

Giant Plumes of Oil Forming Under the Gulf, decreasing oxygen levels by 30% - metamemetics
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/us/16oil.html?hp

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mkramlich
interesting how the whole Repub Party message of "free market is good,
regulation is bad" sounds in the context of this giant oil spill disaster.
hopefully this classic example of Tragedy of the Commons wakes some more
people up.

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kiba
I heard the BP gave a lot of money to Obama.

Maybe it have something to do with Obama wants to stop drilling in the Gulf of
Mexico. I mean, this is like the first oil spill in the gulf of Mexico?

Beside, isn't a whole lot of stuff got tested by Underwriter laboratory and
lot of regulations and standard were simply copied from Underwriter Laboratory
guidelines? This company been around for more than 200 years. Maybe private
regulations have some merit. (coupled with consumer lawsuits to hold private
regulatory agencies accountable)

P.S. I think one of the argument has been proposed against government
regulations is that when the regulators failed, they get more money so they
can do their "job" better. Another argument is that people trust government
too much, so it should be left to private institutions because private
institutions are trusted less thus get more scrutiny.

~~~
kiba
I guess spreading rumors about politicians isn't exactly socially approved
around here, neither do deflecting the questions.

But on the other hand, I still think the whole issue is that fisheries are not
exactly owned by fishermen, thus the whole lack of lawsuit threats against
oilmen for polluting their properties. This mean we have a tragedy of the
common in the ocean. (Overfishing issues could properly get resolved too, but
how do you own schools of fish?)

Regardless, BP will have to pay a big cleanup bill when this is all over. It's
a disincentive in itself.

Also, isn't there's a danger of regulators being brought off? Fishermen don't
have much of incentive to ruin their livelhood by accepting bride from oilmen.
So maybe they'll be able to agree on inspectors agreed upon by oilmen and
fishermen. It won't eliminate the whole issue of bridling probably, must
probably raise the price of corruption higher?

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melling
As much as I am upset at BP, I think the American consumer needs to pay too.
We need to tax gas to incentivize people to buy more efficient vehicles and
fund alternate energy. Yes, windmills are expensive.

~~~
mkramlich
Agreed. And I like the jokes going around about alternative energy, the ones
like, "You heard about the huge wind farm disaster? Yeah apparently it's
caused a gentle breeze." and "You heard about the big disaster at the solar
panel farm? Yeah apparently it's caused an annoying glare." Etc.

~~~
ja30278
How about: "You hear the one about the people who thought they could maintain
a first world standard of living while replacing cheap means of energy
production with happy thoughts and butterfly power"?

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hussong
False dilemma, most of the first world actually has a great standard of living
without ubiquitous gas guzzlers, AC, tumble-dryers and whatnot. Some even
argue that energy efficiency can be improved by a factor of five:
[http://ernst.weizsaecker.de/?p=889&language=en](http://ernst.weizsaecker.de/?p=889&language=en)

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j_baker
I don't understand what makes fixing the leak so difficult. Could someone
explain it to me? I genuinely want to know this.

~~~
nostrademons
There's also the issue of the leak being under 5000 feet of water. The
deepest-diving military submarines can only go down to about 2000 feet; any
more than that, and you need specialized deep submergence vehicles. Very few
of these can dive to 5000 feet; those that can are usually oceanographic
research vessels that can't carry the payloads needed to repair things. And
you can forget about sending a human out in a diving suit; the pressure (or
more specifically, the decompression process) would kill them.

~~~
tzs
"those that can are usually oceanographic research vessels that can't carry
the payloads needed to repair things"

I don't see why they'd need to carry the payload in/on the vessels. Couldn't
the payload be dropped or lowered from above?

~~~
nostrademons
Depends how much finessing it needs. Say they went with the "drop a big dome
over it" idea that's been suggested. The sea floor is uneven; if they want the
solution to last they need a tight seal that can withstand significant
pressure. I don't know the dynamics of underwater concrete jobs, but I'd
imagine you can't just pump concrete down the sides of the dome and hope that
it ends up in the right place.

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mkramlich
I want to start or join an effort to come up with solutions and processes to
help ensure this kind of spill never happens again. Or at least, is never
again allowed to get this bad. Perfection may be impossible, but I'm confident
we collectively have the brainpower, creativity, money and engineering/science
knowledge to make a dramatic improvement. Does anyone know of any existing
projects, grassroots or otherwise? I did some Googling but no luck so far.
Ideally we'd take the best ideas from a variety of sources, draw on smart
folks from various fields, and the ultimate deliverable is a recommendation of
a set of tested processes and gadgets and a plan for fighting this. Ideally
any money required is drawn from the oil industry, directly or indirectly, but
if instead it comes from non-profit organizations or philanthropists, so be
it.

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joubert
Glad I don't own BP stock

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mkramlich
Unfortunately, we all own stock in the US.

(speaking for HN readers who are US citizens)

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philwelch
You don't _have_ to be a US citizen to have a vested interest in the US
economy. America is an elephant. When an elephant collapses and dies, the
whole jungle feels the impact and smells the rotting stench.

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kiba
Ditto. We're too interconnected to just not have a rotting stench. More like a
keystone specie die, everybody else die.

~~~
Aetius
No, not die. Simply regress from developing to 3rd or 4th world status.

