that works, there should be more of it.

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