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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: stockman_scott who wrote (79898)	5/3/2010 10:18:19 AM
From: longnshort	Respond to of 89467

Ron Gouget's comments ought to be getting attention. They aren't and won't ... not what people want to hear: ..... Federal officials should have started burning oil off the surface of the Gulf last week, almost as soon as the spill happened, said Ron Gouget, a former oil spill response coordinator for NOAA. Had the spill happened during his tenure, he would have been one of the people figuring out how to control it. Gouget, who also managed Louisiana's oil response team for a time, said federal officials missed a narrow window of opportunity to gain control of the spill before it spread hundreds of miles across the Gulf and winds began blowing oil toward shore. He also said the heavy use of dispersants -- to this point on the surface -- has likely knocked so much oil into the water column that portions of the Gulf may be nearing the point of becoming toxic to marine life. Still, he said, the continued use of the chemicals may be required to prevent a greater disaster in the shallow coastal marshes. "There was a threshold of about 35 parts per million for oil in the water. Above that, white shrimp larvae died in the laboratory. I don't know where the levels are now in the Gulf, but that is something (officials) will have to keep an eye on," Gouget said. Gouget, now an environmental consultant with Windward Environmental in Seattle, was part of the group that created the 1994 plan designed to allow federal responders to begin burning oil as soon as a major spill occurred. "They had pre-approval. The whole reason the plan was created was so we could pull the trigger right away," Gouget said. "If you read the pre-approval plan, it speaks about Grand Isle, where the spill is. When the wind is blowing offshore, out of the north, you have preapproval to burn in that region. If the wind is coming onshore, like it is now, you can't burn at Grand Isle. They waited to do the test burn until the wind started coming onshore." He said the NOAA officials working with the Coast Guard and BP at the command center in Louisiana know how to respond to spills and know that burning should have started as soon as possible after the initial release was detected. Gouget said they may have been overruled. "It may have been a political issue. The burn would make a big, big plume and lots of soot. Like Valdez, the decisions to get the resources mobilized may not have occurred until it was too late," Gouget said. "This whole thing has been a daily strip tease. At first they thought it was just the diesel, then they said the well wasn't leaking. It's unfortunate they didn't get the burning going right away. They could have gotten 90 percent of the oil before it spread." Gouget said portions of the oil will still burn, especially the stuff bubbling up from the broken well. "I keep reading that burning will only get a small portion of the oil. Not true. This one is a continuing release," Gouget said, with lots of "bright, fresh oil" that should burn fairly easily. "The bottom line, the limiting factor on burning is can you get it to burn. If it gets too thin, like a sheen, it won't burn because you don't have a fuel," Gouget said. "Generally, it's got to be thick enough, and it can't be too weathered. This stuff is weathering immediately coming out of the pipe, losing the volatiles that burn most easily. They've got to get to it right away." Gouget said officials could still make a big dent in the amount of oil that will hit seashores over the next several months by burning. "If they set up multiple boat/fire boom sets and begin a 'bucket brigade' grabbing fresh oil, they can set up a production system to remove huge amounts," Gouget said. "They've got to ramp up the burn program. It's one of the most important tools they have to limit the damage." [ But it would LOOK bad when they take pictures of it. ] blog.al.com