Deepwater Horizon Hearing

mr. chairman thank you very much for allowing me to participate even though I'm not on the subcommittee I'm just gonna ask you a basic question I was down there and we saw that the sombrero did not work and we saw you start the slant drilling here's a basic question when will you camp that well your best guess we have multiple efforts underway that no no I mean one if you haven't give you a deterministic we have multiple efforts that we're working simultaneous are you gonna cap it in 90 days I believe we'll get there no I believe the relief well we'll be down with in roughly now do you think you'll cap it in 90 days with the slant drilling with that with the relief wells or soon or with other methods what other methods so because we're still working on the blowout preventer itself in trying to do a top kill which could be successful we are also trying to get a containment system subsea okay so your best guess is within 90 days that you will close this rig of the evacuation of all the the gasoline that's your best guess I believe we did that or better now you're in a room all alone just you and the governor of Florida and he asks you this question he said when is your best estimate when it'll hit the Florida coast what would you say I don't have any estimates of it hitting the Florida coast I don't know do you think it'll ever hit the Florida coast and then these ninety days that you predict that they'll be closing this the oil I don't have a way of predicting that all I can say is that we're trying to get a containment system in such as that oil is collected but let's take a worst-case scenario if I understand the wind doesn't have an impact it's basically the current is there a worst-case scenario where it could hit the Florida coast that is a possibility that's why we're organizing that stay as a possibility if you had to be a betting man would you say would hit the westcote hit the Florida coast in 90 days I'm not speculating on that okay we're doing everything we can to make sure it doesn't a constituent sent me a little video it showed a large basin of water and they poured oil into it they took blue hay and other types of hay and they dropped it into it and in about a minute and a half it absorbed all of the oil in the bay the basin of water what's the possibility can you drop hay in the area they take the hay out and then it becomes fuel why couldn't you have just dropped something to absorb all that oil instantly to give you more time to make decisions have you ever thought of that yes that some of that absorbent type material will be used in the near shore and the beach areas if anything could have dropped it right on the site then take barges out pick it all up it absorbs all the oil off the top and then you could have made the oil into things that you could actually burn had that ever occurred to you folks I think well we're under unified area command with the per Coast Guard and I don't believe that is as scalable as it needs to be for the for the farthest option if it was a good idea do you need the federal government to approve it or can you do it on your own well we work we work together with the federal government under the unified area command and every decision ok authorised by the unified area command in tab 11 of page 7.7 - 1 in its application to explore - site BP you want to get that tab or you just want me to read it to you this book yeah it reports it has the capability to respond to spills of 300,000 barrels per day ok this is you folks telling us that you had the capability to respond adequately to spills with 300,000 barrels per day it's on page 7 - 1 section 7.0 this is your oil spill information graph worst-case scenario this is you talking worst case scenario and you say volumes uncontrolled bla per day 300,000 barrels per day is that correct the information in here you still stand by that I see that ok what is the current spill per day right today the current estimates 5000 bro ok so base that's 60 times less than you say the worst case scenario that you can adequately respond to is that correct that's the math yes so why are you having so much trouble responding to this when even by your own literature you're saying you could handle up to 300,000 barrels a day you have something as 60 times as less and yet your this thing is starting to hit the Chandeleur coast in Louisiana and the possibility might even move it's hitting Alabama and possibly going to flock so why why can't you why didn't you have an adequate response even when your worst case scenario says you can handle up to 300,000 barrels per day well this this particular incident is very difficult because we've got a it says the worst case scenario this is your word a mechanical configuration of this is very difficult and the relief efforts that we're doing include three drilling rigs that are working simultaneously to try to contain it so you saying today's situation is more than a worst-case scenario that you outlined in your report to us no I'm not saying that well you see why I'm I'm puzzled why you folks are sitting here saying you don't have a control when your worst case scenario said you can handle 300,000 would the gentleman yield for clarification yeah is is the reason you think you could handle a 300,000 barrel a day worst case is because the assumption is the blowout prevention actually works it's it's part of the assumption and in dealing with this thank you mister well I appreciate the Chairman the only thing I would conclude is that I assume in the worst case scenario that that would take be part of the worst case scenario so that's that's the only concern I have Thank You mr. chairman

Channel: RepCliffStearns

Views: 10,739

Keywords: oil spill, environment, Congressman Stearns, Congressman Cliff Stearns, Rep Stearns, Rep Cliff Stearns, Representative Cliff Stearns, Florida, Oil, Deepwater Horizon, Deepwater, FL06, Ocala, Oil spill

Id: xGjG349HloM

Length: 6min 12sec (372 seconds)

Published: Wed May 12 2010