[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mcgowanjm', ' ')Yes, explosives have been used to stop blowouts. To my knowledge, the Russians did this first. A shallow well is drilled to intersect the blowout well. Explosives are set in the bottom of the well next to the casing of the blowout well. The explosion collapses and seals the well. When I worked for Shell, we almost used this technique to stop the Mississippi H2S well blowout. This well produced one thirds of the U.S. production of H2S per day. Three cities had to be evacuated.

[efarmer]

I wondered if shaped charges could be brought to bear some time back. Theoildrum.com has been very helpful, but one thing that doesn't show up and I expected it to by now was the Macondo geology that would be key to any reasonable attempt to implode a well casing. Like many other factors on the Gulf disaster the data is not coming out, either public or private.

Watching Congress grill the oil execs was strange this morning. I saw Congressman grilling execs as to how shoddy their plans and methodology was for recovering from a tragedy in their prime mission of obtaining deep water petroleum and gas.

I remember President Eisenhower talking at the end of his terms about how our military industrial complex as a risk to the long term success of our nation. This morning I felt like I was watching the folks who never created or tended a long term energy plan and defaulted to military assured petroleum supply raising hell that the ambulance drivers who are attending their culture wreck are reckless drivers and have a profit motive. It's sort of like the career mindset of a modern teenager, I suppose if you don't plan and keep at it, you end up grilling.

[Plantagenet]

I haven't seen any discussion of the geology either. I'm sure BP knows it very well, but that kind of information is proprietary and generally isn't released to the public (or to their competitors).

The proposal to use a large bomb to collapse the well bore and stop the oil leak calls for emplacing it at relatively shallow depths. The geology for the upper thousand meters or so almost certainly consists of horizontally stratified unconsolidated silts and fine sands ----- a very simple geologic setting. These sediments would rain back into any explosion crater and might help stop any leakage still occurring after an explosive blast designed to collapse the well. The relief wells would still need to be completed after the explosion to guarantee that no additional leaks would occur.

As far as the congressional hearings go----sadly, our "leaders" seem much more interested in going on TV and assigning blame then in doing the hard work of stopping the flow of millions of gallons of oil that are still coming out of the well.

[Plantagenet]

Matt Simmons also proposed using a bomb to stop the oil leak in the GOM

The Russians stopped their leaky wells with bombs, but the US won't even discuss using bombs to stop the leak because it isn't "politically correct."

So the US government stands by and does nothing and another 2.5 million gallons of oil leak into the GOM every friggin day.

Simmons says bomb the leak

[zeke]

I agree with those who feel that "nuking" this leak is a misguided and, uh..really stupid idea.

while it is true that nuclear explosions can convert sand into glass (and this it is hoped will bottle in the oil) nuclear explosions are also known for blowing shit up.

In other words, tons of rock and other stuff currently (and barely) holding back that oil will be blasted away.

yes, you will produce some glass-like material, but you won't end up with a conveniently-formed glass structure magically covering up the oil.

and sorry, but I'm just can't get erect about anything a military scientist might say. the military is really focused on shooting and exploding...that's pretty much what they do.

this situation calls for something better.


MUCH better.


zeke

[Cog]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', ' ') These sediments would rain back into any explosion crater and might help stop any leakage still occurring after an explosive blast designed to collapse the well. The relief wells would still need to be completed after the explosion to guarantee that no additional leaks would occur.

[Pops]

This might be a stupid question but if they can't get a plug in the thing how are they going to get a bomb in it?

If it were that easy to stick a firecracker up that beauty wouldn't they just shove a cork in it and back up the cement truck?

[Plantagenet]

Of course there is too much pressure to cram a bomb down the well bore. In spite of that, a bomb might still stop it.

There are three possible ways I can see that a bomb could stop the flow:

(1) Here's my idea: A small conventional bomb or even better a series of such small bombs could be placed in a shallow hole drilled a couple of hundred meters down and parallel to the pipe. Set them off all at once and the explosion(s) would crumple and pinch the pipe, just a the blowout preventer was supposed to do at the surface, cutting off the flow of oil.

(2) Here's the marine scientist's idea: A VERY large conventional bomb could be set off next to the pipe. The bomb might crumple the pipe and stop the flow as in (1) above, but it would also be large enough to destroy the upper parts of the well and blast out a crater. Even if the oil can got through the crumpled pipe, it would still have to percolate upwards through the sediment collapsed in the crater. This might stop or restrict the flow for long enough for the relief wells to work. It would also be a time to pump cement down into the crater to try to create an impermeable seal over the crater.

(3) Option 3 is the Matt Simmons scenario---- set off a nuke to create an impermeable glass carapace that stops flow to the surface.

And yes...I think the government should've done this kind of thing weeks ago instead of letting another Exxon Valdez worth of oil jet into the ocean with every few days that passes.

[imagineX]

well here are some thoughts of Byron King on why the Nukes shouldnt be used. What do you make of it?

http://whiskeyandgunpowder.com/nukes-and-expensive-oil/

[Plantagenet]

Well, first let me note that the first two "bomb" options in my list above are NON-NUCLEAR. I think there's a good chance of stopping the leak with either my proposal #1 or the marine corps resident scientist's plan #2.

As far as Matt Simmon's call for nukes go, the blog you linked to was very interesting but its objections didn't seem very substantive to me. The writer was concerned about drilling the hole....well, he was a navy pilot and thats very impressive, but I've been on drill ships including the National Science Foundation's (NSF) famous Glomar Explorer, and I know the hole could be drilled. Then the blogger worried about preparing a nuke for the pressure. Again, NSF has various mini-subs that can take people to those depths and much deeper. It would be possible to build a pressure--proof containment vessel for the bomb. Finally, he worries about the effects of the bomb. Thats why god made supercomputers---to calculate exactly what would happen...AND there are claims the Russians sealed wells with nukes---if they can do it, we can it more neatly and better.

Again, nukes needn't be the first option to stop the leak. But I think even a subsurface nuke would do less damage to the Gulf then allowing this oil spill to continue on and on and on........

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', ' ') These sediments would rain back into any explosion crater and might help stop any leakage still occurring after an explosive blast designed to collapse the well. The relief wells would still need to be completed after the explosion to guarantee that no additional leaks would occur.

[Fiddlerdave]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', 'I')t would be incredible.

The whole world would watch the show to see if the USA us still a country that can do things and solve problems.

Whats going on now is just pathetic....every five days another EXXON VALDEX dribbles out from the sea floor and the government does nothing.

The bomb doesn't have to be nuclear...just big.

Its time to blow this thing to hell!!!!!!!!!

[efarmer]

I do recall reading how the Russians found 600 foot layer of clay buried deep that let them use
their explosive force to press a huge plastic mass against the drill casing and flatten it. The layer of clay was between rock layers and let them focus the force laterally to do the deed. I think the Russians followed up on the casing above the crimp job by filling it with concrete. It is good to remember the Russians created a dry tube to load ordnance into, wire for detonation, and back fill with concrete on dry land rather than a mile under water.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcW_Ygs6hm0

Fiddler Dave, I think you might have swapped Doc Strangelove and Zhivago.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Fiddlerdave', ' ')there is always the yahoo who wants to "fix it" with a bomb and "blow it to hell".

[Fiddlerdave]

" OMG, we HAVE to DO SOMETHING!!!! ANYTHING is better than NOTHING!!

Those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it.

I'd suggest that one thing that could be worse than 3 million barrels of oil in the GOM over the next couple of months would be 300 million barrels of oil in the GOM as we make it possible for all the oil to come out at once!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3712178515303087869#

The Farside Comes to Life in Oregon
By Dave Barry (1990)

By Dave Barry

(click for info)
I am absolutely not making this incident up; in fact I have it all on videotape. The tape is from a local TV news show in Oregon, which sent a reporter out to cover the removal of a 45-foot, eight-ton dead whale that washed up on the beach. The responsibility for getting rid of the carcass was placed upon the Oregon State Highway Division, apparently on the theory that highways and whales are very similar in the sense of being large objects.

So anyway, the highway engineers hit upon the plan — remember, I am not making this up — of blowing up the whale with dynamite. The thinking here was that the whale would be blown into small pieces, which would be eaten by sea gulls, and that would be that. A textbook whale removal.

So they moved the spectators back up the beach, put a half-ton of dynamite next to the whale and set it off. I am probably not guilty of understatement when I say that what follows, on the videotape, is the most wonderful event in the history of the universe. First you see the whale carcass disappear in a huge blast of smoke and flame. Then you hear the happy spectators shouting “Yayy!” and “Whee!” Then, suddenly, the crowd’s tone changes. You hear a new sound like “splud.” You hear a woman’s voice shouting “Here come pieces of… MY GOD!” Something smears the camera lens.

Later, the reporter explains: “The humor of the entire situation suddenly gave way to a run for survival as huge chunks of whale blubber fell everywhere.” One piece caved in the roof of a car parked more than a quarter of a mile away. Remaining on the beach were several rotting whale sectors the size of condominium units. There was no sign of the sea gulls, who had no doubt permanently relocated in Brazil. This is a very sobering videotape. Here at the institute we watch it often, especially at parties. But this is no time for gaiety. This is a time to get hold of the folks at the Oregon State Highway division and ask them, when they get done cleaning up the beaches, to give us an estimate on the US Capitol.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploding_whale
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he resulting explosion was caught on film by cameraman Doug Brazil for a story reported by news reporter Paul Linnman of KATU-TV in Portland, Oregon. In his voiceover, Linnman alliteratively joked that "land-lubber newsmen" became "land-blubber newsmen ... for the blast blasted blubber beyond all believable bounds."[4] The explosion caused large pieces of blubber to land near buildings and in parking lots some distance away from the beach, one of which caused severe damage to a parked car. Only some of the whale was disintegrated; most of it remained on the beach for the Oregon Highway Division workers to clear away.

[efarmer]

The relief well is down almost 3 miles now and 200 feet from the blowout shaft.

A bomb is a longer lead time than the relief well now and would halt it in the act of attempting
to bottom kill in order to be tried. Bomb talk would seem to be a moot point now unless relief fails.


http://blogs.chron.com/newswatchenergy/ ... _with.html

Looks like the relief well has closed to within 200 feet of the Macondo blowout well at
15,936 feet below the ocean floor and above the reservoir. Surprisingly the report says
they will drill past and purposely miss the bore hole on the first pass so they can precisely
determine it's location and pull back slightly to intersect on a second pass.

[Plantagenet]

Interesting old Soviet film showing atomic bomb explosion plugging up an out-of-control gas well in the USSR

How to use a nuke to seal an out-of-control well

Seeing is believing--- it really is possible to plug an out-of-control well with explosives after all..........

[Cog]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', ' ') These sediments would rain back into any explosion crater and might help stop any leakage still occurring after an explosive blast designed to collapse the well. The relief wells would still need to be completed after the explosion to guarantee that no additional leaks would occur.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', '
')Cement will not set up under oil and gas flow conditions.

[efarmer]

Using a big bomb or nuke if the relief wells fail would pretty much spell the end of offshore drilling and put the offshore industry into stasis running existing fields until depleted much like Three Mile Island spelled stasis for the US nuclear power industry after 1979.

The price of petroleum required to fund unconventional plays and extraction techniques will assume the correct and economy murdering level almost immediately and a multiple choice for Americans will be:

1. Voluntary power down and transition.

2. Military enforced oil supply from hostile sources.

3. Cover story of going green over an open ended transition period with media coverage of feel good alternative energy and conservation vignettes while relying on #2 above until it doesn't work anymore.

I think the scenario that wins will be the most financially rewarding for corporations, corporate sponsored government, the defense industry, and provide the most stunning and jarring news for the media on a continuing basis. #3 (#2 with the green candy corporate coating and top notch ads) seems like the likely winner.