The Only Answer for Counteracting the Gulf Oil Gusher
by Jan Lundberg, oil industry analyst
30 May 2010
News Release
For immediate release
Washington, D.C. - If 100,000 barrels a day of crude oil are gushing out
of the damaged sea-floor well underneath where BP’s offshore oil rig used
to perch, what can be done to offset this pollution immediately? Time is
of the essence for the global ecosystem, not just for a part of the Gulf.
The gusher is not abating, for Mother Nature has more power than men can
comprehend -- look at the power of an earthquake or a tsunami, or the
global climate’s increasing distortion. When out-of-control industrial
activity pursues profit at the expense of humanity and nature itself,
Mother Earth can get out of control too.
Therefore, all people can do under the circumstances is to stop the flow
of oil that actually can be controlled. This means stopping a significant
amount of oil extraction and refining anywhere on the planet -- as the
ecosystem is all one interconnected closed system -- to the tune of
100,000 barrels a day, or whatever the best estimate of ongoing damage is
in the Gulf. BP cannot be trusted to estimate the flow, as it falsely
claimed that only 5,000 barrels a day were spewing from the well.
Additionally, the cut back in voluntary oil usage must be large enough to
make up for what has already been spewing into the environment in the Gulf
disaster. For almost a month and a half the gusher has raged out of
control. As failure has dogged the incompetent, irresponsible and
criminal BP, with the pro-oil U.S. government refusing to manage the
situation or clean up the mess with supertankers vacuuming up the oil,
mitigation is clearly overdue. Therefore, the cut back must be
significantly over 100,000 barrels of petroleum a day around the world.
Arguing about who must cut now, and who does not have to, would be a
tragic waste of time. Boycotting BP is wrong-headed if the same amount of
oil is purchased overall, for all extracted and refined oil is eventually
burned or spilled (except that dumped as solids, such as asphalt, and plastics -- which do not biodegrade and end up in minute amounts in our bodies).
Some oil wells are easier to cap than others, and some capped wells can be
brought back into production more easily than others. Enhanced oil
recovery and injection of water mean wells are past their prime, so these
are the logical candidates for closure. Additionally, some refineries can
be closed. Shutting down other BP wells and some of the corporation's refineries first is the right move.
To ease this orderly cutback of supply, consumers must use
less oil, such as ceasing car use one day a week. Large cars guzzling
fuel must be retired anyway. All plastic (a petroleum product) offered at retail outlets can be
refused, both as packaging and content of polluting products. All these
measures help people to recognize also that the global peak of oil
extraction must be dealt with.
We demand a response to this proposal from President Obama and
Congressional leaders. If none is forthcoming immediately, we must take
matters into our own hands. We can hear Obama or any other puppet of
industry intone, “We mustn’t harm the economy.” However, unabated
pollution (going on since the oil industry cranked up a century ago, and
coal before that), is the real long-term threat to economic survival. Has Obama and his circle heard of James Lovelock's book Revenge of Gaia?
The oil industry workers in Louisiana who demand continued oil activity
for the sake of their jobs, despite the clear damage going on at the
disaster site, seem to care not for the welfare of people elsewhere or for
the health of nature. A similar mindset has existed with timber workers clear-cutting the few remaining ancient trees. How long must this be accommodated for the sake of "jobs"?
Short-term thinking is the philosophy of extractive industries and
polluters. Connected to Wall Street, the big banks and capitalism in
general, the forces of private enrichment and greed are stealing from
their own offspring and descendants. Policy change from the two-party Big
Business game is hopeless, but system change is not. Extractive
capitalism is a far cry from acting in such a way to protect the interests
of the Seventh Generation, as the Iroquois Nation consciously did for
centuries before the European invasion.
Whatever we do anywhere in the ecosystem affects us everywhere. It is not
just the Nigerians’ problem when Shell Oil’s facilities poison tribal
villages, or Indians’ problem when Chevron-Texaco’s toxic oil waste in the
Amazon kills natives and wildlife. The “over there” that U.S. consumers want
to forget about is knocking at their door now.
_______________________________________________
Note: this press release was revised as of May 31.
# # #
Jan Lundberg is a former oil industry analyst who, among other functions,
formally studied offshore oil drilling's potential for California on
behalf of the oil industry -- resulting in Congress's immediate lifting of
the moratorium there in the mid 1980s. He ran Lundberg Survey which
published the Lundberg Letter, then known widely as “the bible of the oil
industry.”
Culture Change mailing address: P.O. Box 3387, Santa Cruz, California, 95063, USA, Telephone 1-215-243-3144 (and fax). Culture Change was founded by Sustainable Energy Institute (formerly Fossil Fuels Policy Action), a nonprofit organization.
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