Dispersants and the Piper
There are now two YouTube videos on the internet that have to do with the dispersant being used associated with the 
potential one world order and depopulation of the world by polluting the sea. Just as aggravating is the news media discussing the “danger” of “adding chemicals to the ocean.” But worse than these are people who believe this Enviro-Babble because they basically are as ignorant (as Obama) about the technology being used. These are the people who will follow any Pied Piper of Doom without a second thought about the lies spread by the catchy tune. When you see these conversations show up in your email and on your TV, watch if you will, but watch only if you are fully armed with facts, and that is the purpose of this post. Don’t follow another Pied Piper over another hoax-ridden environmental cliff. Too many people already have a “lemming” attitude trained into them with “Man Made Global Warming” … I must wonder, will they fall for a similar tune twice?
Want to know “why? Read on!
Studio B and Shep “I-became-a- star-with-Katrina” Smith. Yesterday, they had a piece on Studio B where Smith was interviewing a S.C.U.B.A. diver (admitting he was only a diver/journalist and not technically proficient) who dove into an oil slick (picture to left, wonder if he “see’s oil?). Now that takes some real brains. Even the fish avoid that out in the open water. If you heard the piece, you also heard them discuss the “frightening green haze” that was seen below the surface of the slick. (And if you looked closely at the video, you’ll see fish swimming around in the green haze, what’s with that?). Remember, it was Shepard Smith who brought you Katrina with all his hype. You’ve heard this Pied Piper’s tune before, folks.
Click on Image for Clearer View
Let’s talk dispersants. I’m not only familiar with dispersants I have personally applied them. Dispersants were developed in case there was an oil spill that we could not quickly control (exactly this scenario), or for a smaller spill to disperse the oil before it hit a wildlife preserve or caused some other ecological damage. If you look at the MSDS sheet (Material Safety Data Sheet) on Corexit (Nalco 9500), you’ll see it is chemically benign … you could practically drink it. Note the “name” is marketing slang for “corrects it.” It is all EPA cleared, and if you know anything about this process, you will know that takes years, hundreds of LD50 (kill-the-guppy) tests, etc. You don’t just “get clearance” because you know somebody. The EPA is naturally suspicious of chemicals So the dispersant is environmentally safe … doubt if if you want, but the DATA PROVES IT and that same data proved it to the skeptical EPA. Here’s the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet) for Corexit, Nalco 9500). But most “environmentalists” fear Dihydrogen monoxide too: (Discussions of dangers and MSDS HERE).
How chemical dispersion works ITOPF
Natural dispersion of an oil slick occurs when waves and other turbulence at the sea surface cause all or part of the slick to break up into droplets and enter into the water column. The addition of dispersants is intended to accelerate this natural process.
Dispersants have two main components: a surfactant and a solvent. Surfactants molecules are made up of two parts: an oleophilic part (with an attraction to oil) and a hydrophilic part (with an attraction to water). When dispersants are sprayed onto an oil slick, the solvent will transport and distribute the surfactants through the oil slick to the oil/water interface where they arrange themselves so that the oleophilic part of the molecule is in the oil and the hydrophilic part is in the water. This creates a reduction in the surface tension at the oil/water interface and small oil droplets will break away from the oil slick with the help of wave energy. These droplets will be of varying sizes and although the larger ones may rise back to the surface some will remain in suspension and will drift apart and become degraded by naturally occurring bacteria. If dispersion is successful, a characteristic brown plume will spread slowly down from the water surface a few minutes after treatment. (Dark plumes and green haze anyone?)
The cybernetics of dispersant technology is actually pretty simple. You mix it as well as you can with the oil, before sticky, thick, slicks are formed. The oil then, instead of becoming a slick, turns into mist-sized droplets in the water. If you watch the BP feeds, you’ll see a dispersant “wand” blowing dispersant into the oil plume … that is the best possible mixing zone, right at the source where there is great turbulence with the escaping gas bubbles aiding in the mixing process. (Picture on right – Notice the white plume coming out of the small pipe … that’s the dispersant being fed to the point of maximum turbulence). The second best way to add the dispersant is with aerial drops … this for widely scattered spill zones. Also, good old “wave action” can help by increasing turbulence. (The problem with wind is that it can blow the slicks toward shore, but wave action is good). When the oil is “misted” into the tiny droplets, the result is the surface area of the potential oil slick is increased LITERALLY by billions. The whole idea of the dispersant is to increase the surface area making it available for oleophilic bacteria.
Enter the Oleophilics. Once you increase the surface area, you have increased the size of the dinner table for the Oleophilic (oil-loving) bacteria that NATURALLY consume oil. There have been oil leaks in the Gulf of Mexico (and elsewhere in the world) for billions of years. When the earth shifts, rifts open up channels to the trapped reservoirs below. Do you remember the report of “tar balls” in Florida … then the next day, it was retracted because those tar balls did not come from the Deepwater Horizon? Tar Balls were on the Gulf beaches before man was! These things have always been on Gulf Beaches … granted not in the quantities being encountered today, but they are always there … the gulf naturally “leaks” oil. And the reason the gulf is not covered with this oil is the presence of the oleophilic bacteria. So the disperants literally emulsify the oil into the water. And in so doing, the bacteria grow in numbers because of the bonanza food source for them. The “green haze?” It is bacterial growing under the slick. The fish in the green haze, they are going after the plankton that are eating the bacteria … food chain anyone?
- May 18th: 60 Tar Balls found in Florida <– the original report (Sung to Pied Piper’s tune)
- May 19th: Tar Balls found in Florida not from Deepwater Horizon <– the retraction with an oil fouled bird leading the headline! (What a difference a day makes!)
Fact Pages:
Some microorganism of the genera Nocardia and Pseudomonas can grow in the enviroment where the hydrocarbons are the only source of food. These bacteria oxidize straight chain aliphatic hydrocarbon such as octane to their corresponding carboxylic acids:
CH3(CH2)6CH3 +NAD+ O2——– CH3(CH2)6COOH + NADH + H+
Don’t worry about the solution to a problem, just blame anything in sight … But instead of people “discovering” this information on their own (and it is all available with a simple Google search) they would rather listen to the tune of the next Pied Piper of disaster. I guess fantasy trumps truth.
And every time Obama discusses the oil spill, he gathers ownership of the problem:
Bottom Line
Ignorance is the problem. But even the “conservatives” on the right fall for the piper’s tune. So many, even on Free Republic, quickly take up the “Koz” against the big, bad chemical companies that are killing the oceans. This kind of ignorance is perpetuated all the way up the “food chain” to the Oval office. I’ll give you an example. Look at this “mess” we find ourselves in now. We have an incompetent posing the “leader of the free world” because people were ignorant. We have a person who voters gave the duty to answering the 3 am call … and he wouldn’t have a clue what to do if it rang (and is has rung!). All you had to do was a little study and digging before the election to discover this guy was incompetent. He had no experience, nobody knew where he came from, and frankly, you’ve never saw a more twisted family tree. This man cannot even prove he was born!
But the dumb masses voted for him anyway … following the catchy Pied Piper tune of “hope and change.” Now look where following this tune has gotten us. Trillions in debt, USA safety “lucky” twice because of incompetent bombers, Socialized Medicine, Government jobs having a huge growth rate, the private sector jobs stumbling into economic disparity with a “reported” 10% unemployment (that we are told now is the “new standard.” Ignorance got us here!
Yet ignorance continues to abound. If you don’t know what you are talking about, then shut up and listen to those who do, get yourself educated!
Imagine what would happen if Nalco (Corexit) and BP simply shut down their operations and left the gulf oil spill up to Hollywood and Obama. Hey, how tough can it be, all you have to do is “plug the damned hole” and “kick some ass” … piece of cake, problem solved!
But when the media and this incompetent bunch of people we have now “leading” try to politically cripple the ONLY GAME IN TOWN (chemical dispersants), this becomes a conspiracy and an environmental death wish in itself … don’t be a part of it. If you cannot add to the solution of this problem, then you are only adding “white noise” that interferes with problem’s eventual solution. Either enlighten yourself or follow the tune of the new Pied Piper over the same environmental cliff of ignorance … your choice.
My recent “comment” on the Free Republic on the thread about Obama saying he spoke with experts “to know who’s ass to kick.”
If you want to PROVE you are a ROOKIE at Crisis Management, this is exactly the way to do it. If you’ve ever been in a big crisis (and I have), you NEVER start pointing fingers and threatening to kick ass. You focus on blaming the PROCESS, NEVER the PEOPLE … people are almost NEVER to blame anyway, the processes fail. By getting everyone focused on fixing the process, you have 100% of your team working on the potential solution. Threatening to kick ass only STOPS the team dynamics dead in their tracks. Also when you speak about going to “kick ass” … you are admitting you don’t understand the underlying process that failed. I knew he was a rookie at this stuff (I always feared the 3am call would come … and it did!).
My advice to BP … pass out ear plugs to cut down on this administration’s “white noise” so you don’t defocus the team.
These well-meaning ideologues are dangerous to the USA! All they know how to do is “blame” … they have NO IDEAS to solve this problem. So my advice to this administration… lead, shut up or just get out of the way! My advice to voters … for your own well-being stop following the “latest” Pied Piper and start doing your homework to UNDERSTAND what is happening around you! You are going to get one last chance to “Corexit” (Correct it) this coming November … educate yourself before you vote this time! No more Pied Pipers!
Latest Updates
UPDATE: Bacteria Have Consumed Oil Plumes, Scientists Say (ABC – 08.01.10)
Where could the undersea oil have gone? Today, many scientists across the Gulf Coast pointed to the same explanation — deep sea bacteria called psychrophiles that have consumed the oil faster than anyone expected. The bacteria occur naturally in the waters of the Gulf, and when there’s more oil present, they multiply to eat it.
“When a large amount of oil comes into the environment, then they quickly muster, if you will, and they can sometimes grow to 1,000-fold,” said Jay Grimes, a professor of microbiology at the University of Southern Mississippi.
“They’ve been there for millions of years because of the fact that, for millions of years, we’ve had a large amount of natural oil seeping into the floor of the ocean,” Grimes added.
UPDATE FROM ABC NEWS 07.26.10: For 86 days, oil spewed into the Gulf of Mexico from BP’s damaged well, dumping some 200 million gallons of crude into sensitive ecosystems. BP and the federal government have amassed an army to clean the oil up, but there’s one problem — they’re having trouble finding it.
Today, ABC News surveyed a marsh area and found none, and even on a flight out to the rig site Sunday with the Coast Guard, there was no oil to be seen. The numbers don’t lie: two weeks ago, skimmers picked up about 25,000 barrels of oily water. Last Thursday, they gathered just 200 barrels. Still, it doesn’t mean that all the oil that gushed for weeks is gone. Thousands of small oil patches remain below the surface, but experts say an astonishing amount has disappeared, reabsorbed into the environment. “[It's] mother nature doing her job,” said Ed Overton, a professor of environmental studies at Louisiana State University.
UPDATE FROM WASHINGTON POST 07.27.10 - Oil from the BP blowout is degrading rapidly in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico and becoming increasingly difficult to find on the water surface, the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Tuesday. “The light crude oil is biodegrading quickly,” NOAA director Jane Lubchenco said during the response team daily briefing. “We know that a significant amount of the oil has dispersed and been biodegraded by naturally occurring bacteria.”
“The sheer volume of oil that’s out there has to mean there are some pretty significant impacts,” she said. “What we have yet to determine is the full impact the oil will have not just on the shoreline, not just on wildlife, but beneath the surface.” But much of the oil appears to have been broken down into tiny, microscopic particles that are being consumed by bacteria. Little or none of the oil is on seafloor, she said, but is instead floating in the gulf waters.
UPDATE from Fox News 08.24.10 : A newly discovered type of oil-eating microbe is suddenly flourishing in the Gulf of Mexico. Scientists discovered the new microbe while studying the underwater dispersion of millions of gallons of oil spilled into the Gulf following the explosion of BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig. And the microbe works without significantly depleting oxygen in the water, researchers led by Terry Hazen at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., reported Tuesday in the online journal Sciencexpress. “Our findings, which provide the first data ever on microbial activity from a deepwater dispersed oil plume, suggest” a great potential for bacteria to help dispose of oil plumes in the deep-sea, Hazen said in a statement.
Now they cannot find the Crude … it has disappeared … I’ll be darned!
Told you so! (Don’t doubt me!)
Relevant Posts after this post
- Deepwater Horizon Dispersant Use Meeting (pdf of meeting notes) 06.11.10
- NOAA reports underwater oil cloud (Oil&GasJrnl 06.24.10)
- Where did all the oil go? (They can’t find it!) (07.26.10)
- Oil in gulf is degrading, becoming harder to find (07.26.10)
- Mighty oil-eating microbes clean up gulf (07.27.10) (Duh, no kidding!)
- ABC: Oil plumes eaten by bacteria, Seafood testing “safe” to eat (08.01.10)
Look at how the NYT’s discusses the dispersants:
The dispersants contributed to “a toxic stew of chemicals, oil and gas, with impacts that are not well understood,” Representative Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, the Democratic chairman of the House Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, wrote in a letter sent late Friday to Thad W. Allen, the retired Coast Guard admiral who is leading the federal response to the oil spill.
“toxic stew … impacts not understood” … What the HELL do you think raw crude is? It is a TOXIC stew! So let’s just let it remain floating around on the gulf until it lands in some marsh or some beach then bitch about it! “Not well understood?” … they’ve been using dispersants for this for 20 years WITH NO ILL AFFECTS EVER reported. Yet this “POLITICIAN” is an expert on science. What a load of bull and waste of ink on the part of the NYTs … but what’s new with that crowd!
Doubt me? PROVE the toxicity, don’t create an unsubstantiated “rumor” … prove it or shut the hell up!