BP Gulf Oil Spill Seafloor Fractured So Bad Oil May Leak For Years Even If Relief Well Succeeds
Posted by Alexander Higgins - August 20, 2010 at 1:55 am - Permalink - Source via Alexander Higgins Blog
Loading ...I have written a great deal about how fractures in the BP Gulf Oil Spill seafloor could cause the attempt by BP and the government to seal the leaking well with relief wells to fail and leave oil and methane leaking for years.
Over Two weeks after it was widely reported by those watching the BP live oil leak cam that a series of explosions may have Gulf of Mexico sea floor to collapse the Government is now investigating those reports.
I first reported here that a series of those explosion of oil and debris continued and caused topkill to fail although there was no immediate mention of the event in the media, until now.
Last night on Countdown Keith Olberman said their is now evidence that an underground blowout may be happening causing oil to seep out of BP’s leaking well through in various places on the ocean floor.
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Olbermann reported that BP discovered during the topkill procedure that the well was broken beneath the subsurface and that the mud being shot into the well was making it out of the sides of the casing and leaking into the rock surrounding the well.
Rob Cavner, an oil industry expert, called directly on BP to be transparent about the explosions that caused top-kill to fail and address the reports of the massive subsurface leaks on the internet that have been by the underground blowout.
Keith Olberman Addresses Seafloor Leaks Calling The Situation Worse Than Doomsday
The Wall Street Journal also reported that BP concluded that its “top-kill” attempt may have failed due to a blown disk inside the well about 1,000 feet below the ocean floor which may have allowed drilling mud to escape from the well into the rock formation outside of the wellbore.
Senator Bill Nelson has also reported, which has now been confirmed by multiple sources, that the well casing itself may have been pierced telling MSNBC that this indicates the “problem could be just enormous”.
How enormous? Well as Keith Olberman says “What’s worse than doomsday? This is it.”
These reports of the new leaks in the well casing are in addition to well casing blowout that an an internal White House investigation fingers for causing the leaking oil rig to explode in the first place.
These new leaks we are now facing, if confirmed, would mean that there is oil gushing up in multiple disparate places on the Gulf sea floor
Oil could begin leaking from any crack or crevice in the surrounding sea floor and the entire area could be leaking like a sponge.
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Even if a relief well will work it could take until Christmas
The ultimate solution that BP has been touting almost since the disaster began has been “relief wells.”
But these additional leak indicate that the relief well that BP is counting on to cap the Gulf oil spill won’t be the final solution to stop the leaking oil well.
Company CEO Tony Hayward has repeatedly told the public that the strategy is a sure thing.
However Robert Bea, a University of California Berkeley engineering professor and oil industry expert, says that these leaks in the well casing may cause problems with BP’s plan to cap the oil leak using a relief well .
Bloomberg also reports, additional leaks aside, that the normal hiccups involved in a worse case scenario of the relief well could mean that BP may not be able to cap the the leak until Christmas.
In fact last year’s Montara oil leak in the Timor Sea took 5 passes before the relief well actually hit the leaking well casing.
To make matters worse the BP Gulf oil spill relief wells are further complicated by a much higher leak rate, are being dug twice the distance under the seafloor, face hurricanes, dense rock and other problems.
As I have already reported, experts have also warned that if the relief well blows an additional 240,000 barrels of oil per day could begin spewing into the Gulf of Mexico.
How likely is it that the relief well might blow?
We can’t be sure but nola.com reports that a relief well exploded just last year destroying a second well and destroying another rig which further set back the relief well operations.
Matt Simons says short of blowing the well with an explosive this may leak for years
The picture that prominent oil industry insider Matt Simmons paints is even worse.
Matt Simmons believes that the well casing may have been destroyed when the oil rig exploded and says that oil is leaking from the seafloor up to 7 miles away because of the explosion.
Simmons was an energy adviser to President George W. Bush, is an adviser to the Oil Depletion Analysis Center, and is a member of the National Petroleum Council and the Council on Foreign Relations.
On May 27th, Simmons addressed this issue on MSNBC:
On May 26th, Simmons referred to this again on a second appearance on MSNBC warning this could last for years:
Matt Simmons referred to it again on Bloomberg on May 28th:
Matt Simmons reiterated those statements again on MSNBC yesterday:
Matt Simons Again on MSNBC saying there is a second whole and BP will not be a publicly traded company by the end of summer.
Even if the oil well is capped in accordance to BP’s August time frame the results will still be catastrophic.
Today Washington’s Blog posted a great interview Dr. Robert Bea, a scientist on federal government’s flow rate team and one of the world’s leading world’s leading experts in offshore drilling disasters.
Dr. Bea confirmed that BP has in fact drilled into a salt formation during the drilling of the well and during the drilling of the well the sea floor has been become so fractured that oil and methane could continue to leak for years even after sealing it with the relief well.
Top Oil Expert: Geology is “Fractured”, Relief Wells May Fail and Oil May Leak for Years … BP is Using a “Cloak of Silence”
Few people in the world know more about oil drilling disasters than Dr. Robert Bea.
Bea teaches engineering at the University of California Berkeley, and has 55 years of experience in engineering and management of design, construction, maintenance, operation, and decommissioning of engineered systems including offshore platforms, pipelines and floating facilities. Bea has worked for many years in governmental and quasi-governmental roles, and has been a high-level governmental adviser concerning disasters. He worked for 16 years as a top mechanical engineer and manager for Shell Oil, and has worked with Bechtel and the Army Corps of Engineers. One of the world’s top experts in offshore drilling problems, Bea is a member of the Deepwater Horizon Study Group.
Washington’s Blog spoke with Dr. Bea yesterday about the BP oil spill. [We've added a few explanatory comments and links in brackets].
WB: Is BP sharing information with the government?
Bea: No. BP is using a “cloak of silence”. BP is not voluntarily sharing information or documents with the government.In May, for example, Senator Boxer subpoenaed information from BP regarding footage of the seafloor taken before the blowout by BP’s remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). We still have not received a response 12 weeks later. [Bea subsequently clarified that he's not sure whether BP has failed to release the information, or Senator Boxer's committee has sat on the information. My bet is on BP.
Indeed, BP has refused to answer some very basic written questions from Congressman Markey, chair of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. See this and this. Indeed, it is unclear whether BP is sharing vital details even with Thad Allen, Secretary of energy Chu, or the Unified Command].
WB: Might there be problems with the relief wells? I know that it took a couple of relief wells to finally stop the Ixtoc leak, and it has taken as many as 5 relief wells to stop some blowouts.
Bea: Yes, it could take repeated attempts.
WB: Are there any conditions at BP’s well which might make killing the leak with relief wells more difficult than with the average deepwater oil spill?
Bea: That’s an interesting question. You have to ask why did this location blow out when nearby wells drilled in even deeper water didn’t blow out.
You have to look at the geology of the Macondo well. It is in a subsalt location, in a Sigsbee salt formation. [For background, see this and this]
The geology is fractured.
Usually, the deeper you drill, the more pressure it takes to fracture rock. This is called the “fracture gradient“.
But when BP was drilling this well, the fracture gradient reversed. Indeed, BP lost all pressure as it drilled into the formation.
WB: Is it possible that this fractured, subsea salt geology will make it difficult to permanently kill the oil leak using relief wells?
Bea: Yes, it could. The Santa Barbara channel seeps are still leaking, decades after the oil well was supposedly capped. This well could keep leaking for years.
Scripps mapped out seafloor seeps in the area of the well prior to the blowout. Some of the natural seeps penetrate 10,000 to 15,000 feet beneath the seafloor. The oil will follow lines of weakness in the geology. The leak can travel several horizontal miles from the location of the leak.
[In other words, the geology beneath the seafloor is so fractured, with soft and unstable salt formations, that we may never be able to fully kill the well even with relief wells. Instead, the loss of containment of the oil reservoir caused by the drilling accident could cause oil to leak out through seeps for years to come. See this and this for further background].
WB: I know that you’ve previously said that you’re concerned that there might be damage to the well bore, which could make it more difficult for the relief wells to succeed.
Bea: Yes, that’s still a concern.
While we previous discussions focused on cracks in the sea floor preventing the relief wells from sealing the wells altogether these new revealtions from Dr. Bea make it an entirely different ballgame.
The discussion now becomes that even if the relief wells do seal the well oil and methane could continue to leak through fractures in the salt formation for years.
Dr. Bea also informs us that the geology is so fractured that hydrocarbons could leak from fractures several miles away creating the appearance of new natural seeps or even magnifying existing seeps and making them worse.
That means the leaks on the sea floor found by the federal government 5 to 7 miles away on top of the Biloxi Dome may in fact becoming from the BP Well.
3D Model Of Leaks On Gulf Of Mexico Seafloor Near BP Oil Leak Compiled From Data Collected By The Thomas Jefferson
Oil and or natural gas leaks (red and yellow columns) mapped by Thomas Jefferson, and by Gordon Gunter (purple cylinders) along with CTD stations showing high fluorescence or possible oil and gas anomalies (brown, green and white spheres). The Deepwater Horizon well site is in background (red cylinder) and distribution of Bottom Following Reflectors is represented by orange lines.NOAA has said that the leaks on the sea floor graphed in the 3D model above “appear to be pre-existing seeps that occur naturally and are unrelated to the spill” and have labeled leaks as such in the Thomas Jefferson report.
But how NOAA came to determination the determination that these leaks on the sea floor are natural seeps needs to be questioned.
The report indicates that the ships that collected the data mapped the leaks on the seafloor with sonar with a simple alteration.
The altered sonar allowed the ships to track submerged hydrocarbons by detecting higher than normal levels of oxygen depletion.
The ships then dropped canisters in the water to take samples of the water at various depths to confirm the sonar anomalies where indeed hydrocarbons.
None of these methods would allow an actual determination that the leaks found on the sea floor where indeed natural or pre-existing.
It is also questionable why NOAA would label such seeps as “appear to be natural or pre-existing” while saying that the other anomalies found floating in the water column beneath the sea surface need further testing to verify that they are indeed oil and need to be confirmed as coming from the blown BP well.
Perhaps even more alarming is that the reports from the Thomas Jefferson seem to confirm a good part of what Matt Simmons has stated to the media including the existence of leaks miles away from the BP leak and that the Thomas Jefferson was denied permission to investigate the source of underwater plumes it had located.
As the Houston Chronicle reports there are concerns that the series of blowouts that have occurred on the BP well would cause oil to leak into cracks in the surrounding sea floor.
Marvin Odum, president of Houston-based Shell Oil, the U.S. arm of Royal Dutch Shell, told the Houston Chronicle last week that the integrity of the well casing is a major concern. Odum and others from the industry regularly sit in on high-level meetings with BP and government officials about the spill.
If the well casing burst it could send oil and gas streaming through the strata to appear elsewhere on the sea floor, or create a crater underneath the wellhead – a device placed at the top of the well where the casing meets the seafloor – that would destabilize it and the blowout preventer.
Whether or not the leaks mapped by the Thomas Jefferson has found on the sea floor are natural or have been caused by the BP well blowout still needs to be determined.
But in either case there still exists additional concerns that the oil and gas leaking from the BP well could be finding a path into those leaks, natural or not, making the situation worse as Washington’s blog notes.
Obviously, if there are natural oil or gas seeps nearby, there are already pre-existing channels up to the seafloor … so that may very well be the path of least resistance for the subterranean oil to flow up to the seafloor.
Therefore, if there were a substantial breach in the well bore, nearby natural oil and gas seeps could very well increase in volume.
It may also indicate that the leaks reported to be coming from the Rigel well may also be from the BP well.
GeoHazard experts BK Lim warned that if BP had in fact drilled near a salt dome a worse case scenario could be playing out .
We now that we have confirmation from Dr. Bea that BP drilled directly into a salt dome and fractured the geology beneath the well you can review the following progression of images showing exactly what happened during the drilling process.
The evidence all adds up.
BP and the Feds knew about cracks in the sea floor since February.
They knew that the rock formation collapsed and and left an open hole in the well casing in March.
BP had six well control events and or blowouts during the drilling of the well.
The facts are that there BP has reports cracks in the sea floor and well casing and that there have been a series of well control events or blowouts that have occurred during the drilling of of the Macondo oil well that is now leaking millions of gallons of oil every day into the Gulf of Mexico.
The first report of cracks in the both rocks surrounding the well and in the well itself in February was only the first in a series of “well control events” or blowouts.
Since the initial February blowout, according to the findings of an interim investigation released by congress there have been a total of 5 “well control events” or blowouts including the final blowout that led to the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion and collapse.
Time line from the interim investigation revealing that the BP well had 5 blowouts during the drilling of the well
Details of the time line of the Macondo Well Blowouts are as follows:
- February 17-23: BP reports cracks in well casing and leaking of hydrocarbons into the surrounding rock formation. It took BP 3 attempts to fill the cracks with cement before the well control event was brought under control.
- March 2-5: BP reported another well control event that took 3 days to bring under control
- March 8-14: BP reported a well control event that took 7 days to get under control. A series of BP internal emails released by Congress showed
- The surrounding rock formation actually collapsed on the drill.
- BP was then given special permission to cement the well at a shallower depth than normally required because the hole caved in on drilling equipment.
- Another BP email released by congress showed that unnamed MMS official at 11 p.m. on March 11 gave the special permission to insert the cement plug about 750 feet above the bottom of the hole .
- April 4-7: Well control event took 3 days to bring under control.
- April 20: Well control event leading to explosion and collapse of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig.
Further more the chronology of IXTOC well blowout as presented in IXTOC I OIL SPILL ECONOMIC IMPACT STUDY clearly shows that a single underground blowout caused oil to leak from cracks in the seafloor.
Since the blowout BP has stonewalled congress about the integrity of the well and cracks in sea floor.
Immediately after BP capped the well the pressure was far short of target BP and the Government set for an “intact well” and as time passed the pressure still failed to rise significantly indicating the well integrity test failed.
Soon afterward the ROV’s spotted a new leak on the BOP.
The feds then ignored the warning signs, which included multiple leaks on the BOP and the sea bed. and allowed the well to remain shut in even though it risked an uncontrolled underground blowout and came up with a fantasy story about well depletion being the cause of the low pressure in the well.
Then came the news that 40 feet of the relief well collapsed followed by the discovery of a new methane leak found coming from the base of the BOP just inches from the well.
The government then allowed BP to fill the well with mud during the static kill operation and declared that the well was dead even though the well continued to leak.
As the well continued to leak the Government then gave BP the authorization to fill the production casing with cement even though there was a risk that the cement would not cure properly because of the leaks.
That was followed by an increase of oil and methane hydrate leaks popping up all over the sea floor after which BP started filtering the video feeds to hide the leaks.
Then 48 hours after cementing the well the leaks coming from the sea floor continued and became worse as BP started to degrade the quality of the video feeds and was caught once again filtering the video to hide oil and methane leaks from the cracks on the sea floor.
Then oil industry experts came forward and declared that the entire static kill operation failed and has made it even harder for BP to seal the well.
Finally, almost out of the blue, BP lowered a tool to the well flush it of hydrocarbons in a test that was supposed to run for 48 hours but for some unexplained reason was interrupted last light.
That leads us up to today when the federal government has postponed the relief wells until September while admitting that a collapse in the rock formation and not the cement it pumped into the well may be preventing the flow of oil.
Meanwhile the leaks on the sea floor continue and we have even seen a massive tornado form on the sea floor and a crater that was apparently created from it.
All of these events combined with BK Lim’s analysis and Dr. Bea’s revelations tell us that we have some massive fractures on the sea floor that are leaking all over the place and while the BP and the Feds have declared mission accomplished in reality this is far from over.
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Great overview.
I would caution against relying on anything BK Lim has published on the Mocando issue.
I put some hard questions to BK Lim about his theories. I fell his (non)-responses are a serious red flag.
Make your own judgment on the back and forth we had about my questions, here:
http://bit.ly/Questions-to-BKLim
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Yes, Fintan I agree.
I have spoke with BK Lim on the phone and brought discrepancies in technical details to his attention some of which he has corrected.
Others remain to be reworked which is why I haven't reposted his work.
Overall the diagram does give the general concept of what may have occurred here.
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In fact, BKLim answered your post here:
Yes I know, the last few articles were supposed to be thought provoking. It may seem impossible plus the fact that I had intentionally left many technical gaps in all my postings since July 2010. I had expected most all these to surface and my answers can actually be found hidden in my previous articles and comments. I would like to integrate all these into one article titled “And they thought It was checkmate”.
This was what I wrote:
This article is the first of several series which will present evidence of mass deception for public discussion. Without doubt, underhand tactics and adulterated data would be used to discredit me and my articles as they had done to Matt Simmons. Bloggers would be employed to disseminate distorted facts and to confuse the general public, under the guise of technical discussions. Do not be intimidated by technical jargons meant to confuse, for the truth is always simple and logical.
It is always easier to tell the truth as the truth will not contradict any facts that are revealed over time.
My answers are rather long and complicated, needing diagrams to illustrate. Otherwise it may be misconstrued and misinterpreted. Would appreciate if all the questions and doubts in all my previous articles can be emailed or commented here for me to answer in the coming article. “Bring them on” as you Americans will say.
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6 votes
#8.1 – Wed Aug 18, 2010 12:20 PM EDT
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Does anyone think if it becomes real serious that the Government would or should evacuate the areas ? Or would this be like Katrina and the under-privileged would be left behind. Is the Government even considering all this ? The Government and media should warn people so they can be prepared. Thad Allen, BP , and the Government need to come clean with America.
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Perhaps if you have time, you could answer a question for me. I found some fault maps of the Gulf of Mexico from a Dr Reed who published his findings in 2002. He posited that there was a fault in the Gulf that is responsible for the New Madrid quakes and specifically for causing the Mississippi River to run backward during the large historical quakes of the 1800s. When I look at his maps and the maps of the well, these things appear to be close if not overlap. Is that signficant or surprising at all? Would this be in part why that area is so fragile with salt domes? And if the authorities were to drop powerful explosives down those holes, would that have triggered anything significant on land at all?
And I realize that you may not have the answer to that. I don’t know either. Here is a link to the paper that caught my attention
http://www.aapg.org/explorer/2002/11nov/rift_zone.cfm
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Yes, BK Lim answered my post. Unfortunately, his answers in posts or articles haven't actually specifically addressed the issues in the questions I put, in my opinion.
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[...] BP Gulf Oil Spill Seafloor Fractured So Bad Oil May Leak For Years Even If Relief Well Succeeds [...]
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[...] http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/08/20/bp-gulf-oil-spill-seafloor-fractured-bad-oil-leak-years-…2 votes#19.2 – Sat Aug 21, 2010 12:03 AM EDTBK Lim Anon I find your posting of this article, purposeful obfuscating or omitting technical facts for whatever reason to be bad journalism. You yourself said: the truth is always simple and logical, however you're complicating the truth you are trying to present to us. [...]
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[...] Bleaker Estimates Seepage where WELLHEAD MEETS SEAFLOOR filmed by ROV on “BUBBLE COUNT” BP Gulf Oil Spill Seafloor Fractured So Bad Oil May Leak For Years Even If Relief Well Succeeds A Top Scientist Working On BP Gulf Oil Spill For The Federal Government Confirms BP Drilled Two [...]
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[...] if something has gone wrong, or something does go wrong with the relief wells or sea floor and as many believe? Oil could or will continue to leak into the gulf from the ruptured well for many years to come, [...]
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[...] Succeeds | Alexander Higgins Blog Posted by Alexander Higgins – August 20, 2010 at 1:55 am – Permalink – [...]
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[...] wrote:BP Gulf Oil Spill Seafloor Fractured So Bad Oil May Leak For Years Even If Relief Well Succeeds That has to be the lamest stratigraphic diagram I've ever seen. What Rocket Surgeon [...]
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[...] subsurface leaks on the internet that have been by the underground blowout.READ MORE AT THE LINK:http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/08/20/bp-gulf-oil-spill-seafloor-fractured-bad-oil-leak-years-... Posted by Anita Stewart at 12:14 PM Email This BlogThis! Share to [...]
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[...] BP Gulf Oil Spill Seafloor Fractured So Bad Oil May Leak For Years Even If Relief Well Succeeds [...]
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[...] October 2nd, 2010 http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/08/20/bp-gulf-oil-spill-seafloor-fractured-bad-oil-leak-years-... https://twitter.com/BPGulfLeak September 25, 2010 [...]
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The next time I read a web page, I hope that it doesnt disappoint me as a lot as this one. I mean, I know it was my option to read, but I essentially believed youd have a thing interesting to say. All I hear is a bunch of whining about a thing that you just could fix in the event you werent too busy looking for attention.
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