China Deals With Its Own Oil Spill

[MariaDine]

See the photo here... and send your good energy to that situation, to the people, to nature etc ...............

Namaste


http://news.discovery.com/earth/china-oil-spill.html


July 21, 2010 -- Chinese authorities have closed several beaches and an island resort near the major port of Dalian as they try to clean up an oil spill that has affected crude shipments, state media said Wednesday.



Tourists were barred from Bangchui island and city beaches amid ongoing efforts to clean up the slick that stretches over at least 183 square kilometers (70 square miles) of ocean, the China Daily newspaper said.



More than 25 tons of oil-eating bacteria and dozens of oil-skimming vessels are being used to remove the slick, after a pipeline explosion and fire on Friday sent tons of crude spilling into the sea.



In this photo released by Greenpeace, a firefighter covered in oil is rescued following an attempt to fix an underwater pump.



Some state media reports put the amount of the spill at around 1,650 tons, but others said the total amount was unknown. So far, at least 500 tons of oil have been scooped up, according to the Xinhua news agency.



Hundreds of soldiers and residents have been involved in the clean-up effort, the report said. One firefighter was killed Tuesday after he was pushed into the ocean by a huge wave and drowned.



Authorities lifted a partial ban on port traffic on Tuesday after oil was cleared from the main shipping waterways, but the interruption in port access has affected shipments of oil from Dalian to the south of the country.



Dalian is China's second-largest port for crude oil imports and a major domestic production hub, according to the China Daily.



Refineries in the port city are processing inventories so oil prices are not expected to be impacted, Xinhua said.



Workers in Dalian are using barriers to prevent the slick from spreading, but are concerned wind and heavy rain could worsen the situation.



Most of the hundreds of fishing boats called in to help the clean-up were forced to return to shore due to the poor weather conditions.

[bluestflame]

can expect they'll release the ninjas , pretty coincidental to be having more oil issues

[MariaDine]

A ninja or shinobi was a covert agent or mercenary of feudal Japan specializing in unorthodox arts of war. The functions of the ninja included espionage, sabotage, infiltration, and assassination, as well as open combat in certain situations. The ninja, using covert methods of waging war, were contrasted with the samurai, who had strict rules about honor and combat.

... ninjas in China ? ...you mean...the enemies of China ? what do you mean ?

[bluestflame]

just seems a little too coincidental the last few months oil related accidents , google " white dragon society"

[giovonni]

Greeting's MariaDine

Here's another release of this story from the Associated press~



A firefighter rushes to aid his colleague amid thick oil as they attempted to fix a pump in Dalian, China. More



Large China oil spill threatens sea life, water
By CARA ANNA, Associated Press Writer

BEIJING – China's largest reported oil spill emptied beaches along the Yellow Sea as its size doubled Wednesday, while cleanup efforts included straw mats and frazzled workers with little more than rubber gloves.

An official warned the spill posed a "severe threat" to sea life and water quality as China's latest environmental crisis spread off the shores of Dalian, once named China's most livable city.

One cleanup worker has drowned, his body coated in crude.

"I've been to a few bays today and discovered they were almost entirely covered with dark oil," said Zhong Yu with environmental group Greenpeace China, who spent the day on a boat inspecting the spill.

"The oil is half-solid and half liquid and is as sticky as asphalt," she told The Associated Press by telephone.

The oil had spread over 165 square miles (430 square kilometers) of water five days since a pipeline at the busy northeastern port exploded, hurting oil shipments from part of China's strategic oil reserves to the rest of the country. Shipments remained reduced Wednesday.

State media has said no more oil is leaking into the sea, but the total amount of oil spilled is not yet clear.

Greenpeace China released photos Wednesday of inky beaches and of straw mats about 2 square meters (21 square feet) in size scattered on the sea, meant to absorb the oil.

Fishing in the waters around Dalian has been banned through the end of August, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

"The oil spill will pose a severe threat to marine animals, and water quality, and the sea birds," Huang Yong, deputy bureau chief for the city's Maritime Safety Administration, told Dragon TV.

At least one person died during cleanup efforts. A 25-year-old firefighter, Zhang Liang, drowned Tuesday when a wave threw him from a vessel, Xinhua reported.

Officials, oil company workers and volunteers were turning out by the hundreds to clean blackened beaches.

"We don't have proper oil cleanup materials, so our workers are wearing rubber gloves and using chopsticks," an official with the Jin****an Golden Beach Administration Committee told the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper, in apparent exasperation.

"This kind of inefficiency means the oil will keep coming to shore. ... This stretch of oil is really difficult to clean up in the short term."

But 40 oil-skimming boats and about 800 fishing boats were also deployed to clean up the spill, and Xinhua said more than 15 kilometers (9 miles) of oil barriers had been set up to keep the slick from spreading.

China Central Television earlier reported an estimate of 1,500 tons of oil has spilled. That would amount roughly to 400,000 gallons (1,500,000 liters) — as compared with 94 million to 184 million gallons in the BP oil spill off the U.S. coast.

China's State Oceanic Administration released the latest size of the contaminated area in a statement Tuesday.

The cause of the explosion that started the spill was still not clear. The pipeline is owned by China National Petroleum Corp., Asia's biggest oil and gas producer by volume.

Friday's images of 100-foot-high (30-meter-high) flames at China's second largest port for crude oil imports drew the immediate attention of President Hu Jintao and other top leaders. Now the challenge is cleaning up the greasy plume.

"Our priority is to collect the spilled oil within five days to reduce the possibility of contaminating international waters," Dalian's vice mayor, Dai Yulin, told Xinhua on Tuesday.

But an official with the State Oceanic Administration has warned the spill will be difficult to clean up even in twice that amount of time.

Some locals said the area's economy was already hurting.

"Let's wait and see how well they deal with the oil until Sept. 1, if the oil can't be cleaned up by then, the seafood products will all be ruined," an unnamed fisherman told Dragon TV. "No one will buy them in the market because of the smell of the oil."

___

Associated Press researcher Yu Bing in Beijing contributed to this report.

[Operator]

Posted by giovonni (here)

So this is how it looks like without dispersant ... ?

More than 25 tons of oil-eating bacteria and dozens of oil-skimming vessels are being used to remove the slick

Another (better ?) way of fighting it ...

[Etherios]

Operator you missing the point... China wants to clean this. BP wants to hide it ... its totally different. Corexit doesnt help the clean up it hide the problem under the carpet. For them cleanning is not paying the price. Thus what ever China tries is better than BP.

[Arpheus]

I bet the chinese will get this thing cleaned in no time,they got the resources and they arent BP.

[Operator]

Posted by Etherios (here)
Operator you missing the point... China wants to clean this. BP wants to hide it ... its totally different. Corexit doesnt help the clean up it hide the problem under the carpet. For them cleanning is not paying the price. Thus what ever China tries is better than BP.

Hi Etherios,

I never mentioned what BP does is better ? I even referred to the oil-eating bacteria .... my only point is to look at the difference ... there is a huge difference !
It just proves that BP is taking a lot of effort to hide a thing that might look similar to this ...

Well, maybe the cases are not fully comparable ... but it will be interesting to see how a different approach probably will take a very different coarse.

[Luke]

Posted by Operator (here)
Well, maybe the cases are not fully comparable ... but it will be interesting to see how a different approach probably will take a very different coarse.

Sure It'll be, though, I don't know how it'll be reported. Remember that China has PR priorities in this one, but have no human concerns really. And corruption and ineptness of bureaucrats are high factors in both cases.