Do not buy BP gas.

The problem is the leak is one mile down. Pressures at that depth are 2,227 psi. If this leak had occurred in 200 ft of water it would have been fixed in three to five days with human divers instead of remote controlled robots.

We are in uncharted and untested territory when your dealing at those depths.

BP had to drill at those depths because they were unable to drill closer to shore in shallower waters due to U.S. environmental regulations and concerns.

This mess is due to the Environmentalists, BP taking short cuts, and incompetent Government regulators who were tasked to look out for us. These Government regulators were accepting gifts from BP to look the other way concerning the enforcement of federal regulations.

 

In a perfect world, there would never be an oil spill.
In a perfect world, we would not be so dependent upon oil (or foreign oil).
In a perfect world, there would not be people streaming across our borders with an arrogant disregard for our laws and values.
In a perfect world, government could spend an unlimited amount of money without any financial consequences.
In a perfect world, there would not be a global food shortage.
In a perfect world, wars would be a thing of the past.

Unfortunately, we do not live in a perfect world.
As individuals, we can vote with our pocketbooks.
As individuals, we can vote for elected officials that are realistic about what can and should be done, rather than voting for individuals that just tell you what you want to hear.

Keith

P.S. Sorry - I guess that I forgot to take my medication, again.

 

I sort of disagree with this from this standpoint. Seems to me that drilling a well at a mile down doesn't happen casually. If a company, or a government wants to allow this to happen, and wants to profit from the benefits of the potential results of this action, then the potential disaster scenario cannot be allowed to be an uncharted or untested scenario. The oil companies cannot default to the simple position that it's hard to fix...or that the odds of what happened happening are extremely low..all which might be true..but should not be accepted by the government, the oil companies or the public.

Blaming an inability or failure to have a plan to deal with this outcome on "Enviromentalists" because they didn't allow poor oil companies to simply drill closer to shore in shallower waters...sounds like BS to me.

Whatever the depth, or whatever the water pressure it's the responsibilty of the people putting the enviroment at risk to have plans contingent to deal with minimizing the risk and impact. They obviously did not...and now trying to spin this as somehow the fault of enviromentalists....is hog wash. In my opinion.

 

Nothing is too great. We just lack the financial and political will. If we were to move away from oil aggressively our economy would be impacted, but it would adjust. Our lifestyle would be impacted, but we would adjust. At some point we will have to pay the price. All we are doing is deferring these costs to our children and grandchildren.

 

Jesse Jackson and those that would follow a BP boycott should examine who this ill hurt. Did you ever think that who it will hurt immediately is the local BP retailer, his employees, the local economy, and ultimately you. This is a boycott proposal that does not work.

 

Sometimes I champion admittedly imperfect idealism. Why? Because sometimes the crap gets too deep and you just have to do something to let the powers that be know that you're awake.

Yes, a boycott hurts a lot of people. It hurts a lot of people that have nothing to do with the political choices of a government, or the financial choices of a huge oil company, or even the reality of a oil leak at the bottom of the sea.

But I'm for a limited boycott even knowing the reality that it isn't perfect if only to send a message across the board. This isn't acceptable, we (the people) are upset. If that turns into a NO BP for a week slightly miss-aimed, mostly symbolic protest? I still think it's beneficial and necessary.

 

I agree with you 1000%. I wish there were a forum for SUV's and 4X4 trucks. A boycott by those drivers woud have a greater impact than Prius folks, but every little bit helps!

 

I thought "Bee-Pee" was environmentally friendly - guess not.

This might have happened sooner or later, but BP's safety record made sure it was sooner....per 60 minutes they ignored enough procedures that guaranteed they would lose at Russian Roulette.

 

This is an ill conceived idea, in reality it would mean nothing, and it would simply hurt employees, many of them Americans. Watch the video of Phillipe Cousteau in this article, especially at 5:30 into it, kind of explains the whole oil deal.
Phillippe Cousteau To Bill Maher: Even Before Oil Spill, The Oceans Couldn't Take Any More (VIDEO)

 

You're a damn idiot. Do some research on the issue. The gas stations, for the most part, are privately owned. You are hurting the mom and pop owners, not the corporation. Secondly, if I'm not mistaken, the government called for more drilling in the Gulf. Stop acting like BP did something illegal. Yes, the issue is dire but I wouldn't put all the blame on BP... fixing a leak 5280ft below the surface is quite difficult.

Hindsight is 20/20.

 

I feel BP has made a weak effort to stop the leak but I don't think they realized, either that this could happen, or it would be so difficult to fix. The real character test will be how they respond after the leak is stopped. I have no doubt that companies can drill safely if they make it their first priority. People talk about us having to make a lifestyle change. It's not as much the people as it is the auto manufacturers. The manufacturers need to produce vehicles that use less oil or run on batteries longer. The Prius is a good example; you see those cars every where. If they build the right vehicles people will flock to them. I know, I own one, and I love saving gas. If they made a car that got 100mpg I would buy that instead. This is how you do it, slowly and smartly. Gas is low enough that people can still drive their SUVs on the weekends but use the ones that save energy to commute with. If the companies build them right people will naturally buy them and our oil consumption will go down. I heard there is a waiting list for a Volt. This an American car company with a first year product and yet people are on a list to get one. Remember when the pollution devices came out on cars in the 70's? People were upset because converters robbed power. Now the cars of today out perform those cars and they do it with less pollution. I don't mind having that equipment on my car. The technology has to improve without sacrificing comfort or performance. If they can do that, people will cast aside their gas guzzlers.

 

It doesn't really matter your warm fuzzies for beyond petroleum, but whether they should have a contingency plan for something every one thought might happen - a leak of a deep water well. To BP's benefit it seems that none of the big drillers had a plan, but that has nothing to do with them not thinking it might happen. They just didn't want to spend the money to plan for it.

If you want to destroy those warm fuzzy feelings, look at the bp explosion in texas city, or the pipeline leak, and you will quickly see how much they really care. To be fair, this is far from the beginning of bp, when it was the british government owned company that stole the oil from iran, then was mainly responsible to get a the british government to get us government help to overthrow the iranian democracy because they thought it was their oil. Don't look at their early history of human rights violations, they have many fewer human rights problems today.

They responded to previous environmental and safety problems with PR campaigns and campaign contributions. I would expect similar here, but they will spend billions to partially clean up. Oil is necessary and so is drilling. But why must we drill without contingency plans, and why are maximum fines for safety violations so low? Oil is fungable. There is no reason to do deep water drilling until safety plans are in place.

 

I have noticed that a lot of former BP stations have changed their franchises recently.

I do business there now. I think Mom & Pop are getting pissed too...

 

BP is big enough that if they (and all their production capacity) disappeared overnight there would be a serious supply constraint. Even with a Prius you would be standing in line for your fuel ration.

The only potential hook we have is the political will to force them through regulation, oversight, and permitting to change their culture of dangerous shortcuts.

 

You guys are all a bunch of wimps. For a disaster of this magnitude, public executions would be appropriate! The executive staff of BP should be lined-up along the west side of the White House and publicly shot. Or better yet, boil them in oil. Now for every day that the oil well continues to leak, another 2 BP executives and 1 BP lawyer should be boiled. That will teach them that nothing less than perfection is acceptable.

Keith

 

Sorry I disagree. It is premature and irresponsible to judge before all the facts are in and analyzed. I highly doubt anyone here has access to the complete set of facts. Remember innocent until proven guilty?

This tragedy has already cost plenty a premature rush to judgement will only raise the costs higher as will the loss of BP in our market. Obama's premature moratorium upon offshore drilling has throw a good part of the economy in the Gulf region into disarray as well as putting thousands out of work.

That being said punitive damages, fines and jail for negligence and if gross negligence then hoist the bastards on their own petard's, a sentence of oily seafood and water to consume and oily water to bathe in until the Gulf is cleansed or a life sentence. I rather think we'll find this whole affair is part accident with enough blame sprinkled in enough places as to boggle the best legal minds we can muster.

 

You accomplish nothing by boycotting BP gas stations. You accomplish fantastic things if you can come up with a way of buying NO gas.

 

You misread the information Orca. That is what I understood after the first article I read but after more research they had finally reached the oil and were "shutting it down" so that oil could be extracted. They had finally finished. There are many good articles I found at rigzone.com. Also on 60 minutes there was a good segment with a worker from the rig giving his account. BP execs were rushing the workers to finish because the well was costing them too much money as it had went far, far beyond the deadline they had originally set. As we can see this is a well that would have had a huge payload. Unfortunately it's all going into the ocean.

 

Boycott BP by buying a Tesla. I believe they are available for immediate delivery.