Activating the blowout preventer was supposed to work. So too was the “top hat.” Plan C — the “top kill” — offers no promises, but it’s the latest hope and most intensive effort yet devised to plug the well gushing more than 210,000 gallons of oil per day into the Gulf of Mexico. It’s a complex procedure, and it’s never been undertaken at a depth of 5,000 feet. On Wednesday morning, a crew will attempt to make history and put an end to one of the worst environmental disasters in US history.
The procedure sounds simple enough: pump heavy mud through the wellhead to slow the flow and then pump in cement to seal it for good.
But the procedure is being undertaken by remote operated vehicles almost a mile underwater, and involves a damaged 5-story blowout preventer sitting atop an even deeper well. It doesn’t help that there is virtually zero visibility and a complicated mess of wreckage at the seafloor where the top kill will take place. A team of experts has been working on the procedure since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig sunk to the sea floor more than a month ago, and even now they don’t know exactly what they’re up against.
According to BP, much of the 50,000 barrels of mud that surface ships are prepared to pump into the blowout preventer will leak out the top of the stack and into the sea. For this reason, bigger pumping capacity is better. The surface team will have 30,000 hydraulic horsepower at its disposal to force mud into the well at the highest flow rate possible.
“We know we’ll lose some out the top,” Kent Wells, BP senior vice president of exploration and production, told reporters Tuesday morning. “But can we pump fast enough to ultimately kill the well?”
If so, they’ll follow up the mud with a stream of cement which would seal the well for good. If all goes according to plan, the top kill could be completed and confirmed successful in 12 to 48 hours. In case the kill shot doesn’t work, the team is preparing for Plan D, and even Plan E.
BP has been testing the junk shot, “looking at different configurations of what might restrict the flow out of the Deepwater Horizon riser and what types of materials would help shut it off. Materials in a junk shot can include well-known items such as pieces of tires golf balls, and pieces of rope,” according to BP’s official release.
The Washington Post reports engineers are also preparing a fix that hasn’t received much media attention. Robotic submarines could sever the top of the blowout preventer, temporarily increasing the flow of leaking oil by as much as 15 percent, and then contain the stack with a cap called a Lower Marine Riser Package.
We’re ready for some good news. Let’s hope Wednesday brings it.
Image via British Petroleum.