Harry, Here is the difference between theory and reality. (below)    These
fools theorized until they hit a wall.   When they hit the wall it said that
they could go no further in stripping the safety protocol from their wells
for profit.   Up until that point they had permission from their
stockholders to proceed.   

The social contract is that they will do what is necessary to protect people
and the environment.   

The economic contract is that every cent that is spent for safety is theft
from the stockholders.   

Don't argue with me.   They've said this themselves.   Reality is the world.
These folks are in theories.   The most absurd comment is that the bible is
reality and evolution is a theory rather than theoretical process.   They
and you have so confused reality with myth that there is no place to begin.
It's just strange and has been for 500 hundred years of dialogue. 

REH

October 28, 2010
Panel Says Firms Knew of Cement Flaws Before Spill
By JOHN M. BRODER

WASHINGTON - Halliburton officials knew weeks before the fatal explosion of
the BP well in the Gulf of Mexico that the cement mixture they planned to
use to seal the bottom of the well was unstable but still went ahead with
the job, the presidential commission investigating the accident said on
Thursday.

In the first official finding of responsibility for the blowout, which
killed 11 workers and led to the biggest offshore oil spill in American
history, the commission staff determined that Halliburton had conducted
three laboratory tests that indicated that the cement mixture did not meet
industry standards.

The result of at least one of those tests was given on March 8 to BP, which
failed to act upon it, the panel's lead investigator, Fred H. Bartlit Jr.,
said in a letter delivered to the commissioners on Thursday. "There is no
indication that Halliburton highlighted to BP the significance of the foam
stability data or that BP personnel raised any questions about it," Mr.
Bartlit said in his report.

Another Halliburton cement test, carried out about a week before the blowout
of the well on April 20, also found the mixture to be unstable, meaning it
was unlikely to set properly in the well, but those findings were never sent
to BP, Mr. Bartlit found after reviewing previously undisclosed documents.

Although Mr. Bartlit did not specifically identify the cement failure as the
sole or even primary cause of the blowout, he made clear in his letter that
if the cement had done its job and kept the highly pressurized oil and gas
out of the well bore, there would have been no accident.

"We have known for some time that the cement used to secure the production
casing and isolate the hydrocarbon zone at the bottom of the Macondo well
must have failed in some manner," he said in his letter to the seven members
of the presidential commission. "The cement should have prevented
hydrocarbons from entering the well."

The failure of the cement set off a complex and ultimately deadly cascade of
events as oil and gas exploded upward from the 18,000-foot-deep well. The
blowout preventer, which sits on the ocean floor atop a well and is supposed
to contain a well bore breach, also failed.

In an internal investigation, BP identified the faulty cement job as one of
the main factors contributing to the accident and blamed Halliburton, the
cementing contractor on the Macondo well, as the responsible party.
Halliburton has said repeatedly in public testimony that it tested and used
a proper cement formula and that BP's flawed well design and poor operations
caused the disaster.

Jesse Gagliano, a Halliburton technical adviser, told federal investigators
in Houston in August that the company was confident in the cement job and
said that BP's decision to use six well-stabilizing devices known as
centralizers contributed to the failure of the cement work.

Another Halliburton official, Thomas Roth, told a National Academy of
Engineering panel last month that Halliburton's cement met industry
standards and that it had been successfully used at more than 1,000 other
wells. Mr. Roth said BP ignored "multiple red flags" in the drilling and
completion of the well.

The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig was operated by a third company,
Transocean.

Cathy Mann, a Halliburton spokeswoman, said the company was reviewing the
panel's findings. A BP spokesman said the company would have no comment.

Halliburton, a major oil field services company and one of the nation's
largest defense contractors, was once led by former Vice President Dick
Cheney. Mr. Bartlit's law firm, Bartlit Beck Herman Palenchar & Scott, has
done legal work for Halliburton in the past but has not represented the
company since 2005, the firm said.

The commission obtained from Halliburton samples of the same cement recipe
used on the failed well, including the same proportion of nitrogen used as a
leavening agent and a number of proprietary chemicals used to stabilize the
mixture. The cement slurry was sent to a laboratory owned by Chevron for
independent testing.

Chevron conducted nine separate stability tests designed to reproduce
conditions at the BP well and the cement failed them all, the staff report
said.

"Although laboratory foam stability tests cannot replicate field conditions
perfectly," Mr. Bartlit's letter said, "these data strongly suggest that the
foam cement used at Macondo was unstable."

One and a half gallons of the actual mixture used on the doomed BP well
survived the accident and are being held as evidence in continuing criminal
and civil investigations.

Shortly before technicians began pumping cement slurry down the well on
April 19, Halliburton conducted one last test of the mixture. The company
changed some of the conditions of the test and appeared satisfied with the
result, although those findings were not communicated to BP until after the
well explosion, the commission found.

The commission concluded, "Halliburton may not have had - and BP did not
have - the results of that test before the evening of April 19, meaning that
the cement job may have been pumped without any lab results indicating that
the foam cement slurry would be stable."

Further, the panel found, "Halliburton and BP both had results in March
showing that a very similar foam slurry design to the one actually pumped at
the Macondo well would be unstable, but neither acted upon that data."

The commission, appointed by President Obama in late May, is led by Bob
Graham, the former senator and governor of Florida, and William K. Reilly, a
former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. The commission
is scheduled to present its interim findings on the cause of the accident on
Nov. 8-9 and its final report to the president in mid-January. It released
this report early, it said, because other wells may be planning to use
similarly flawed cement.

Mr. Bartlit, who conducted a much-praised investigation of the 1988 Piper
Alpha blowout in the North Sea off Britain that killed 167 workers, said the
flawed cement was not the whole story. Many human and mechanical failures
combined to create the disaster, he said, and backup procedures were skipped
or ignored.

"Because it may be anticipated that a particular cement job may be faulty,
the oil industry has developed tests, such as the negative pressure test and
cement evaluation logs, to identify cementing failures," he wrote. "It has
also developed methods to remedy deficient cement jobs. BP and/or Transocean
personnel misinterpreted or chose not to conduct such tests at the Macondo
well."

In its internal investigation, BP said that after a conference call on the
morning of April 20 with BP personnel and its contractors on the well, the
BP team decided not to conduct a cement evaluation log. The investigation
said that in relying on other types of assessments rather than logging, the
team ignored BP's own guidelines for evaluating cement.

Robbie Brown contributed reporting from Columbia, S.C., and Henry Fountain
from New York.

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ray Harrell
Sent: Thursday, October 28, 2010 3:19 PM
To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Back cover blurb

I believe Mike did that very well. 

REH

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Harry Pollard
Sent: Thursday, October 28, 2010 12:26 PM
To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Back cover blurb

Ray,

Perhaps you can explain to me why my "land theories" have little connection
to reality.

Harry

********************************
Henry George School of Los Angeles
Box 655
Tujunga  CA  9104
818 352-4141
********************************

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ray Harrell
Sent: Tuesday, October 26, 2010 1:39 PM
To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION'
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Back cover blurb

Actually, it's all a form of Feudalism.   With the same aristocratic model
that ruled all of Europe for centuries as families.   They had middle
people.  Burghers and they had serfs.   The system isn't new, it's just
rehashed.

As for Predator / Producer.  That's a specious European argument that bears
as little connection to reality as Harry's land theories and Keith's
comparative advantage.    There is a better way but I suspect the world is
at least a couple of thousand years away from being mature enough to do it.
By that time it will be too late because they will have devoured the place.
The only intelligence by that time will be mineral.

Oops!  you roped me in.

I have to do other things but thank you for the comment even though I
trashed it.

REH

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Christoph Reuss
Sent: Tuesday, October 26, 2010 2:51 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Back cover blurb

REH wrote:
> Winners and losers
> Christians and Atheists
> Capitalists and Communists

These are false dichotomies to divide Producers, pit them against each
other, and waste their energies and time with endless false battles (or
reading misleading nonsense in the NYT etc.).

The dichotomy that matters is:  Producers and Predators.
(NOT a binary dichotomy, but opposing characteristics)

Btw, "communism" is state capitalism!

Chris




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword
"igve".


_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework

_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework



_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework

_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework

_______________________________________________
Futurework mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework

Reply via email to