Methane levels 40% instead of normal 5% in Gulf - Scientists are Worried

reply to post by xEphon


I know and that is just the point.
We thought we knew but we didn't.

What else do we know that is not correct ?

Heres a new way to look at it
www.youtube.com...

If you look at the may 17th image and take some measurements using google earth it is around a 58 square mile area with oil on it. I use the fact that 1 gallon of paint covers 350 square feet. if you do the math thats 6.27 million barrels as of the 24th of may that is on the surface of the gulf that would put a number up to today at around 12 milion barrels of oil. So far this would also break down to 168000 barrels leaked per day I would also say that is conservative since a dispersant is used and underwater plumes have been found.

When talking about methane in the oil field, they usually refer to gas in "units". Most logging gas detectors and chromatagraphs will read up to 10,000 Units of gas, or 100% Methane. 40% would be 4,000 Units, which is alot, but it could be worse. Ive been on land rigs where we were getting 4,000+ units everday, and it just gets released into the atmosphere. Ive never been off-shore, and would never like to go, so I really don't know how all of their down hole equipment and BOP work.

I know that the "reason" all this happend, was because of a faulty BOP(Blow Out Preventer) and read that this thing is 2 stories tall.

On the land rig I was following, our BOP was only about 7-8 foot tall.

Anyways, just figured i'de throw in a little knowlege.

reply to post by TxLogger


That was on land though - have you read the entire article in the OP discussing what science has to say about the effects of this level of methane in an underwater environment ?

reply to post by SneakAPeek


matter's state (gaseous, liquid, solid) is based not only pressure but & temperature too.

reply to post by cosmicpixie


Yes it can. I am not sure if this has been said before but as i remember in 1986 something similar, but of a smaller scale occurred in lake Nyos, and it killed 1,700 people and all their cattle because of the CO2, and also methane bubble which exploded, expanded and smothered people and animals to death.

This was a volcanic lake.

www.wired.com...

If this leaks keeps going, and it has already caused several fissures, and is cracking part of the ocean floor around the leak something bigger could occur.



[edit on 20-6-2010 by ElectricUniverse]

Why wasn't this Methane issue brought to light when the Congress was
raking the Oil executives over the coals last week? It really irks me
how Congress men/women hold investigative hearings but never
derive any new information, let alone solutions to the problem at hand.
They did the same thing to the insurance executives, yet health
premiums and medical costs are still skyrocketing.

Here we have huge threats from methane and the chemicals used to
disperse the oil, yet Congress would rather spend the day calling British
Petroleum/Amoco people scumbags than working out solutions to these
threats. -cwm

.

Originally posted by cosmicpixie
A new article out today might inadvertently add some weight to Richard Hoagland's claim /theory/rumour of a methane bubble under the sea waiting to explode on some Armegeddon -type level. ...?

Hoagy???

According to oceanographer John Kessler the methane levels in the oil coming from the sea floor now are at 40 % compared to the normal 5% found in typical oil deposits.

Rubbish! This is nothing but conjecture. Has he measured the percentage of methane levels? NO! These are just vague deductions.

Well, the latest trend in these conspiracy threads seems to be to latch on to the corniest piece of info and roll it around for eyeballs!

Carry on!

Originally posted by OrionHunterX

Originally posted by cosmicpixie
A new article out today might inadvertently add some weight to Richard Hoagland's claim /theory/rumour of a methane bubble under the sea waiting to explode on some Armegeddon -type level. ...?

Hoagy???

According to oceanographer John Kessler the methane levels in the oil coming from the sea floor now are at 40 % compared to the normal 5% found in typical oil deposits.

Rubbish! This is nothing but conjecture. Has he measured the percentage of methane levels? NO! These are just vague deductions.

Well, the latest trend in these conspiracy threads seems to be to latch on to the corniest piece of info and roll it around for eyeballs!

Carry on!

Agreed.

The "oil well" that the DWH was drilling more than likely to be classified as a gas well. People really need to educate themselves before they spew off on things that they know nothing about. A well is classified as a gas or oil well by the ratio of gas to oil come from the well. The ratio is called GOR or Gas Oil Ratio. Spiffy name.

Fact- At 1800 psig and -14° (C or F) the fluid coming from the DWH is going to be almost 100% liquid even with a high methane content. As the fluid rises in the ocean it will warm / depressure and the lighter components will flash off. Some of the heavier molecules will stay attached to the lighter molecules but the majority will be lighter. Here's a clue for some of you freaking out about evil methane. If you are connected to natural gas at home for heat you are burning methane. Natural gas is mostly methane and some ethane. The components of natural gas are (lightest to heaviest): Methane, Ethane, small amounts of Propane, and rarely Butane. Pentanes, Hexanes, and heavier make up what is called oil or condensate. Each component can be liquefied. A mixture of these components will be liquid at a different pressure and temperature than any of the single components. The more the mixture is weighted to the heavy ends the less pressure and higher temperature it can exist as a liquid. Propane, for example, is the stuff you use to fire your grill (if you use a propane grill). It exists as a liquid in the tank at the temperature of the surrounding air. If it's 90°F outside the tank will contain propane in liquid and vapor form. It will be at equilibrium. When you start the grill the pressure in the tank drops slightly and the mixture boils which causes it to cool which brings it almost back to equilibrium. Shut the grill off and the pressure rises slightly and boiling stops. Key here is that since the liquid cools the pressure inside the tank is not quite as high as it was. It will eventually reach the temperature of the surrounding air however and as it heats up the pressure will rise. PV=zNRT

[edit on 6/20/2010 by Mike6158]

reply to post by OrionHunterX


You forgot to mention that he is a raging idiot imho...

I am starting to look into something other than a blowout preventer. I am sure it is damaged but, if the leak started with only the BOP then that isn't as bad as a bore hole leak. I found this study on Sudden casing pressure(SCP) from 2001 by LSU university. It is a study about the GOM and how wells here have a huge problem with SCP.

"The LSU study has elevated the concern surrounding SCP incidents in the GOM. The study itself is concerned largely with statistical analysis of SCP incidence, and makes some key statistical conclusions."

The study is 268 pages but list some interesting points. I didn't understand much of it but it basically goes on to try to find the causes of sub floor blow out due to increase pressure from a cause they are not sure of? Heres the link:

www.mms.gov...

Someone with a better knlowledge could check this out and see if it says anything relevant to methane gas causing pressure increases

Originally posted by Iamonlyhuman
reply to post by getreadyalready

 

Did you watch the video above? It show a real example of one of those lakes that exploded.
I do hope that's not something we'll have to deal with. It certainly would be a devastating thing to happen, especially being 15 miles from the coast. Keep up with the news from all sources as they probably wouldn't announce the possibility of something like this.

If you listen closely to the video, it was carbon dioxide, that caused the explosion, not methane. The explosion shows, that under strange conditions, strange things can happen, but for the conditions of the oil of mexico to change into anything like the conditions in those small acidic crater lakes, there would have to be more than a gushing crude/methane pipe.

If you live so close to the shore, you should probably worry more about the force of future hurricans, once your protecting wetlands have decayed under the crude. And probably check occassionally, wether the air smells strange.

reply to post by Mike6158


You seem somewhat knowledgeable with Methane geekery, so could give me some educated guesses?

I have seen some nice vids of burning tap water in kitchen sinks. How high would the methane concentration in water have to be, to achieve this effect? Do you see any other circumstances, that are necessary for such an effect, other than methane concentrations?

Afaik depth currents in oceans can show some very peculiar attributes. There have been lots of methane gusheed in the Gulf Basin lately. What do you think, how high can the concentration in any given isolated stream or pool get?

Just wanted to make sure I understand the situation. If the gulf Area, ignites in a HUGE (Titanic??) Methane explosion, and wipes-out MILLIONS who live around the shoreline, BP will pay for everything, right??
BTW- what IS a human life going-for, on the open-market, these days?? (American, NOT Third World!!) (YES- THAT was S-A-R-C-A-S-M).
Sounds like the NWO's depopulation plan, going along schedule!

Just wanted to make sure I understand the situation. If the gulf Area, ignites in a HUGE (Titanic??) Methane explosion, and wipes-out MILLIONS who live around the shoreline, BP will pay for everything, right??
BTW- what IS a human life going-for, on the open-market, these days?? (American, NOT Third World!!) (YES- THAT was S-A-R-C-A-S-M).
Sounds like the NWO's depopulation plan, going along schedule!

Originally posted by TxLogger
I know that the "reason" all this happend, was because of a faulty BOP(Blow Out Preventer) and read that this thing is 2 stories tall.

On the land rig I was following, our BOP was only about 7-8 foot tall.

Anyways, just figured i'de throw in a little knowlege.

Do you think, they used the right size of BOP for the pressure of the field at all? I heard, the BOP was on the upper end of its capacity, pressure-wise, even before it was neglected and abused by the drilling crew.
Given BPs reputation for cutting corners that sounds likely to me. How does it sound to an actual rig worker? Do you think they calculated the pressure inside the well correctly, before starting to drill, or just made some optimistic guesstimates about it?

I had to think about the movie "Das Boot", when Capt. Lt. Lehmann-Willenbrock, tests the hull of its submarine by diving far below the wharf guarantees: "Das Boot muss das abkönnen"

Has anyone else noticed that water temps in the Gulf of Mexico are well above normal for this time of year?



www.nodc.noaa.gov...

Notice where you can compare current temps with the historical average, the temps right now are 4 to 5 degrees HIGHER than normal.

Originally posted by XenoStuffz
reply to post by Mike6158

 

You seem somewhat knowledgeable with Methane geekery, so could give me some educated guesses?

I have seen some nice vids of burning tap water in kitchen sinks. How high would the methane concentration in water have to be, to achieve this effect? Do you see any other circumstances, that are necessary for such an effect, other than methane concentrations?

Afaik depth currents in oceans can show some very peculiar attributes. There have been lots of methane gushed in the Gulf Basin lately. What do you think, how high can the concentration in any given isolated stream or pool get?

I've spent my entire life in the gas processing industry. We are the downstream end of the oil and gas business. The next step after us is the consumer. We work with natural gas and natural gas liquids (including crude oil) at temperatures and pressures similar to what the Maconda well is leaking at. Actually we work with temperatures that are much colder. -166°F for Demethanizer overhead and -300°F for liquid methane / nitrogen mixtures.

You will get more exposure to toxic things like Benzene from fueling your automobile and breathing fumes from that over your lifetime than you will this spill. I never stand by my fuel nozzle when I'm fueling my car. I always turn the pump on and walk away. I do not return to the pump until it clicks off. I would recommend that everyone do that.

Hydrocarbon phase behavior is an interesting topic. Especially when the hydrocarbon is a mixture at high pressure, somewhat cold temperatures, and in the presence of water. Some of the Methane and Ethane (as well as other components), in the presence of water, at the conditions we are discussing, will form a hydrate (which is a solid). Not might, will. The remaining components will exist as a liquid that contains methane, ethane, propane, butane, pentane, hexane, etc. The liquid won't be as dense as the sea water but it will relatively close. That will allow it to remain in suspension and slow it's rise to the surface (under water plumes). A couple of things complicate estimating what is happening in this situation. The use of dispersants and the fact that the stream of hydrocarbon is being "jetted" into the surrounding water. There will be some "mixing" due to the turbulence from the high velocity stream flowing into the surrounding sea water though not in the sense of a chemical bond forming. More like an emulsion.

I don't know what to say about your methane / tap water vids. How did the methane get into the line? Did someone tap a gas line with a water line? I've seen the results of what happens when someone accidentally tapped a fuel line and connected it to an air system. It was not pretty.

I think it's more than a little suspicious that I was told on 6/13 that the relief wells would be completed (by someone very close to the situation) around 7/1 yet no mention of that was made of that until today and even then only briefly. In the meantime "they've" been ramping the flow estimates up and fanning the flames of environmental discontent. I don't care what your degree is in or how long you've been doing what you do, anyone that says that they know how much oil is coming out of the well is either a liar or an idiot. There is not enough information available to accurately judge the flow from the well. This looks to me like a well orchestrated symphony of disinformation. For what purpose I am not sure.

Originally posted by Iamonlyhuman
The hydrates at the bottom of the ocean are frozen methane. I would think that if massive amounts of warmer crude were continually gushing out that the crude could raise the temperature and therefore "unfreeze" the hydrates? This seems logical but I am no scientist.

I did find this article from 2005 talking about the pros and cons of "farming" these hydrates as an energy source: Flashback: Deep sea methane: Energy Saviour Or Impending Disaster?

It made me wonder if they were after the methane all along, started a thread on it but it hasn't gotten alot of attention...
www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by Rich Z

That is interesting, but it could be simply that long-term averages are just that: averages. There are going to be variations up and down from the average in a natural environment situation of this type. But all the same, it is known that the warmer the water, the greater the potential amount of energy available to any ocean-based circular storm that might enter the region.

Speaking of hurricanes, I've been checking the National Hurricane Center (NHC) website daily, because if a hurricane enters that region it will at best hamper the relief well efforts and at worst -- well, we don't know what the worst might be because even the experts seem to be unsure.

There has been a region of weather that the NHC people have been keeping an eye on and mapping as it might become a depression and then a circular storm. A few days ago they rated it at a 10% chance of becoming a tropical cyclone, then about two days ago they upped that to 20%.

Today, they say

There is a medium chance...50 percent...of this system becoming a tropical cyclone during the next 48 hours.

Here is the source at NHC/NOAA. (This page will be subject to updates and so the information given in my post here may become out of date -- for better or for worse.

In any case, as this potential circular storm is expected to move west-northwest, it could enter the GOM. As you all probably know, determining the track of such areas of depression/storms is not easy.

Mike

EDIT for UPDATE: a couple of hours after I posted the above, the prediction was revised downwards to a 40% chance. Good news!


[edit on 22/6/10 by JustMike]