An Addiction Destroying the Earth

The world is seemingly addicted to so-called cheap energy. Companies like BP are the dealers who help us get our hands on the stuff. That means oil drilling isn’t about to stop.

Pelicans actually have snowy white feathers, but oil pollution in the Gulf of Mexico has turned their plumage a dirty brown. In order for these birds to be saved, they have to be laboriously cleansed by hand on the Louisiana coast, but in many cases the help comes too late. And the oil pollution caused by an explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform more than two months ago has yet to be controlled, despite some partial successes. The leaking hole a mile below the surface of the Gulf has long since become a fiasco for BP, which had been making every effort to project a “green” image.

It was learned just yesterday that a leak in the emergency relief valve had been discovered weeks prior to the explosion on the drilling rig. Such valves are a sore point in oil drilling. According to some experts, roper repair of the deficiency should have been mandatory, but it would have cost BP $500,000 to carry out. The valve ultimately failed.

Similarly, it was just learned that BP knew the amount of escaping oil was much more than they were publicly admitting. At first, they said it was about 1,000 barrels per day, or about 120,000 liters; that soon became 5,000 barrels per day. Now American scientists figure that somewhere between 35,000 and 60,000 barrels per day are being discharged into the environment. If one subtracts the 15,000 barrels BP is now siphoning out of the well, at least 20,000 barrels per day seep into the ocean. That’s roughly equivalent to a cube measuring 100 feet per side.

BP’s helpless attempts to gain control of the spreading pollution are matched only by how little is known about their effectiveness. Science simply doesn’t know how to handle the catastrophe. The oil reaching the surface can be cleaned up relatively easily. The real problem, however, is the sub-surface oil. At present, no one knows exactly where these plumes are or in which direction they might spread.

Current models consider only the upper layers of Gulf Stream waters, but it’s conceivable that oil plumes are moving deep beneath the surface. The difference is that currents at deeper levels move more sluggishly and are thus slower to migrate. Expert opinion holds that the oil will become a danger to the Caribbean and the Atlantic unless efforts to plug the well and stop the flow are soon successful.

While risk assessment for the world’s oceans must remain speculative at present, the ecological problems for the Gulf and its coastal areas are already reality. The pollution caused by oil reaching the shores can harm animal life there for decades, as shown by the incident with Exxon Valdez in 1989. It’s also not known what effect unknown incidents — such as a hurricane that could carry the oil into hard to reach areas — might have.

The world is hooked on allegedly cheap energy. Companies like BP are only the ones who can help us get our hands on the stuff, which means drilling for oil will continue — and presumably at greater depths, where technical glitches are harder to control and the ramifications are more serious. Thus, it’s even more important that we learn the lessons taught to us by the Deepwater Horizon incident. It’s not merely a matter of better safety and security measures that place environmental protection ahead of the profit motive, nor is it a matter of increased monitoring in the affected ecosystems. It’s ultimately about weaning ourselves off oil and switching to cleaner energy. That won’t be done easily or cheaply, but the price of oil is already too high.