| Posted on June 11, 2010 at 10:23 AM | 
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The ongoing catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico involving the oil leak that has resulted from the tragedy of the explosion on the BP Deepwater Horizon platform is a glaring example of our increasing need to move away from fossil fuel sources. Not only is the environmental and economic impact of this terrible crisis immense in size but the lasting legacy is likely to be even greater.
The environmental impact will be huge – the damage to the ecology and marine life in the Gulf of Mexico will be devastating. One can only hope that BP and the US Federal Government fulfils its promise to provide extensive support for the clean-up operation and that Mother Nature intervenes, as seen with the MV Braer spill near Shetland in 1993, and helps overcome the oil with some stormy weather.
The damage to the reputation of BP, a previously blue chip company, particularly in the USA, will no doubt leaving lasting harm to their all-important share price but this pales in comparison to the devastation left by the oil spill across the southern coast of the USA. No doubt there will be ongoing coverage of the impact on sea life and National Geographic and Discovery Channel will have a field day.
What this tragedy also illustrates is a lack of preparation for the ‘what if…’ scenarios that might present themselves during heavy industry activity such as this, particularly that which involves such potentially hazardous material extraction located close to such environmentally significant locations. The importance seems to have been placed on getting the oil out of the ground and generating revenue more than planning for any worst-case situations. Hopefully the solution to the spill can be propagated throughout the world to help stop any future oil leaks having a similar impact.
People may have issues with wind farms or other green technologies but if a turbine stops working it doesn’t devastate local communities or hundreds of miles of coastline….it stops working, sends a signal to a monitoring system that it has faulted and an engineering team is dispatched.
(Image courtesy of BBC website and NASA)
The environmental impact will be huge – the damage to the ecology and marine life in the Gulf of Mexico will be devastating. One can only hope that BP and the US Federal Government fulfils its promise to provide extensive support for the clean-up operation and that Mother Nature intervenes, as seen with the MV Braer spill near Shetland in 1993, and helps overcome the oil with some stormy weather.
The damage to the reputation of BP, a previously blue chip company, particularly in the USA, will no doubt leaving lasting harm to their all-important share price but this pales in comparison to the devastation left by the oil spill across the southern coast of the USA. No doubt there will be ongoing coverage of the impact on sea life and National Geographic and Discovery Channel will have a field day.
What this tragedy also illustrates is a lack of preparation for the ‘what if…’ scenarios that might present themselves during heavy industry activity such as this, particularly that which involves such potentially hazardous material extraction located close to such environmentally significant locations. The importance seems to have been placed on getting the oil out of the ground and generating revenue more than planning for any worst-case situations. Hopefully the solution to the spill can be propagated throughout the world to help stop any future oil leaks having a similar impact.
People may have issues with wind farms or other green technologies but if a turbine stops working it doesn’t devastate local communities or hundreds of miles of coastline….it stops working, sends a signal to a monitoring system that it has faulted and an engineering team is dispatched.
(Image courtesy of BBC website and NASA)
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