Headline tomorrow: BP installs new cap, will shut off flow from the damaged riser to 0%, everybody rejoices! Live camera shows NO oil spewing into the gulf, great PR success, high five!
Headline next month: Mysterious new seepage of a whole lot of oil from the seabed, miles from the Deepwater Horizon site. BP last seen whistling, looking at sky, shuffling foot.
You cap the top off, and the oil pours up a pipeline to a waiting ship. Great. A million gallons a day captured instead of spilled. Fantastic. That million gallons is pushing against the weight of a mile-long pipeline-full of oil. A sign off a successful installation for this cap will be HIGH pressure inside the pipeline.
THE CASING IS BROKEN. High pressure. On the TOP end of the pipe which is broken to an unknown degree somewhere a thousand feet or more beneath the seabed. Oil is going to "surprise" BP by breaking out of the casing in increasing volume. You may even see stories about the pressure in the cap falling. I wonder if we will see this link drawn by the lamestream media.
Whatever the case may be, the ultimate solution -if the well can be stopped- is the relief wells. WellS. They know full well that one, two, or four relief wells may not do the trick. Don't be surprised if the first relief well can't get it plugged. And don't forget that the oil which is currently leaking down there, is less than leaks onto land from normal surface wells in 3rd-world countries in Africa.
Oil is messy.
Nuke-you-ler.
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