gees that is "put out the oil fires " company.
i see all the oil fire companies are deep trouble and saying Government has done nothing to assist them, and that they, the companies are not ready.
Hate to be crass but might this lead to a play???:)
<< Reuters
RPT-Teams expect tough battle with Iraq oil fires
Friday January 31, 8:48 am ET
By Richard Valdmanis
(story originally filed on Thursday)
NEW YORK, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Firefighting firms that doused the blazing oil wells of Kuwait in the aftermath of the first Gulf War are concerned by a lack of preparation ahead of a potentially tougher challenge in Iraq, the companies said.
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The United States has done little so far to prime the companies for battling burning crude in the vast Iraqi oilfields, a likely scenario amid signals that Baghdad will attempt to destroy its fields in the event of a U.S. invasion.
The situation cuts a stark contrast to the planning in place before Kuwait's wells were ignited by Iraqi troops in 1991, and could spell a much worse environmental disaster and shock to the world's oil markets.
Iraq has about twice the number of oil wells as Kuwait, spread across 25 times the land area -- with many of the fields several hundred miles (kilometers) from the water required to cool a searing oil blaze, experts said.
"We see an urgent need for an emergency response plan," said Mike Miller, president of Canada's Safety Boss, an oil well control company that put out 180 of Kuwait's more than 700 burning oil wells after the Gulf War.
"Many people are predicting damage to Iraq's wells, but no one seems to be taking the next obvious step," he said.
The White House is building a case to invade Iraq, claiming the country has violated sanctions by developing weapons of mass destruction. The United States will present evidence of Iraqi weapons violations to the United Nations next week.
Oil well control teams, including Safety Boss, Boots and Coots International Well Control Inc. (AMEX:WEL - News), RPC Inc.'s (NYSE:RES - News) Cudd Pressure Control, and Superior Energy Services Inc.'s (NYSE:SPN - News) Wild Well Control -- which worked together in Kuwait -- have been put on notice by low level U.S. military officials that their services may be required in the coming months.
WHO WILL PAY?
But large questions remain over how and when fire-fighting equipment would be moved to the region, and who would finance the multibillion-dollar effort.
"In Kuwait there was a willing and wealthy government to finance the work and provide contracts, and planning began four months before the wells were ignited," said Miller. "This isn't the case in Iraq. The U.S. or the U.N. may have to pay, and there has been almost no planning."
"Iraq is a very different challenge from Kuwait," said Bill Mahler, manager of Wild Well Control. "In Iraq, we have very little intelligence about the wells and the information we have received so far has been very general and vague."
Dousing the oil fires in Kuwait after the first Gulf War cost about $2.5 billion, with an additional $17 billion to $18 billion for reconstructing the damaged oil infrastructure, with the lion's share of the money coming from Kuwait.
"There are certainly a number of questions, but at the same time there will be answers and solutions to these problems," said Ronnie Roles, president of operations for Cudd. "This job will be done."
A senior U.S. official said last week that Iraq intends to "cause damage or destruction" to its own oil fields if war breaks out," and that there are indications that President Saddam Hussein's forces have already started planning.
Such an attack threatens to be worse than a repetition of the oil blazes in Kuwait, which spilled 50 million barrels of oil onto the desert, 10 million barrels into the ocean, and reduced 500 million barrels into thick black clouds.
"It made the Exxon Valdez look like a drop in the bucket," said Safety Boss's Miller.
POTENTIAL JUMP IN OIL PRICES
It could also potentially set off a spike in world crude oil prices, already flirting with two-year highs due to war fears and supply disruptions from Venezuela, dealing a blow to the fragile world economy.
With response time of the essence, well control firms said they expect one hurdle to be finding water supplies for some of the major Iraqi fields due to the distance of some of them from the Mideast Gulf and the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.
Additionally, the prospect of reversing oil pipelines from the Mideast Gulf to supply water to damaged fields, as was done in the dry areas of Kuwait, has been made less attractive due to the threat of sabotage in a post-war Iraq.
"In Kuwait we could use oil pipelines to bring water to the fields because the hostile forces had been pushed out. But in Iraq, it might be much more difficult," said Mahler. "The people would certainly not be happy after an invasion, and we could not expect them to welcome us with open arms."
While some well control firms hire their own "ordinance teams" to handle booby-trapping, the firms said most of the security concerns for potential work in Iraq would be dealt with by the U.S. military.
Iraq may also take aim at oil fields in neighboring countries, some fear. Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz this week pinpointed Kuwait as a possible target due to the presence of U.S. forces there.
"Kuwait is a battlefield and American troops are in Kuwait and preparing themselves to attack Iraq," he said. "We will of course retaliate against the American troops wherever they start their aggression on Iraq."
"We've seen what this kind of thing can do to a country," said Mahler. "The people will need the flow from these wells to recover from the impacts of war. If Saddam does this stuff, it would be a big blow to his people." (Reporting by Richard Valdmanis; editing by Gary Crosse; Reuters Messaging: richard.valdmanis.reuters.com@reuters.net; +1 646 223 6056)>>
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