Realistic Advice and One INSANE Idea

I can't help writing about the Gulf as I think it is the turning point in our energy future...and in governance too, for that matter.
This article, with quotes from a Transocean attorney and industry veteran, I found compelling EXCEPT for the suggestion that we use a s small nuclear device to plug the hole. OK, so he inhaled a little too many fumes along the way....
But he alludes to the fact that Russia actually DID such a thing years ago! Hello? Not that I follow all the nuclear explosions on the planet very closely...but I thought that would have made some news.

Quote:


The very depth of the well is one reason this spill has been so bad—5,000 feet under water and another 18,000 feet in the Earth to tap into oil. The deeper you go, the more pressure there is, and it’s that pressure that blew through protective measures that proved too flimsy, destroying a vessel twice the size of an aircraft carrier in a plume of black smoke and flame. On Wednesday, the latest attempt froze as a saw blade being used to cut through a pipe to allow for a new containment dome got stuck.

Simmons said the BP Deepwater Horizon spill may just be the event that spurs a reaction that shortens the time horizon for the switch from oil. His favored approach is the development of offshore wind turbines, but other ideas include the use of algae as a substitute for oil.

“I think it could happen within five years if we tackle this with the intensity that we reacted after Pearl Harbor,” he said. “We have to use that intensity now, and that’s the only good thing about the tragedy—it’s going to focus people on the problem.”

http://www.portfolio.com/industry-news/energy/2010/06/03/matthew-simmons-reflects-on-deepwater-horizon-disaster?ana=e_pft

End quote

The fact that the pressure is coming from 18,000 feet below the bottom of the ocean floor...that is of volcanic proportions! And it virtually vaporized something twice the size of an aircraft carrier? This, for me, gives some perspective to the problem.

Any elected official, lobbyist, activist, voter who does NOT see this as the bellweather event for the change to a clean, safe, secure energy economy has got other priorities such as self preservation through financial donations, denial, disregard for the future of our planet and their progeny upon it, political motivations...and I am sure there are more.

I have said it before...and again...there are thousands upon thousands of good hardworking, well - meaning people working for the likes of BP. They all just need to understand that they must be a part of the change that is happening. They don't need to lose their jobs or get relocated. They just need to know that what they do everyday isn't going to be supporting the ever riskier search for and extraction of oil.