Friday, June 04, 2010

Mr Brown's take on the Singapore oil spill

"... and also, there is a minor side effect of some nature things will die." link

More seriously:

BP "doesn't want pictures of dead animals" from the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico making their way to the media. BP is facing a groundswell of public anger and hostility as the oil continues to flow into the ocean, and coastal communities on the Gulf Coast of the US face the prospect of severe damage to their homes and livelihoods. The US government has announced its intention to launch a criminal investigation into BP's conduct even as the company struggles to stem the flow of oil.

Latest reports say that the riser pipe of the well has been successfully cut, a key step before the company can lower a containment dome over it. However, this means that the flow rate will increase until the dome is in place. Some 'armchair engineers' have suggested using a nuclear bomb to shut off the well, but no one is seriously considering that as anything more than idle speculation.

The degree of public anger seems to be of the same magnitude as that directed against Wall Street when news of the financial crisis broke, if not greater, because the public sees this as yet one more example of big business and big money trading the well-being of the common man for profits. But merely condemning the company, or having the government seize its assets, as some have called for, cannot be the solution, because the oil company is the one with the expertise to clean up its mess. The head of the US government's response to the spill has commented that the government is not as well-placed to handle the plugging of the oil well as BP is.

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