- #71
stewartcs
Science Advisor
- 2,178
- 3
jreelawg said:nothing would look worse on tv, than a pelican covered in a radioactive tar.
lmao!
Cs
jreelawg said:nothing would look worse on tv, than a pelican covered in a radioactive tar.
stewartcs said:lmao!
Cs
stewartcs said:Six billions minds would be a bigger cluster f--k than it is now. Even with more transparency the average person reading this or trying to help will not have the slightest idea what would really help fix the problem (your fabric cloth for example).
This sounds more like a political rant than anything else.
CS
zoom_in said:This type of problem highlights both the shortcomings in our (namely the internet's) ability to vertically integrate information streams and the enormous potential of such integration.
Over six billion minds on the planet, millions of people in the US alone with degrees in the sciences and engineering--all of it an underutilized resource on problems such as this one.
zoom_in said:Take one percent of the energy involved in the finger-pointing, the blame-laying, and the sound and fury about this leak in the media streams
Arizona said:Why not drill and set anchors for the top hat method? Make some type of seal and cinch it down.
What fraction? The US CG says this where?Geigerclick said:The Coast Guard does say that some fraction of the oil is been captured, but I am not hearing a lot of optimism.
mheslep said:What fraction? The US CG says this where?
crapworks said:I have thought of that before, but I think getting it a seal would be tough given the pressure of the oil.
I have another method. Can they try digging near and around the well and insert several conventional explosives around it?
The explosives will not be actually strapped around the well. There will be some mud or sediment between the well and the explosives. That should hopefully, pinch the well, seal it or radically constrict it, without destroying and making it worse.
I'm just not sure if we have existing explosives/bombs that can be safely used at such depths without exploding prematurely.
stewartcs said:Why does everyone want to blow the well up?!
If the casing is compromised already, an explosive device could open up another leak path for the hydrocarbons. It's a bit risky to try and we're not really sure of the outcome in deepwater.
CS
Geigerclick said:I think people don't grasp that the function of a nuclear detonation is to fuse a large area into glass/ceramic, and that simply using conventional explosives would not achieve this result. People like the idea of the boom, but don't want the blue glow, so they wish for a different way. I believe it is called "desperation."
I for one, would rather see this well leak until December than we "test" a nuke in the gulf. I for one, remember why we stopped ground and water bursts; too messy.
OmCheeto said:But I liked the cloth tube idea.
It could be built in a day and unspooled from a ship in under an hour. Being deflated, it would be void of water, so you wouldn't have the methane hydrate freeze up problem when the oil/methane mixture enters the tube. Since no matter where the oil is in the column, it is going to be a sea pressure, it wouldn't have to be strong as steel. Once the oil gets to the surface, it would enter the bottom of a floating container, which would start to sink under the weight of the oil. Once the oil level in the container rises to a certain level, it would be pumped out and into a waiting oil tanker.
I think it's a brilliant and simple solution at keeping the oil contained until a permanent fix is developed.
But I think that may be why people don't like it. It's too simple.
xxChrisxx said:Well on the plus side it would make the fisherman's job a lot easier, al those fish can't swim away. Plus they'd probably already be cooked, granted glowing a little but a bit of radioactive fish never hurt anyone. Would probably give us all superhero like powers.
xxChrisxx said:Well on the plus side it would make the fisherman's job a lot easier, al those fish can't swim away. Plus they'd probably already be cooked, granted glowing a little but a bit of radioactive fish never hurt anyone. Would probably give us all superhero like powers.
Geigerclick said:Crapworks: To get deep enough in the seabed would require... wait for it... DRILLING! Why not wait for the relief well in that case? Besides, there are a lot of maybes and shoulds that I don't like when it comes to detonating a nuclear bomb.
crapworks said:That's true. And this makes using conventional explosives to pinch the well a much better alternative.
Maybe it's possible to run some quick deep sea trials in collaboration with the navy to try to pinch a metal tube of the same kind used in drilling wells using explosives. If it works consistently, then they can try it on the troubled well itself.
Geigerclick said:I don't think you understand why a nuclear detonation might work, and why conventional explosives would not. It is the fusion of sand and mud into glass over a large area that forms the "plug" from a nuke... compared to collapse from conventionals. The latter would require even more drilling, and I have a hard time believing that it would work.
Imagine the miles of geologic formations containing the the oil reservoir, in the worst case, as glass , i.e. brittle. Then imagine the worst case outcome of a large explosion in the 'glass' containment material over possibly hundreds of millions of barrels of oil & gas down there.crapworks said:Maybe it's possible to run some quick deep sea trials in collaboration with the navy to try to pinch a metal tube of the same kind used in drilling wells using explosives. If it works consistently, then they can try it on the troubled well itself.
mheslep said:Imagine the miles of geologic formations containing the the oil reservoir, in the worst case, as glass , i.e. brittle. Then what imagine the worst case outcome a large explosion in the 'glass' containment of possibly hundreds of millions of barrels of oil & gas down there.
stewartcs said:No.
1) they can't glue steel tubes together especially while the well is flowing.
2) even if they could seal the tubes together the pressure acting on the surface area on the bottom of the tubes would blow them out.
CS
Bernie100 said:Am I not right that assuming a flow velocity of 10 fps, which I believe to be rather low considering the pressure behind this, for a 21" pipe would be more like 411,000 barrels per day and not anywhere close to 19,000 barrels per day being quoted in the media.
That's the outer diameter of the pipe. ID of an undamaged pipe would be 19", and this one is both slightly crushed and has internal obstructions (at least before the pipe cut). More importantly, only a fraction of the effluent is oil (vs gas).Bernie100 said:... for a 21" pipe
mheslep said:That's the outer diameter of the pipe. ID of an undamaged pipe would be 19", and this one is both slightly crushed and has internal obstructions (at least before the pipe cut). More importantly, only a fraction of the effluent is oil (vs gas).
Bernie100 said:Do we have a mechanical engineer here somewhere?
In my view, the flows provided to us are ridiculously low.
Am I not right that assuming a flow velocity of 10 fps, which I believe to be rather low considering the pressure behind this, for a 21" pipe would be more like 411,000 barrels per day and not anywhere close to 19,000 barrels per day being quoted in the media.
Could I have some feedback on this. If I'm anywhere close, this is a far greater catastrophe than the public is led to believe.
Based on the 19,000 barrels per day, the flow velocity would only be 0.5 fps which seems ridiculous.
Bernie100 said:Thanks for your response. I agree with you as far as the Bernoulli Effect but not completely.
The BOP just ahead of the cut pipe has some restrictions in it but let's not forget that the body housing this stuff inside is quite a lot larger. I don't believe that the design would allow for much pressure drop as this would constrict the flow and cut into big oil coffers. I am talking about a calculation based on velocity which shows 20 times more flow than they are stating. Am I to believe that the flow restriction in the BOP would reduce the flow down to 1/20th? Furthermore, the sea water does provide back pressure in the order of 2160 psi. However, the positive pressure from the well could very well be an additional 1000 psi greater or possibly much more. There is no question that BP knows that pressure at the well head. This would be normal instrumentation provided at every well head or well known by their engineers based on all the other flow data.
I appreciate your input.
Bernie100 said:Thanks for your input. The gas portion is a very valid point. However, the gas is compressible but many multiples under these pressures including the sea water pressure. As far as i know, in mechanical piping the quoted line size is the inner diameter and not the outer diameter. An example is that a schedule 80 pipe which has a thicker wall than a schedule 40 pipe has a larger outer diameter but the same inner diameter.
Thnks again,
Bernie100 said:Thanks for your comment and I sincerely hope you're right. The difference though might be that normally the flow has to be brought to the surface with the full 5,000 ft. of head at the well head considering the pipe frictions. In this case, the flow is unrestricted as far as the pipe frictions.
PaulS1950 said:This should have been solved a long time ago. It would be a simple matter to use a valve attached to a piece of pipe the right size and fit it to the pipe at the well with wedge blocks and bolts with the valve open and then once attached the valve could be closed. This type of wedge clamping is not at all uncommon in the hydraulic and high pressure steam industry.
Since the pipe is standard sizes for well heads it seem rediculous that they don't have devices assembled and in stock for just this kind of event.