Peak Oil is You
Donate Bitcoins ;-) or Paypal :-)
Page added on December 5, 2013
BP’s learned nothing: The oil company is pursuing its riskiest strategy yet
BP is going after huge oil reserves that could make or break its fortunes
BP is yet to finish compensating the victims of the 2010 oil spill that killed 11 people and sent millions of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico, but the oil company isn’t about to let one major oil spill bring it down. Strapped for cash and in pursuit of bigger, deeper wells, it may be the only company capable of tapping risky reserves worth as much as $2 trillion.
Three years [after the spill], there are a record 39 rigs drilling in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, according to IHS Petrodata, as drillers probe enormous troves of oil in untapped formations — some of which are under especially high temperature and pressure.
…Environmentalists are alarmed. “You hope (BP) has learned their lesson, but the nature of the business is that there are going to be spills, there is human error,” says Athan Manuel, director of the Sierra Club’s lands protection program. “These high pressure wells could cause another environmental disaster in the Gulf.”
For BP, drilling deeper is a bold and crucial step. CEO Bob Dudley told colleagues at an industry conference last year that management “thought very carefully before re-committing the company to the deep water following the 2010 accident.” The spill has cost BP $42.5 billion, and legal battles are ongoing.
BP decided to go forward in a major way. Dudley may not have had much choice — BP needs the oil. Its production is down 21 percent since the oil spill and its share price is 22 percent lower. Big oil companies need to find giant fields to generate enough oil to replace the steady natural declines of existing fields. These big fields are now only found in remote or difficult locations.
To get there, the company is developing equipment that can sustain extreme heat and pressure. In the name of safety, it’s also pursuing some low-tech hacks, such as changing the shapes of their “start” and “stop” buttons to make them harder to confuse.
Yet “BP’s basic thinking has not fundamentally changed,” Robert Bea, an expert on offshore technology, told the AP. ”They want to develop those resources so badly, and they want to develop them so quickly, their drive for production overcomes what should be a comparable drive for protection.”
9 Comments on "BP’s learned nothing: The oil company is pursuing its riskiest strategy yet"
wildbourgman on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 12:35 am
Ok,,,, what’s the risky strategy? This is a poor piece of journalism. Are there any real details connected to this story or is there a part 2 coming soon?
BillT on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 1:49 am
Going back for the kill shot…
DC on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 2:13 am
By all rights, BP should be bankrupt-now. Except it isnt. But the US of Oil never met an oil company it didn’t like. Unless it is Chinese, Arab, Russian, South American or Asian of course. Besides those kind of oil companies, it loves all the others. All the millions of gallons of oil they dispersed are now either suspended in the water column, or have sunk to the bottom of the ocean-where they have basically killed off all the life down there.
None of this, in our for-profit, corporate controlled world, is considered remotely criminal. Certainly not in the eyes of the US ‘legal’ system.
rockman on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 12:33 pm
To add to the wildman’s comment there was nothing extreme or unmanageable with the drilling conditions at Macondo. I actually carry a bit of resentment for those folks who, while criticizing BP, also inadvertent give them a bit of an excuse for the accident. I.E just too difficult to drill. The reservoir pressure was around, 12,000 psi. I’ve routinely drill such pressures with no problem. I’ve drilled reservoirs with pressures as high as 19,000 psi. And the temps weren’t especially high either.
BP’s error was leaving the well in an unbalanced state: the weight of the fluid column in the well bore produced a bottom home pressure less than the reservoir pressure. Which means that if anything went wrong, like cement failure, the well was guaranteed to flow. This is exactly what happened. In my 38 years I’ve temporarily suspended 100’s of wells and not once did I ever leave on in an unbalanced state. Packers, cement, etc. could fail and a well would never blow out because the weight of the fluid column exceeded the reservoir pressure. No imbalance…no blow out. It really is that simple.
The cement failure that led to the blowout was not the big mistake. Cements fail all the time. I have had the cement fail on the same well several times but with no blowout because the well was balanced. The truly inexcusable error was the rig personnel not specifically watching for signs the well might be flowing because they were in an unbalanced state. It’s difficult to understand why they weren’t paying closer attention. There was even an argument amongst the managers on the rig about the unsafe condition. But I also know what it’s like when rigging down and everyone is focused on getting home: some folks getting dumber than usual. Had the folks who were responsible for monitoring indications of well flow been doing their job they would have seen the well coming in and shut off the access to the drill floor of that oil/NG stream. IOW no blowout would have occurred. I’ve had dozens of similar well control situations where just that has happened and no blowout.
AFAIK here are no regulations or equipment functioning in the DW GOM today that would prevent another Macondo if the same risky and incompetent actions were followed. At last I haven’t found any reports that the feds have banned leaving a well in an unbalanced state even though such a rule change would be obvious. Maybe the wildman can tell us…he still plays out on the water these days unlike me. A poor procedure aided by poor monitoring of the well led to Macondo. It wasn’t bad cement or high pressures and temps. It was pure human error. IMHO. And last time I looked we were still using humans to drill offshore.
steveo on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 2:23 pm
Let’s see, after making the biggest environmental mess in a generation what have BP and the other companies involved learned?
They learned that no middle or high level managers would go to jail.
They learned that the high level executives would still make huge money even though the company lost a couple or quarters worth of profit.
They learned that they could continue to cut corners on safety with no repercussions.
Yep, they actually learned a lot.
Kenz300 on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 4:34 pm
Companies make the profits and the environment and the people suffer the impact of the pollution….
rockman on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 5:48 pm
kenz – But don’t forget the people also get the energy they demand. If folks didn’t demand that oil no company would be drilling anywhere offshore.
Spillstocome on Fri, 6th Dec 2013 7:02 pm
Someones go to take the wrap. You leave in charge experienced men. Human error yes! poor monitoring yes! responsible to clean up before opening more wells NO! Stop Drilling! No spilling! simple as that!
Lone Realtor on Sat, 7th Dec 2013 1:09 am
Mr. Rockman is obviously a well side geologist with years of drilling experience. I thank him for his expertise.
When I see people like some of these folks commenting on what the B.P. explosion did to permanently destroy the Gulf of Mexico’s water and floor, and shoreline I get a good laugh. I have had more than one geologist tell me that oil is forever and constantly leaking from the floor of the Gulf of Mexico.
As a Real estate agent, I live, work, and enjoy recreational times, on the Gulf of Mexico in the Houston, Galveston area. One thing I can say about oil, is the fact that most all the population of Houston, Galveston and all the Texas Gulf Coast and most of Louisiana are thankful for the Black gold that is found in the Gulf of Mexico.
I’m “oil field trash,” and proud of it. Oil gave my dad a job, 42 years with Humble Oil. Oil put me through college and through graduate school. 85%. Of my clients work in the oil industry and now, my son is a geologist, working offshore.
To those of you who want to walk to work, heat your home with a wood burning stove and scream at those men and women who are finding more and more oil that for now, generates our economy, please shut up. You don’t even know what you’re talking about. You just show your ignorance.
As for me, may God bless the men and women on those rigs. Drill, Baby, Drill! Frack, Baby, Frack!