Scientists Tussle Over Gulf Oil Tally

[LTX]

August 17, 2010, 6:24 pm
By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF

When the Obama administration released scientific findings early this month estimating that roughly three-quarters of the oil from the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico had been captured, burned, dispersed, evaporated, degraded or dissolved in the water, a number of independent scientists cried foul, describing the report as premature and suggesting that it was portraying the ecological impact of the spill in an unduly rosy light.

Now, a team of Georgia researchers has codified that dissent, using the government’s own data to craft a report estimating that as much as 79 percent of the oil spilled from the Deepwater Horizon well in fact remains at large in the Gulf of Mexico, where it still poses a threat to the marine ecosystem.

The estimates, by researchers with the University of Georgia and Georgia Sea Grant, are difficult to contrast with those in the federal report as they do not take into account the roughly 800,000 barrels of oil captured by BP directly at the wellhead. And the Georgia report, unlike the federal analysis, was not subject to peer review.

. . . . .

Other marine scientists involved in evaluating the impact of the spill defended the government’s findings. “I generally agreed with the results,” said Edward Overton, a biologist at Louisiana State University who was one of several scientists who reviewed the federal study prior to its release. “I think it’s close to being on the mark.”

Dr. Overton also said the rate of natural breakdown of the oil by bacteria estimated by the Georgia researchers was too pessimistic.

“The thing that surprised me from their report was the amount of biodegradation,” he said. “It was just an insignificant number.”

Close to shore, these bacteria appear to be degrading oil at a rate even faster than the federal report had estimated, Dr. Overton said. “Personally I think things are going in the right direction very, very quickly,” he said.

A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration spokesman said the agency stood by its findings.



http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/tussle-over-gulf-oil-tally-drags-on/

[flyarm]

1. The NYT does not ask Dr. Overton if he has taken money from BP or from our government.

See , BP went on a buying spree of Scientists ( and yes even from major and minor universities in the Gulf region!) through out the country and most notably the Gulf Region, as well as Lawyers.

I'll believe the independent Scientists, thank you very much.

[Poboy]

8. Overton is dirty! That SOB minimizes damage for his OIL buddies/paymasters.

[LTX]

13. Just a little recreational slander?

This is precisely the kind of juvenile nonsense that adds nothing to discussion.

[LTX]

12. "Belief" really has nothing to do with the topic.

There are competing views of the Gulf spill status. There is nothing to indicate that the competing views were reached in bad faith (though that seems to be the prevailing method for comparing the two views around here - i.e, I "believe" the scientists that I disagree with are liars). I have no reason to question the integrity of either the University of Georgia researchers or Dr. Overton. Overton's work at LSU, and the LSU Gulf resource center, have an impressive history that long predates the recent spill, and there is no reason for him or the research facility to jeopardize their research record by "doctoring" an outcome (as you clearly, and I think improperly, suggest they have):

http://www.gulfbase.org/person/view.php?uid=eoverton

http://www.lsu.edu/pa/mediacenter/tipsheets/oilspill.shtml

What I do know is that the recent report from the University of Georgia researchers at the Georgia Sea Grant (http://uga.edu/aboutUGA/joye_pkit/GeorgiaSeaGrant_OilSpillReport8-16.pdf) has not yet been subjected to peer review, and that there are scientists who view its estimates as unduly pessimistic and not inclusive of all captured oil.

What I also know is that the spill had localized effects in the Gulf, and that the scientific debates about oil settlement and potential toxicity are focused on the northeastern Gulf region that suffered the direct impact. It dismays me to see a persistent implication around here that the entire Gulf has been "poisoned," and that all Gulf fisheries, even those unaffected by the spill, must consequently be avoided.

[flyarm]

21. I agree to a point in your opinion but where i disagree is ..we don't know who all the peers were in

the peer review and we don't know if all or any of the so called Peers were the ones bought off by BP and NOAA!

And that is not disclosed in the NYT article..it would be nice if the NYT would disclose any ties ($$$ or other ) of the peers to BP or NOAA!

you may "trust" BP and NOAA..but many many many of us on the Gulf do not..they have lied about everything from the get go! They have not told the truth about a damn thing!

Nor has the EPA!

I certainly would not trust the health or enviornment of my children and grandchildren to BP, NOAA nor the EPA, nor this Peer review.

They have given none of us on the Gulf any reason to trust them or believe them. Not a damn thing!

[flyarm]

2. Plumes of Gulf oil spreading east on sea floor

Plumes of Gulf oil spreading east on sea floor
Plumes of Gulf oil spreading east on sea floor
Source: CNN

CNN) -- A new report set to be released Tuesday renews concerns about the long-term environmental impact of the Gulf Coast oil disaster, and efforts to permanently plug the ruptured BP oil well have been delayed again.

Researchers at the University of South Florida have concluded that oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill may have settled to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico further east than previously suspected -- and at levels toxic to marine life.

Initial findings from a new survey of the Gulf conclude that dispersants may have sent droplets of crude to the ocean floor, where it has turned up at the bottom of an undersea canyon within 40 miles of the Florida Panhandle. The results are scheduled to be released Tuesday, but CNN obtained a summary of the initial conclusions Monday night.

Plankton and other organisms at the base of the food chain showed a "strong toxic response" to the crude, and the oil could well up onto the continental shelf and resurface later, according to researchers


Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/08/17/gulf.oil.disaster /...

[flyarm]

3. Reports Sharply Contradict Claims About Vanished Oil

Reports Sharply Contradict Claims About Vanished Oil

(Aug. 17) -- Two new reports from different groups of academic scientists are providing a counterweight to the government's rosy assertions that the Gulf of Mexico oil spill crisis is drawing to a close. One says that as much as 79 percent of the oil is still loose in the gulf; the other expresses the fear that oil on the ocean floor may not stay there but could resurface at a later time.

Researchers at the University of Georgia announced Monday that between 70 and 79 percent of the oil and its toxic byproducts are still present under the surface of the gulf. That finding stands in stark contrast to the calculations released by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists during the first week of August, which say that only 26 percent of the spilled crude remains after the rest of it was collected or dispersed or naturally evaporated or dissolved.



The major dividing line between the government's and UGA's estimates (both are based on imperfect information, The Wall Street Journal points out) rests on the oil in those last two categories.

"One major misconception is that oil that has dissolved into water is gone and, therefore, harmless," UGA marine scientist Charles Hopkinson told the Journal. "The oil is still out there, and it will likely take years to completely degrade."

The UGA report adds that all the dissolved oil could not have evaporated because large plumes of oil exist under the ocean's surface. Only oil on the surface can evaporate into the atmosphere.

http://www.aolnews.com/article/reports-79-of-bp-oil-sti... |htmlws-main-w|dl1|link6|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolnews.com%2Farticle%2Freports-79-of-bp-oil-still-on-loose-in-gulf-could-resurface-l%2F19596811

[flyarm]

4. hey NYT it is not Just Georgia researchers..Florida's as well!

Researchers at the University of South Florida to be exact!

That are experts in the field of research on the Gulf!

[SidDithers]

5. Peer-reviewed science is usually better than non-reviewed science...nt

Sid

[flyarm]

6. unless they are already owned by BP!

Chris Kromm: Blacklash Grows Against BP Efforts to "Buy Up" Gulf ...Jul 30, 2010 ... BP's efforts to "buy up" scientists in Gulf states was first revealed by ... BP attempted to hire the entire Marine Science Department at the University .... http://just-me-in-t.blogspot.com/2010/07/whats-for-dinner.html ...
www.huffingtonpost.com/.../blacklash-grows-against-b_b_665621.html - Cached

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://coto2.wordpress.com/2010/07/18/bp-and-noaa-buy-scientific-silence/

BP and NOAA buy scientific silence

By Ben Raines
Press-Register

BP has been offering signing bonuses and lucrative pay to prominent scientists from public universities around the Gulf Coast with contracts that ban them from publishing their research. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is offering a similarly restrictive contract according to scientists, refusing to provide the media with a copy of its contract, reports Ben Raines.

For the last few weeks, BP has been offering signing bonuses and lucrative pay to prominent scientists from public universities around the Gulf Coast to aid its defense against spill litigation. BP PLC attempted to hire the entire marine sciences department at one Alabama university, according to scientists involved in discussions with the company’s lawyers. The university declined because of confidentiality restrictions that the company sought on any research.

The Press-Register obtained a copy of a contract offered to scientists by BP. It prohibits the scientists from publishing their research, sharing it with other scientists or speaking about the data that they collect for at least the next three years.


go ahead google it up yourself...I dare you........google this up.......

BP buys up scientists int he Gulf of Mexico


Seems you have a vested interest in stopping the flow of Info as well??????

[flyarm]

10. Peer review you say? What peers have been paid off and what ones haven't?

can't fool those of us on the Gulf..we have been dealing with the paid off pigs and owned pigs from the get go.

You may be fooled?( ha! I made myself laugh) or one of the owned?

But I live on the Gulf..I can't be bought..the safety of Americans is too damn important to me..sorry it isn't to you!

And if this is some pathetic game to you..I could only wish you the same medical disasters awaiting those of us on the Gulf and throughout this nation who ingest the seafood or breathe the toxins that have been forced on us On the Gulf by BP and our government!

This is not a game!

[flyarm]

7. From the St Petersburg Times , just this morning..........

USF scientists find evidence that oil spill damaging critical marine life
St. Petersburg TImes

By Craig Pittman, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Wednesday, August 18, 2010

ST. PETERSBURG — The oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster is still in the Gulf of Mexico and is causing ecological damage, according to new findings from the University of South Florida.

USF marine scientists conducting experiments in an area where they previously found clouds of oil have now discovered what appears to be oil in sediment of a vital underwater canyon and evidence that the oil has become toxic to critical marine organisms, the college reported Tuesday.

In preliminary results, the scientists aboard the Weatherbird II discovered that oil droplets are distributed on the gulf's marine sediment in the DeSoto Canyon, a critical spawning ground for commercially important fish species.

Laboratory tests conducted aboard the ship on the effects of oil have found that phytoplankton — the microscopic plants that make up the basis of the gulf's food web — and bacteria have been negatively affected by surface and subsurface oil.

The Weatherbird II, carrying 14 researchers and six crew members, returned to St. Petersburg on Monday from a 10-day research venture. The findings reported Tuesday must be verified in lab tests.

[flyarm]

9. and from the Miami Herald yesterday.............

Study: Gulf oil spill still a threat to seafood safety
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/16/v-fullstory/1778984/study-gulf-spill-still-a-seafood.html#ixzz0wyB2arX8

BY FRED TASKER
[e-mail]
The Gulf of Mexico oil spill still poses threats to human health and seafood safety, according to a study published Monday by the peer-reviewed Journal of the American Medical Association.

The report comes two days after President Obama and members of his family swam in the Gulf at Panama City Beach and ate fish caught there, and hours after this year's commercial shrimping season officially kicked off along the Louisiana coast.

Federal officials disputed the new report and said ongoing testing is aggressive and sufficient to protect public health.

In the short term, study co-author Gina Solomon voiced greatest concern for shrimp, oysters, crabs and other invertebrates she says are have difficulty clearing their systems of dangerous polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) similar to those found in cigarette smoke and soot. Solomon is an MD and public health expert in the department of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco.

In the longer term, she expressed worries about big fin fish such as tuna, swordfish and mackerel, saying levels of mercury from the oil might slowly increase over time by being consumed by fish lower in the food chain and becoming concentrating in the larger fish.

As time goes on, she said, doctors may be warning pregnant women and children to strictly limit the amount of such fish they eat. Some of the fish had relatively high levels of mercury even before the oil spill, she said.

``It's like iron filings to a magnet,'' she said. ``Several years from now the concentration will go up in fish at the top of the food chain -- tuna, mackerel, swordfish.''

[flyarm]

11. some people around these parts are working very hard to keep the truth from the American people..K&R

K&R this thread if you care about both the Gulf and the ramificiations of toxic fish and seafood to all Americans!! And if you care about what was once a magnificent Ocean!

[tnlefty]

14. I did for those reasons,

but mainly out of concern for the folks who live on the Gulf trying to fight back against the noise machine and trying to live through this. :thumbsup:

I often get the sick feeling that the Gulf residents will soon be forgotten.

[SidDithers]

15. K&R this thread if you agree the Georgia study is flawed...

because it didn't include oil captured at the wellhead, and underestimates biodegration.

Sid

Edit: that's why I recc'd it. Because it seems to be a balanced article that points out the shortcomings of the Georgia study.

[flyarm]

16. how about Kicking this for the American Medical Association!!!!!!!!

Study: Gulf oil spill still a threat to seafood safety
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/16/v-fullstory/17789...

BY FRED TASKER
[e-mail]
The Gulf of Mexico oil spill still poses threats to human health and seafood safety, according to a study published Monday by the peer-reviewed Journal of the American Medical Association.

The report comes two days after President Obama and members of his family swam in the Gulf at Panama City Beach and ate fish caught there, and hours after this year's commercial shrimping season officially kicked off along the Louisiana coast.

Federal officials disputed the new report and said ongoing testing is aggressive and sufficient to protect public health.

In the short term, study co-author Gina Solomon voiced greatest concern for shrimp, oysters, crabs and other invertebrates she says are have difficulty clearing their systems of dangerous polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) similar to those found in cigarette smoke and soot. Solomon is an MD and public health expert in the department of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco.

In the longer term, she expressed worries about big fin fish such as tuna, swordfish and mackerel, saying levels of mercury from the oil might slowly increase over time by being consumed by fish lower in the food chain and becoming concentrating in the larger fish.

As time goes on, she said, doctors may be warning pregnant women and children to strictly limit the amount of such fish they eat. Some of the fish had relatively high levels of mercury even before the oil spill, she said.

``It's like iron filings to a magnet,'' she said. ``Several years from now the concentration will go up in fish at the top of the food chain -- tuna, mackerel, swordfish.''

[SidDithers]

18. Yeah, I read tthat when you posted it upthread...

how it validates the Georgia study, or invalidates the LSU one, I'm not sure.

But, as I've frequently posted, facts are good.

Sid

[flyarm]

17. How about the Plumes reported by Researchers at the University of South Florida

Plumes of Gulf oil spreading east on sea floor
Source: CNN

CNN) -- A new report set to be released Tuesday renews concerns about the long-term environmental impact of the Gulf Coast oil disaster, and efforts to permanently plug the ruptured BP oil well have been delayed again.

Researchers at the University of South Florida have concluded that oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill may have settled to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico further east than previously suspected -- and at levels toxic to marine life.

Initial findings from a new survey of the Gulf conclude that dispersants may have sent droplets of crude to the ocean floor, where it has turned up at the bottom of an undersea canyon within 40 miles of the Florida Panhandle. The results are scheduled to be released Tuesday, but CNN obtained a summary of the initial conclusions Monday night.

Plankton and other organisms at the base of the food chain showed a "strong toxic response" to the crude, and the oil could well up onto the continental shelf and resurface later, according to researchers


Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/08/17/gulf.oil.disaster /...

[SidDithers]

20. Yeah, I read that one upthread too...

thanks for reposting it, tho.

Sid

[flyarm]

23. did you read about the ties of BP to Obama poltical and campaign advisors?

Spill, Baby, Spill
By Michael Isikoff, Ian Yarett and Matthew Philips | NEWSWEEK
From the magazine issue dated May 10, 2010

BP has been trying hard to burnish its public image in recent years after being hit with a pair of environmental disasters, including a fatal refinery explosion in Texas and a pipeline leak in Alaska. One major step was to announce, in 2007, that it had hired a high-powered advisory board that included former EPA director Christine Todd Whitman, former Senate majority leader Tom Daschle, and Leon Panetta, who were each paid $120,000 a year. (Panetta left when he became President Obama's CIA director.) Two years ago the oil giant's chief executive, Robert Malone, flew board members out to the Gulf of Mexico on a helicopter to demonstrate the safeguards surrounding BP's advanced drilling technology. "We got a sense they were really committed to ensuring they got it right," Whitman told NEWSWEEK.

Now BP, formerly known as British Petroleum, finds itself blamed for what could prove to be the worst oil spill in U.S. history. And only weeks after Obama announced an ambitious plan to open up more U.S. offshore waters to oil drilling, shunting aside environmental concerns from his own Democratic Party, his administration is facing a comeuppance from hell. "There was a lot of wishful thinking, I guess," says Villy Kourafalou, a scientist at the University of Miami's Rosensteil School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. "The new technologies were said to be so wonderful that we'd never have an oil spill again." Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), who had sought to block the expanded drilling, says the oil and gas industry was pushing this idea hard. "They said, 'We'll never have a repeat of Santa Barbara,'?" referring to the 1969 rig explosion off the California coast. Both the Bush and Obama administrations "were buying the line that the technology was fine," Pallone adds.

BP pressed hard to make that point in D.C. Its PR efforts included payments of $16 million last year to a battery of Washington lobbyists, among them the firm of Tony Podesta, the brother of former Obama transition chief John Podesta. Last fall, after the U.S. Interior Department proposed tighter federal regulation of oil companies' environmental programs, David Rainey, BP's vice president for Gulf of Mexico exploration, told Congress that the proposal was unnecessary. "I think we need to remember," he said, that offshore drilling "has been going on for the last 50 years, and it has been going on in a way that is both safe and protective of the environment."

Read the full article at:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/237298

[SidDithers]

25. Are you saying the NOAA can't be trusted?...nt

Sid

[flyarm]

26. I am pointing to facts...you make your own judgement..I have made mine but they are my business.

do the damn research and make up your own mind.

That is , if you can.

I stand on the side of truth, the whole truth..and nothing but the truth..however truth can be uncomfortable to some..and it can be ugly sometimes! Damn ugly!

The causalities can be people's lives, if truth is withheld. The whole truth.

[LTX]

31. No, you cherry pick headlines and try to build conspiracy theories.

If you were actually interested in the data concerning the spill, you'd be looking at, and citing, the NOAA, UGA, and USF reports (and, by the way, USF has not, to my knowledge, released an analysis or report on their August 6 sampling).

And again, where do you live? I'm kind of curious.

[flyarm]

32. I don't cherry pick anything..it seems you do though and you try your damnest to obsure facts

and truth!

I posted articles..you can read them or not, many vindicated the reports and in some ways did not.

I left that for your own judgement.

I have my own. They are mine, due to my experience on the Gulf.

You are free to your own conclusions, and judgement. As I am.

I will ask you again ..( but i expect the same crickets ) ..do you live on the Gulf ? is it your back yard? what is your vested interest in stopping valid information? Because it is obvious you have a vested interest..albiet not the same as many who do live on the Gulf, and have had to breathe the toxic air or lose their livelyhood..people who won't compromise the health of others by selling toxic shellfood or fish and who won't put profit and payola ahead of truth!

I despise liars..i think liars who put peoples lives at risk are the most evil among us! And they know no shame!

Enjoy being only the 2nd person I have ever put on my ignore list!

[LTX]

33. Yes, I do live on the Gulf.

I live in Houston and New Orleans, splitting my time between the cities. My permanent residence is in Houston near Rice University, and I stay in an apartment near Tulane that my company keeps when I am in New Orleans. My company's clients range from Homa to Baton Rouge, New Iberia, Lafayette, Beaumont/Port Arthur, Galveston, Clear Lake and Houston. I have a direct and vested interest in the Gulf coast region, and I've never made any secret about it, or any secret about where I live.

You, on the other hand, seem to be full of self-righteousness, but little actual information. And I have no idea why you decided to put me on your ignore list. Perhaps my questions about where you actually live make you a little uneasy, or perhaps the citations to actual NOAA, UGA, and USF information centers and reports demand too much actual reading. Generic claims about being a Gulf coast resident, and headline mongering in pursuit of hysterical conspiracies, are easier, I suppose, if you don't have someone around asking questions.

[flyarm]

36. I was not replying to you, but you know that don't you?

Little information..have you read anything..anything I posted?

Little info????????

what world are you in?

You posted from the NYT..I posted from Gulf States news organizations.

Now who should I listen to, such a dilemma, a newspaper in NY City that helped lie us into 2 wars..or News from the gulf..let me see?????????

Let me contemplate that.............duh

Gee i lived in Dallas for 8 years..how are all those Oil boys doing in your neck of the woods??

[LTX]

37. Well, let's see,

Your post 32 was a reply to my post 31, and my post 33 was a reply to your post 32. So it sure looks like you were replying to me.

As for your information, you've posted the article from May, 2010 about about BP lobbying efforts, and the article about USF scientists allegedly being silenced by the NOAA -- several times each.

And you've ignored my posts 12 and 28. Do you have any issue with the NOAA/USF analysis of the Weatherbird II May 23-26 samples, and do view that analysis as largely consistent with the brief (and only) current synopsis of the Weatherbird II August 6 samples?

[LTX]

34. Oh, and by the way,

you never asked where I live until this post of yours, so I have no idea why you made the following statement: "I will ask you again ..(but i expect the same crickets ) ..do you live on the Gulf?"

As you may have noticed (depending upon whether you actually put me on ignore), I'm perfectly happy to say where I live. Why aren't you?

[flyarm]

35. wrong place delete

[G_j]

19. K&R

[flyarm]

22. USF says government tried to squelch their oil plume findings

USF says government tried to squelch their oil plume findings

http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/article1114225.ece

By Craig Pittman, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Tuesday, August 10, 2010


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



A month after the Deepwater Horizon disaster began, scientists from the University of South Florida made a startling announcement. They had found signs that the oil spewing from the well had formed a 6-mile-wide plume snaking along in the deepest recesses of the gulf.

The reaction that USF announcement received from the Coast Guard and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the federal agencies that sponsored their research:

Shut up.

"I got lambasted by the Coast Guard and NOAA when we said there was undersea oil," USF marine sciences dean William Hogarth said. Some officials even told him to retract USF's public announcement, he said, comparing it to being "beat up" by federal officials.

The USF scientists weren't alone. Vernon Asper, an oceanographer at the University of Southern Mississippi, was part of a similar effort that met with a similar reaction. "We expected that NOAA would be pleased because we found something very, very interesting," Asper said. "NOAA instead responded by trying to discredit us. It was just a shock to us."

NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco, in comments she made to reporters in May, expressed strong skepticism about the existence of undersea oil plumes — as did BP's then-CEO, Tony Hayward.

"She basically called us inept idiots," Asper said. "We took that very personally."


please read the entire article!!!!!!!!


and now we are supposed to believe these people from BP and NOAA and our overnment?????? yeah right..

and I bet many here didn't know Tom Daschle was on the payroll of BP along with Christine Whitman ( you know the lady who lied about the air quality at Ground Zero!) and the new head of our CIA..Leon Panetta!!

don't believe me ..believe your own eyes!


Spill, Baby, Spill
By Michael Isikoff, Ian Yarett and Matthew Philips | NEWSWEEK
From the magazine issue dated May 10, 2010

BP has been trying hard to burnish its public image in recent years after being hit with a pair of environmental disasters, including a fatal refinery explosion in Texas and a pipeline leak in Alaska. One major step was to announce, in 2007, that it had hired a high-powered advisory board that included former EPA director Christine Todd Whitman, former Senate majority leader Tom Daschle, and Leon Panetta, who were each paid $120,000 a year. (Panetta left when he became President Obama's CIA director.) Two years ago the oil giant's chief executive, Robert Malone, flew board members out to the Gulf of Mexico on a helicopter to demonstrate the safeguards surrounding BP's advanced drilling technology. "We got a sense they were really committed to ensuring they got it right," Whitman told NEWSWEEK.

Now BP, formerly known as British Petroleum, finds itself blamed for what could prove to be the worst oil spill in U.S. history. And only weeks after Obama announced an ambitious plan to open up more U.S. offshore waters to oil drilling, shunting aside environmental concerns from his own Democratic Party, his administration is facing a comeuppance from hell. "There was a lot of wishful thinking, I guess," says Villy Kourafalou, a scientist at the University of Miami's Rosensteil School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. "The new technologies were said to be so wonderful that we'd never have an oil spill again." Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), who had sought to block the expanded drilling, says the oil and gas industry was pushing this idea hard. "They said, 'We'll never have a repeat of Santa Barbara,'?" referring to the 1969 rig explosion off the California coast. Both the Bush and Obama administrations "were buying the line that the technology was fine," Pallone adds.

BP pressed hard to make that point in D.C. Its PR efforts included payments of $16 million last year to a battery of Washington lobbyists, among them the firm of Tony Podesta, the brother of former Obama transition chief John Podesta. Last fall, after the U.S. Interior Department proposed tighter federal regulation of oil companies' environmental programs, David Rainey, BP's vice president for Gulf of Mexico exploration, told Congress that the proposal was unnecessary. "I think we need to remember," he said, that offshore drilling "has been going on for the last 50 years, and it has been going on in a way that is both safe and protective of the environment."

Read the full article at:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/237298

[LTX]

28. It was my understanding that USF was going to release a new report

on August 17 concerning the samples collected by their research ship, the Weatherbird II, during its August 6 sampling cruise. I don't see that report posted on their information page:

http://guides.lib.usf.edu/content.php?pid=121415&sid=1044275

The only synopsis of the USF Weatherbird II August 6 sampling cruise that I can find is the following:

"The researchers found micro-droplets of oil scattered across the ocean floor and they also found those droplets moving up through a part of the Gulf called the DeSoto Canyon, a channel which funnels water and nutrients into the popular commercial and recreational waters along the Florida Gulf Coast. The scientists say even though it's getting harder to see the oil the Gulf is still not safe."

Brief as it is, this synopsis is consistent with the full analysis of the earlier Weatherbird II samples from May 23-26, which can found here:

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/PDFs/noaa_weatherbird_analysis_final.pdf

I'm not getting where the hysteria is coming from. The NOAA obviously wanted a full analysis of the August 6 cruise samples before conclusions were put into press releases. I don't see this as at all unwarranted. And it appears that USF has not, in fact, completed its analysis of the recent samples.

[TheKentuckian]

24. Thanks to flyarm for being chock full of information here

[SammyWinstonJack]

27. +1

[jpak]

29. Nobody bothers to read these reports - the UGA team vindicated the NOAA/DOI study

They fault the media for misrepresenting what the Federal Science study on the spill.

They used the FSR's own numbers to draw their conclusions.

They came to the same conclusion as the FSR - the oil is still in the Gulf - it did not "disappear".

The science is correct - the media reporting is not.

wake up

[LTX]

30. Agreed.

The media is peddling attention grabbing soundbites, not actual information. It's extremely frustrating.