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BP Moves the Goalpost for the Oil Well Integrity Test
I noted
on July 15th:
As Coast Guard admiral Thad Allen has explained,
sustained pressure readings above 8,000 pounds per square inch (psi)
would show that the wellbore is more or less intact, while pressures of
6,000 psi or less would mean there could be major problems:
We
are looking for somewhere between 8,000 and 9,000 PSI inside the
capping stack, which would indicate to us that the hydrocarbons are
being forced up and the wellbores are being able to withstand that
pressure. And that is good news.
If we are down around in the
4,000 to 5,000, 6,000 range that could potentially tell us that the
hydrocarbons are being diverted someplace else, and we would have to try
and assess the implications of that. And as you might imagine, there
are gradations as you go up from 4,000 or 5,000 PSI up to 8,000 or
9,000. …
We will at some point try to get to 8,000 or 9,000 and
sustain that for some period of time, and these will be done basically,
as I said — if we have a very low pressure reading, we will try and
need (ph) at least six hours of those readings to try to ensure that
that is the reading. If it’s a little higher, we want to go for 24
hours. And if it’s up at 8,000 or 9,000, we would like to go 48 hours
just to make sure it can sustain those pressures for that amount of
time.
How
was the 8,000 psi number calculated to determine the lower acceptable
limit for the pressure test?
Don Van Nieuwenhuise - director of
geoscience programs at the University of Houston - explained to CNN that
the pressure at the bottom of the well is 11,000 psi, and so scientists
have calculated that it should be 8,000 psi at the top of the well:
Yet
BP is now trying to pretend that 8,000 psi was never the target.
As
oil industry expert Robert Cavner writes:
Kent
Wells moved
the goalpost during his Friday, July 16 briefing, saying,
"We
also said that if the pressure go above 8,000 pounds and really the
number in 7,500 pounds, it would really say to us that we do have
integrity under, essentially, any scenario."Very
smooth. In one sweeping statement, that the press let him get away
with, Wells moved the target pressure down as much as 1,500 psi from the
9,000 psi to 7,500, much closer to the 6,700 psi they were holding,
which is actually at the lower end of the ambiguity range we
talked about on Friday. Wells did it again yesterday, moving the
"good integrity" range number
down to 6,000 psi to 7,500 psi, saying,"But
at this point there is no evidence that we have no integrity and
that's very good and the fact that the pressure is continuing to rise
is giving us more and more confidence that as we go through this
process."So, over the last 3 days, BP has walked
the "integrity" goalpost down from as high as 9,000 psi to 6,000 psi, or
at least the 6,700 psi, which happens to be where they are, give or
take 100 psi. You know Adm Allen didn't just make up the 8,000 to
9,000, being a sea captain and knowing little to nothing about oil and
gas. Somebody gave him those numbers. BP moved to goalpost and
the timeline, and the press let them get away with it. Again.***
So
the stage is set. It sure looks like to me that BP is refusing to
disclose critical data and playing chicken with the government while
holding our Gulf of Mexico as hostage. They have every motivation to
not produce the well, for all the reasons we've discussed before, most
importantly, being able to measure the flow; and the ROV feed of oil
roaring back into the Gulf is the gun to the head. The government
should compel BP to release all the data from this test. Again, this
well, this lease, this oil and gas belong to the United States. This
well is in federal waters, and we are all owners here. As owners of
this resource, we have a right to see all the information available.
BP should immediately release all of the pressure buildup data,
temperature data, acoustic data, and seismic data. They should also
release their build up models including the Horner plot forecasts that
Wells discussed yesterday. Only then can we make a judgment that BP is
managing this in the best interest of the United States, not just
their own. We need no more reason for this demand than the massive
scale of this catastrophe.One more thing...these McBriefings
are BS, and we're just passively sitting there letting BP get away with
"technical briefings" that are neither technical or briefings. It's
time to start asking the hard questions, demanding the data, and to
stop putting up with the one question per customer, no followups, no
coupons accepted policy. These briefings should be live, with
some reporters actually present rather than just by telephone. If the
government won't do it, then we need to. This is too important.
Cavner's article is well-worth reading in
full.
»
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Today, recently-retired Shell CEO John Hofmeister told MSNBC:
YouTube Video
I just saw him while I was slumming watching NBC nightly news. In a matter of fact manner he referred to a (I'm paraphrasing) the vast amount of oil in the Macondo prospect. He didn't give a number but certainly seemed concerned about the intergrity of the casing and associated risks.
"Vast amount of oil in the Macondo prospect." Anyone have a clip?
this might be what you're looking for, Hofmiester refers to a large amount of oil
I will and I don't think he used the word vast (that's my word) but the implication was lots of oil down there e.g. way more than 50m bbl. Keep looking here and I will post when I find it.
If there is a good probability that there is a real problem--there will certainly already be an evacuation plan in place. I have looked around and the only thing I can find is an "operation swift fox"
This is a scary scenerio, let's hope it stays a bad fantasy ...
http://www.helium.com/items/1882339-doomsday-how-bp-gulf-disaster-may-have-triggered-a-world-killing-event
Not really on topic, but had not seen it here before: the NOAA ship Thomas Jefferson Deepwater Horizon Response Mission Report.
I wonder if someone with experience in undersea acoustic measurements can take a look; this is very much an academic paper (fragment) with very few concrete conclusions. But it definitely alludes to the fact that there is much data yet to be analyzed, and that other measurements were done (and are likely ongoing) regarding the measuring of the spread of oil under the Gulf's surface. And that there is likely/possibly quite a bit of oil under there. There is a wealth of research data and results here at the NOAA site if anyone cares to dig in.
It seems to me that the figures on pages 23 and 24 of the mission report might have something to do with Mr. Simmons' otherwise not quite consistent claims/theories. Possibly also the "seepage" a few miles from the well (though the measurements in the paper are 5 miles from the well).
the first number i heard was 13,000 psi are we sure that is not being downplayed as well? there seems to be a lot of wiggle room for the readings to be interpreted however they decide to interpret them.
The 13,000 psi number was calculated by some knowledgeable folks using the reports of someone on the rig concerning the mud weight BP was using to drill the well. The mud weight numbers were not entirely accurate as it related to the bottom of the hole, IIRC. BP reported the actual pressures on the logs supplied to Congress.
The bottom sand reservoir pressure was MEASURED by MDT at 11,961 psi. The 13,000 psi number came from calculating the pressure of the mud used to drill the bottom portion of the hole. You can calculate the pressure exerted by the mud column (I know you understand this Aug but others might not). I have quoted the 13,000 number repeatedly because it is a "highest possible" number for the reservoir pressure given that it was drilled with that mud weight. In several of the calculations I have posted I have used numbers that were intentionally "cushioned" to prove that even in a case of errors all in the wrong direction the quoted experts are far outside what can be possible.
So for all you Matt Simmons fans please note the above - it has been a matter of public record since the first Congressional hearing that the reservoir pressure was MEASURED by logging tool at 11,961 psi (max - I used the absolute base of the sand as the depth). So when Matt claims 60,000 - 70,000 - 100,000 psi depending on the day of the week and how long since he took his meds he is stating something than EVERY INFORMED OBSERVER KNOWS CANNOT BE TRUE BY 600% - 700% - 1000%.
- but...but..why the blowout??
Because BP removed the pressure holding that 11,961 psi back without having properly sealed it off.
It's pretty simple.
was that a detail log?
That was an MDT - it is a tool that is pushed up against the borehole wall and can measure multiple pressure data points as well as sampling the reservoir fluids. Keep that in mind when you hear people claim there are no chemical analysis of the oil.
An interesting video of Dr. David Valentine talking about Methane and oil plumes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBBzYranATY
Kessler
short
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU0U9KEvgVM&feature=player_embedded
long video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TowZfE33D8&feature=player_embedded
Good link, thanks.
Jesus Christ, people, who the hell is Thad Allen? You must remember that this paragon of responsiblity and clear-headedness has worked for the US government all his life. That's the "everything I touch turns to crap and I never fire anybody" US government.
This guy sent a memo to BP on Sunday night that said "Hey we saw some seepage somewhere. Not going to to tell you exactly where, or how much, or how the fuck we saw it. Now, you've got four hours, sailor, to give me a plan to take that cap off! You better have it ready, or I'm going to have you cleaning the fucking latrines while your buddies are on R&R in Gulfport this weekend!!".
I'm paraphrasing a little bit.
Despite BP's faults (one of which may be, they are trying to complete the well rather than kill it, but that is idle speculation on my part), they are in fact a fucking OIL COMPANY and they no doubt have their very best people on this, guys who drill and complete oil wells for a living, not paper pusher career-minded bureaucrats. Maybe we need to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Just sayin'.
[Edited slightly for misspelling]
Remember these are the bungholes who told us that the well was only gushing a few thousand barrels, blew up their own chemical plant due to negligence and neglect, and allowed the Alaska pipeline to deteriorate to such an extent that they were forced to shut it down at one point. Do you really want these guys in charge of anything? How about we let their best people take your daughter out for a date.
No, I thought not.
. . . I thought. Not.
When did BP ever state that the flow was a few thousand barrels a day? When did BP ever state what the flow was on any day? Bunghole?
Jane Lubchenco, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Administrator: “Simply observing where the oil is coming out is insufficient to really calculate any flow rate with any degree of accuracy.” [White House briefing, 4/29/10]
Lamar McKay, President of BP America: “The volume estimates are based effectively on surface expression, because you can’t measure what’s coming out at the seabed.” [Senate testimony, 5/12/10]
Tom Mueller, BP: “We’re not going to take any extra efforts now to calculate flow there at this point. It’s not relevant to the response effort, and it might even detract from the response effort.” [5/14/10]
Doug Suttles, BP COO, Global Exploration: Since the beginning, we’ve said it’s almost impossible to get a precise number. But ourselves and people from NOAA and others believe that something around 5,000 — it’s actually barrels a day — is the best estimate.” [ABC News, 5/14/10]
http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/05/20/bp-lies-disaster/
You're right about one thing, it wasn't just BP lying, it was our government too..and they seemed to be working in concert.
Look, I have no love for BP because I think they are a bunch of arrogant British jackasses, but point of fact, in 2006 "The Alaska Pipeline" did not shut down due to corrosion. The MSM got away with telling that story but it is simply not true. What got shut down was a production line coming from the Prudhoe Bay field (BP Area Ops) carrying oil to Pump 1 (the northern terminus of The Alaska Pipeline). I guarantee you, while that line was shut it, COP was pumping AS MUCH OIL AS POSSIBLE from the West side of the field, Kuparuk, and Alpine because they did not have to share the pipe with BP. At the time, I was incredulous as to how the MSM was lying to the lower 48 about this whole deal. Subsequently I went to the Alyeska Pipeline website and compared monthly delivery stats. During the month that the pipeline was supposedly shut in for 2 weeks, deliveries were only off less than 15% of monthly averages.
But like you said earlier, you're not defending BP right. They do have a suck safety record right? And they have, more than once, plead to criminal charges before right? And that is a relevant factor to keep in mind right?
What is relevant is what I wrote about. There are many accusations made about BP that are true. The one about he shut down of TAPS in 2006 due to corrosion is not one of them. How can you possibly have a beef with me about that? Google the son of a bitch. Educate yourself.
I don't have a beef with you "about that." Notice I am not challenging that. But doing one thing right does not remove the fact that they have done many things wrong, criminally wrong. You are an oil man, I am a criminal trial lawyer. We both have our perspectives. I am pointing out that when someone like BP has a safety and criminal record like they do, their credibility and accuracy as an information source comes into significant question. A criminal record is quite different from a civil / tort record isn't it? Hell, there are evidence rules that specifically allow a party to impeach a witness for the mere fact that they have certain criminal records. That IS relevant to this string an any other discussion of this disaster.
Chevron is a good oil company. Exxon is a good oil company. Check the safety violations over the last 5 years and who is ALWAYS at the top of the list by a wide margin? Yes, BP. So yeah, BP is a FUCKING oil company and a FUCKING bad one at that. Some of us still remember folks who were killed by BP. So far BP has paid out $1.6 BILLION for that 2005 refinery explosion yet "On October 30, 2009 OSHA imposed an $87 million fine on the company for failing to correct safety hazards revealed in the 2005 explosion. In its report, OSHA also cited over 700 safety violations. The fine was the largest in OSHA's history, and BP announced that it would challenge the fine." That's what these bastards think about human lives and safety.
Well, the SOBs at BP are going to end up paying yet another fine, this time for Deepwater Horizon. Do you see a pattern here? Do you see any sense of civic responsibility amongst these bastards? Yet I can assure you that Exxon, Chevron, Halliburton, and many other petroleum related companies here in Houston are far more responsible than BP ever has or ever will be.
They are liars and they are irresponsible scum. There's not much pity down here in South Texas right now for BP, I can assure you.
Granted, but they still know way more about oil wells than the Coast Guard does.
I junked you accidentally, I was aiming for the "reply" link.
You can un-junk your own junks by clicking the same link again...
Done, thanks.
Cavner needs to push this meme so he keeps getting invited back by his lefty friends to be their pet oil industry expert who can be counted on to bash BP.
He does have enough experience in this business to KNOW the uncertainty level with a single control point in a reservoir 18,000' deep and below salt (or so some say, I don't know that) which has been in almost AOH for 80+ days. For a guy with his knowledge to push this idea that we could know ahead of time what the shut-in pressures would be is unconscionable. It's BS.
And so we go on with the "failed integrity test" storyline. GUYS - this isn't high school graduation! What the hell does "failed the test" mean? Who decided there were 'goalposts' that needed to be reached? THE DAMN WELL IS SHUT IN. It is leaking slight amounts from the flex joint. It may be leaking small bubbles near the wellbore - that's not clear yet. I don't buy the 2 mile away seep as likely (yes it was "conceivable" to quote the earlier thread - that's not normally the wording used to indicate "is").
Finally - and once again - the relief wells are what will kill this thing for good. I still haven't heard anything that suggests a problem with that occurring. The current situation is stop gap - BUT IT IS BETTER THAN HAVING THE OIL IN THE GULF. I hope we can all keep that in mind.
Admiral Allen is the one that placed the goalposts and he is the one that is concerned that the tests so far indicate structural integrity issues. He's not claiming anything wild like Matt Simmons. He just wants the well open so that further pressure problems do not occur and so that the well is still intact if they have to seal it for a hurricane. Admiral Allen's position makes good sense to me at this point whereas BP's position only makes sense in terms of trying to limit their $$$ liability, which is already large enough to sink the liars anyway. Further, with the new cap, they can basically capture 99+% of the oil at the surface, saving the shut-in state for a situation that actually needs it (like a hurricane).
Given the endless stream of lies, half-truths, and distortions, including crap that came out under oath before Congress (like the testimony where BP had to admit they overruled Halliburton despite clear signs of problems with the cement) lead me to believe that BP can not be trusted. And frankly, O&G people I know here in Houston think BP has it coming for running a shoddy, negligent operation generally. Try coming down here and driving down Texas City way and then go into a local bar and tell people that BP is an angel who can do no wrong and it was the worker's fault that refinery blew up. The refinery workers (those that SURVIVED that blast) will rip your head off and place it on a co-worker's gravestone.
BP is not loved down here in Houston. They are a shoddy company with a long history of safety violations and this well is just further proof of the same. At this point, if Admiral Allen wants to open that well and produce the flow as a means of saving the remaining well integrity, strictly because he believes that is the lowest risk option, I'll damned well side with him over the lying assholes from BP. And if that costs BP some more money, I say "Tough shit."
... if Admiral Allen wants to open that well ...
Has Admiral Allen directed BP to open the cap, as of mid-afternoon 7-19?
Admiral Allen Orders Well Opened, BP Says It Will Keep Well Closed
Actually he ordered it opened yesterday and BP has refused.
ACTUALLY, he just approved another 24 hrs of tests.
Ya'll may not know this, but Thad Allen retired from the USCG June 30 2010. He is a civilian now. Don't know if it has been commented on.
He reports to Janet Napolitano, she of sending SWAT Teams to a sunken rig without sponges fame...LOL.
All questions should be directed to her office say's I, as he is subordinate to her.
Just sayin.
Who’s in charge, BP or Admiral Thad Allen?
"Today’s direct contradiction over whether or not there are seeps of oil or gas coming from the seabed near the well is the most serious disagreement yet. If there are seeps, Allen is likely to end the testing phase and order BP to open the well to avoid an even more catastrophic failure. If that happens, BP would have little choice to either follow Allen’s order or disobey him and directly challenge U.S. authority over management of the site."
http://trueslant.com/oshagraydavidson/2010/07/19/whos-in-charge-bp-or-ad...
No challenge - more likely the US Govt. will roll over and quietly comply with whatever BP demands.
I think BP paid $20 Billion for some rights...
BP and its Bilderberg members are in charge.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAaQNACwaLw
Don Van Nieuwenhuise - director of geoscience programs at the University of Houston - explained to CNN that the pressure at the bottom of the well is 11,000 psi, and so scientists have calculated that it should be 8,000 psi at the top of the well:
What he explained to CNN, which did a poor job on the report, is that the ORIGINAL pressure was 11,000 psi at the bottom of the well. OF course, that is in direct conflict with oil expert Matt Simmons who continues to claim that it was either 60,000 or 100,000 psi. But that is beside the point. Neither Nieuwenhuise, nor anyone else, knows what the current formation pressure is after about 90 days of uncontrolled flow. However, he does try to explain how the Admiral came to the first guess of 8,000 psi. If you listen closely I don't believe you will find that he states that the current pressure measurement confirms that there is a leak. Maybe it does, maybe it does not, is about what I understand him to say.
Reasonable & Sensible:
I see no reason why people are junking anything questioning the doom and gloom from people who have already been discredited. It is the only subject that this level of junking occurs. I would suggest that environmentalists, hoping for the spill to be worse than it is (in order to push their agenda), must be junking- they hate reason and logic.
Nah, Israel/Palestine threads are wayyyy worse for junking.
Junked!
I find it amazing that while BP claimed the leak was only 5kbpd, they had "no idea about the well pressure", and now all of a sudden when it suits them, they whip out this 11,000psi figure as fact.
BP have lied about absolutely everything all along, and paid off whoever they could, so excuse the living shit out of me for being cynic when some expert with connections paints a picture in BP's favour.
When did BP ever state that they had no idea about the initial well pressure? They made it available with the info delivered to Congress, several months ago. Possibly sooner, AFAIK.
C'mon. Let it out already. Just tell us how much BP is paying you.
Does Simmons make you clean the wheels on the car when you are taking a break from posting to help his position?
Response to GG way above. Close by when made. Far away now.
To defend fact (or lack of same) against speculation is to neither defend nor support BP.
Character assasination is a sign of desperation and a weak argument.