BP officials seem to be running out of ideas for ways to stop their damaged undersea oil well from spewing millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico, because they're starting to repeat themselves. And it's quite possible their new strategy could make things worse instead of better, increasing the flow by as much as 20 percent until the leak is capped, according to White House energy advisor Carol Browner.
The new plan is for BP to use a diamond-cut saw to slice through a damaged pipe leading out of the well, cap it with a funnel-like containment dome, using underwater robots to put the device in place, and capture as much of the oil as possible. At the same time, BP is saying that the only permanent solution is to finish the relief wells they are drilling, work that will take months to complete.
"The American people need to know that it is possible we will have oil leaking from this well until August when the relief wells will be finished," Browner said Sunday on "Face the Nation." And on "Meet the Press" Browner said: "This is probably the biggest environmental disaster we've ever faced in this country. It's certainly the biggest oil spill, and we're responding with the biggest environmental response."
The most recent part of that big environmental response was the "top kill" tactic that BP tried last week. It didn't work. The idea there was to pump so much heavy drilling fluid (called "mud") into the damaged well under high pressure that the oil would stop flowing long enough for workers to cap the leaks. BP combined the "top kill" procedure with a so-called "junk shot" strategy, in which workers dump assorted refuse such as knotted rope, golf balls, and other junk into the leak to clog it up.
BP considered the top kill/junk shot one-two punch its best chance to stop the leak before relief wells could be completed sometime this summer. Now that those efforts have failed to get results, however, BP is returning to a variation of its earlier strategy of using a containment dome to capture the leaking oil and pump it to ships on the surface.
BP first try at a containment dome in early May failed when the dome couldn't create a good seal over the leak and cold underwater temperatures caused gas hydrates--ice-like solids--to form in the pipes. Another effort to siphon the leaking oil with a mile-long tube also failed, as did various other efforts.
BP is hoping that by cutting the pipe it can ensure a stronger seal for the new dome and capture much of the oil that is still gushing from the undersea well at a daily rate of somewhere between 12,000 barrels (504,000 gallons) and 25,000 barrels (1.05 million gallons).
Also Read:
Comments