Hard News by Russell Brown

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Hard News: The Future of the Future

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  • Steve Barnes,

    I have a sneaky feeling that this oil spill will continuing for a while yet.
    There are a few ways to stop the flow but the quickest way Blow it up with the mother of all bombs or MOAB ( Pretty Pix Here).
    Trouble is that if they do that I don't think they will be granted a licence to drill a new well, which means they must try to recover and bring it on-line.
    See, when these fuckers look at all that oil in the water, they don't think "Look at all the damage we're doing" they think "Look at all that oil were losing".
    So, I guess they"ll just carry on trying to save that well and "Socialise" the losses.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Well, at least it's not the end of the world...

    The End of The World


    The World is empty. It has been abandoned, its continents unfinished. Through binoculars, I think I can glimpse Britain; this sceptred isle barren in the salt-breeze.

    Here, off the coast of Dubai, developers have been rebuilding the world. They have constructed artificial islands in the shape of all planet Earth's land masses, and they plan to sell each continent off to be built on. There were rumours that the Beckhams would bid for Britain. But the people who work at the nearby coast say they haven't seen anybody there for months now. "The World is over," a South African suggests.

    All over Dubai, crazy projects that were Under Construction are now Under Collapse. They were building an air-conditioned beach here, with cooling pipes running below the sand, so the super-rich didn't singe their toes on their way from towel to sea.

    Part of an in-depth look at Dubai
    The dark side of Dubai By Johann Hari

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Oil spill gets worse, thanks to BP wanting to save the oil rather than the the Gulf and all of it's inhabitants. This from The New York Times

    Problem With Cap Causes Causes More Oil to Gush in Gulf
    By LIZ ROBBINS 6:37 PM ET

    BP suffered a setback when a discharge of liquid and gases forced it to remove the containment cap.

    And now this...

    WASHINGTON — A federal judge in New Orleans on Tuesday blocked a six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling projects that the Obama administration imposed after the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

    When will it end?.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • recordari,

    BP suffered a setback when a discharge of liquid and gases forced it to remove the containment cap.

    How would this force them to remove the cap? It was liquid and gas before, no? There is a point at which you start finding the conspiracy theories just that little bit more convincing.

    AUCKLAND • Since Dec 2009 • 2607 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    How would this force them to remove the cap?

    It seems to be the old hydrate problem that they had with the original cap but this time it is the system for preventing build-up of hydrates that has fucked up. Why they don't just cap the well is the real conspiracy.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • dyan campbell,

    See, when these fuckers look at all that oil in the water, they don't think "Look at all the damage we're doing" they think "Look at all that oil were losing".

    Earthy, colloquial and dazzlingly accurate. I nominate Steve PAS's local Mark Twain.

    auckland • Since Dec 2006 • 595 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    Hi-res satellite pic

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

    See, when these fuckers look at all that oil in the water, they don't think "Look at all the damage we're doing" they think "Look at all that oil were losing".

    Earthy, colloquial and dazzlingly accurate. I nominate Steve PAS's local Mark Twain.

    Wow, not just accurate, but dazzlingly so.

    Thine eyes have been dazzled by crap. It doesn't take a rocket technologist to work out that the lost oil revenue of a million or few dollars a day is small change to BP in comparison to the tens of billions of dollars in subsequent costs, and the risk to the company as a whole - any ignoramus oil company executive could work that one out. So that conspiracy to allow the well to remain uncapped, what might its cunningly obscure objective be?

    Not ‘Mark Twain’, more like ‘Dip Stick’.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Why thank you ChrisW, I wonder what the W stands for?

    . It doesn't take a rocket technologist to work out that the lost oil revenue of a million or few dollars a day is small change to BP in comparison to the tens of billions of dollars in subsequent costs,

    Oh perleeez...
    Have you never heard the term "Privatise the profits, socialise the cost"?
    It's not a case of balancing the books. it's an instinctive response of multinational companies, it's what they do, Wally.
    And... Sacha's link gives a 404, a cover up?
    You bet your sweet crude it is.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    Have you never heard the term "Privatise the profits, socialise the cost"?

    I think the costs are being broadly spread over both BP and the environment, government, private individuals in this case. Fucked up all over.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • recordari,

    Not ‘Mark Twain’, more like ‘Dip Stick’.

    Here's one to dip your shtick in.

    Is Using Dispersants on the BP Gulf Oil Spill Fighting Pollution with Pollution?

    AUCKLAND • Since Dec 2009 • 2607 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

    Steve - Did I have to spell it out? - the tens of billions of dollars in subsequent costs to BP. Any and all socialised costs additional.

    You want it both ways, that BP are concerned about the lost revenue from the escaping oil but not the damage it does to others' property, livelihoods and the environment (because BP thinks it's not their problem), so you would have them think, instinctively or consciously, in the first week and still - 'Let us only do the minimum we can get away with in pretending to plug the well while allowing it to keep gushing forth, for that's the way to maximise our profit and shareholder value in our proud multi-national brand'?

    I see plenty cock-up prior to the explosion, no doubt including an under-estimation of the consequences to BP of a catastrophic failure of the blow-out preventer (partly on the basis that some of the costs would be socialised), so they had insufficient systems to prevent that failure and under-preparedness to deal with the contingency that it might anyway. No doubt a few cock-ups since. But a conspiracy to allow it to continue uncapped?

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    I think you miss my point. BP is trying to save the rather expensive hole they had drilled, there are billions of dollars worth of oil down that hole. If they plug that hole there is no way in hell they would be allowed to drill another one for the foreseeable future. The public image means nothing, they are an oil company and people want oil. There is no conspiracy, it's just business as usual.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

    So those relief wells they've been drilling for another $100 million or more - no intention of using them?

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    So those relief wells they've been drilling for another $100 million or more - no intention of using them?

    You know what a relief well is right? It is so BP can save the existing one.They don't want to loose the existing one.

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Not ‘Mark Twain’, more like ‘Dip Stick’.

    Cheap shot.

    Why thank you ChrisW, I wonder what the W stands for?

    That too, although you were provoked.

    Argue vigorously, gentlemen, but try and keep it non-personal.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    :) Now I'm giggling . Sometimes it just feels like kindergarten. Ahh those were the days. I think some people had a lack of sleep last night.

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Just spike his drinks so he falls asleep after dinner ;-)

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW,

    OK enough lead-swinging on my part, time to acknowledge that while casting aspersions elsewhere I plumbed the depths into personal attack with dip stick, sorry Steve.

    I succumbed to the never-to-be-repeated opportunity for an in-context triple sort-of pun, not intended as a cheap shot, but as a comment on the depth of analysis of BP's motivations.

    You're right, I did not see any sign of a point in the earlier posts of yours, quoted directly and indirectly, of BP allowing the well to remain uncapped in order to retain that point of access to the oil reservoir. All things considered now, I disagree with you on that as well.

    Yes I understand what a relief well is, conventionally and as stated in this case its objective is to plug the original hole from below, and conventionally and as stated in this case the relief well(s) would also then be plugged.

    I infer that whether or not BP maintains access (or really, how long till it subsequently regains controlled access) to this oil reservoir, one of its many, weighs little in its thinking relative to the ongoing damage to its image, its direct costs, and the $US20 billion in liability it has lost control of, all these to continue increasing with the continuing volume and duration of escaping oil, and which in combination have so far knocked 50% off its shareholder value, this proportion also continuing to increase.

    Lovely morning on the estuary here, much better than on the Gulf coast I’m sure.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • recordari,

    I succumbed to the never-to-be-repeated opportunity for an in-context triple sort-of pun, not intended as a cheap shot, but as a comment on the depth of analysis of BP's motivations.

    Here's one to dip your shtick in.

    Yeah, my bad.

    AUCKLAND • Since Dec 2009 • 2607 posts Report Reply

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    Lovely morning on the estuary here, much better than on the Gulf coast I’m sure.

    Ahh, but for how long?
    Da da da daa :)

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Thank you Mr. W apology accepted.
    Whether BP is deliberately not giving a toss about the environmental consequences of their actions or not (note use of double negative there, clever huh?) they consider their job is to explore and extract to feed us all the oil we want and damn the cost, they are not in the business of environmental conservancy. As for the drop in share price, in the wonderful world of wacky money games that is Capitalism I'm sure there is someone making a fortune out of that. The socialisation of cost is a game played by all those wacky wonderful multinationals out there, the world Cup is no different (see The True Cost of the World Cup in South Africa)
    Also, for your edification and Saturday Viewing...

    Enjoy

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    A little update on the response to the Gulf oil spill...

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

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