Gulf Oil Spill: Cleanup and Mitigation Efforts Outdated, Ineffective, Crude

BP CEO Tony Hayward's denials to the contrary, a number of state and federal researchers have tracked and confirmed the growing existence of vast underwater plumes of crude oil massing below the water's surface throughout the Gulf of Mexico.

Neither BP nor the oil industry, despite their years of deepwater drilling and oil extraction, have developed methods for mitigating oil spills below the water's surface. Their methods, including blowout preventers, are focused only on preventing spills, not cleaning up should wellheads fail. With only one line of defense - prevention - against a wellhead failure a mile below the surface of the ocean, BP can do little but wait for the oil to rise to the surface, then collect, burn or disperse it.

Burning, skimming and dispersants are decades-old methods of oil spill cleanup that focus soley on the ocean's surface. The methods have long been rendered outdated, from a mitigation perspective, by the modern trend of drilling far below the ocean's surface.

The methods are simple, crude, mechanical: one burns collected oil, or skims it up with sorbents, or breaks up into microscopic droplets with chemical dispersants. BP is working a spill with methods that don't address the literally deeper issues: the vast quantities of oil that have not reached the water's surface.

Listen to a portion of Doug Suttles's recent press conference, and his reaction to federal demands that BP hand over all recrods related to the spill.

As for BP's long-term business prospects, the company is unlikely so suffer much damage, according to business analysts.