- There seems to be more intense and widespread flooding
less than a year after the BP's massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Is this a mere coincidence? Or is there more to it and the main stream
media is not telling?
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- As of late Oct 2011, the massive oil spill has not run
its course yet. There has been has been numerous sighting of fresh oils
and reported gas bubbles at locations where previous oil slick had been
found. See figure 145-1 (U20111023) below. All these confirmed our previous
prediction of long term climatic consequences following BP's mega oil spill
disaster.
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- While massive flooding had occurred before; they have
never occurred on such a massive scale over so many regions at such close
intervals following a massive well blowout and a mega oil spill.
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- Pro-oil scientists and geologists often cite that it
is impossible for a tiny 10inch well spewing only 60,000 bpd (upgraded
from the initial 1,000) for 87 days to have caused such havoc to the world's
climate. Their favorite line of argument: "No well blowout in history
has caused such massive environmental havoc before". But did they
emphasize the huge fundamental flaws in their argument.
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- First and foremost there has never been a well blowout
so deep underwater and so disastrous. Although the government officially
capped it at 4.1 millions barrels, talks among industry circles put it
possibly many times more. With the reservoir still leaking openly through
the faulted pathways all around the gulf, the leaks will not stop until
depletion. The Macondo recoverable reserves was estimated to be as low
as 50 million barrels but a Forbes publication suggests it could more likely
be a hefty 1 billion barrels.
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- This means a lot more oil has yet to leak out through
the broken geology if nothing is done. In a worst case scenario, the wide
spread underground erosion sets off an unprecedented shallow crustal adjustments
in the New Madrid fault zone. Like an unwinding spring coil releasing all
the pent-up stresses accumulate over thousands of years. The Macondo prospect
lies within the central pivoting point of the intra-plate tectonics and
a "deep puncture" at here is more disastrous than anywhere else
in the gulf.
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- The main stream media has also not emphasized the massive
amount of green house gases released into the atmosphere? The widespread
vaporization of methane deposit (due to hot escaping oil) and toxic gasses
leaking from the Macondo reservoir have not ceased for sure. After more
than 15 months of relentless underground erosion (from reservoir level
to the seafloor) the rate of toxic gas emissions is likely to have increased
exponentially.
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- To be fair, the world was already swamped with environmental
pollution from the rapid pace of global industrialization, mining and urbanization.
An oil spill and gas discharge on such a massive scale just turbo-charged
and drove the world faster over the brink. Observational evidence shows
a clear correlation between historic eruptions and subsequent years of
cold climate conditions. See Geology SDSU.Edu on the examples of Laki (1783),
Tambora (1815), Karkatau (1883) and Pinatubo (1991). No doubt the volume
of gases and other volcanic materials spewed during the eruptions are more
massive within a few weeks but BP's mega oil spill disaster lasted much
longer (at least 15 months longer and counting) and spread wider.
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- When It Rains, It Pours
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- Hydro-dams can only control water when the water is still
in the catchment area and not after the flood waters had reached the flood
plains. Most typhoons, like Nesat and Nalgae dumped much of their rain
load on the fluvial plains outside the control of hydro dams. Most existing
drainage systems converge and drain into the main fluvial channels. This
is like causing a massive traffic jam during peak flows and they all flow
southwards towards Bangkok. With low elevation, there is not much gradient
to speed up the water flow. Even if there is, the flood water will accumulate
at the next flat zone. Our present surface drainage system is thus like
a serial, linear system; never suitable to cater for peak flows during
floods.
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- To solve our flooding woes, our fundamental concept of
a converging system must radically change to a divergent distributed system
(a complete reversal). In order to do that
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- there need to be alternative water outlets, not just
the sea
- any excess water above the optimum flow level of the
main channels must be automatically removed so that the volume of water
can never reach the danger level of flooding (tackling the problem at root
level before it gets too massive to handle)
- water in the alternative outlet can be stored for extraction
during the dry period or channel out to areas in need of water.
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- Nature has already provided us with a ready made solution.
All we need to do is to harness the enormous potential of our natural resources,
hundreds to thousands of metres below us. Drill large deep wells into the
highly fractured fault zones to act as vertical and inclined channels to
the suitable porous rock formations for massive storage. Each country
will need to design their own distributed network of underground channels
(a combination of connecting tunnels and suitable fault zones) to interconnect
the aquifers and deeper formations based on their respective geological
structures and stratigraphy.
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