There is a vast amount of information available regarding the Deepwater Horizon incident. The primary purposes of this lab are (a) to provide you an opportunity to read about the spill incident and the factors effecting environmental concerns, and (b) to help you learn to process the information, especially when it is conflicting, in such a way as to discount ‘bad’ information, acknowledge ‘good’ information, and gain useful knowledge from the overall body of information.
Directions:
Regarding the Deepwater Horizon Spill, answer the following based on your internet research. Cite all source references in your answers, and include dates for websites and news media information. For example, your …show more content…
What is a ‘blow out’? Describe the series of events that led to this release of petroleum material.
The Deepwater Horizon Spill was caused by the explosion of an oil drilling rig named “Deepwater Horizon” as told by the Environmental Protection Agency in their report (most recently updated in 2015). The Oil Drum, a news source dedicated to discussing “energy and our future”, denotes in more detail the events that led up to history’s largest oil spill within their May 2010 article. There was not the correct amount of cement between the production and protection casings, which led to a faulty blowout preventer and a consequent blowout. The Arnold and Itkin law firm, a group that specializes in maritime law, explains a blowout as an event occurring when the pressure of an underground collection of oil, the oil field, becomes too much. The pressure builds when digging occurs, though it typically will not lead to blowouts with the proper blowout preventers. Because of this foreboding fault, as the extraction continued to produce pressure with the lack of safeguards there was a blow out and then the pulsating and vigorous release of …show more content…
Is crude oil homogeneous?
According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), crude oil is found under the ground and then extracted, staying in liquid form the whole time. The 2017 EIA report also includes that crude oil is composed of a “mixture of hydrocarbons”, making it a heterogenous and not homogenous mixture. Refined oil, which are petroleum products, is when the crude oil is made into more useful products. This can be done by both removing hydrocarbons and processing the crude oil, the EIA