Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Disaster: Crunching numbers!

Tired of being mixed up between gallons, imperial or US, barrels of oil and flow rate?

Let’s go metric to help us understand the scale of the disaster unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico.

The inner diameter of the pipe (the riser) is 20 inches or 0,508 meters

Which gives us a surface at the mouth of the pipe of 0,203 m2

This means that one meter of pipe carries 203 liters of oil.

The experts and scientists are all falling over each other attempting to calculate the flow rate.  A Federal Team was even created on the 20^th May 2010  in order to determine the flow rate !!!

One meter per second of flow, would give us 60 meters per minute and 3,6 km per hour. About the walking speed of a normal man.

That small flow rate of one meter per second gives us 600 metric tons* of oil per hour and 14400 metric tons per 24 hour period.

In a 30 day period: 432 000 metric tons or more than one and a half AMOCO CADIZ Do you want to know more? per month.

At that rate, it has already over-passed the IXTOC more oil spill of 480,000 metric tons on the 23^rd of May.

At that rate if will reach the level of the first Gulf War spills of 1,5 MILLION TONS more at the beginning of August 2010.

And this is only based on a rate of flow of 1 meter per second!

It is shocking to find out that BP has refused to allow scientists to perform more accurate, independent measurements of the flow, claiming that it is not relevant to the response and that such efforts might distract from efforts to stem the flow.

But then, everything in the situation is shocking and disgusting.

“A jolly bad job that definitely deserves a slap on the wrist!”

*One tonne (metric ton) of crude oil is roughly equal to 308 US gallons or 7.33 barrels and 1 oil barrel is equal to 42 US gallons approx.

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The Atlantic cod: Living proof that conservation works

Scientists say the fish threatened with extinction is back on the menu again

By Martin Hickman, Consumer Affairs Correspondent Saturday, 15 May 2010

Although stocks are still low by historic standards, the recovery could prompt British supermarkets to start stocking North Sea cod again.

North Sea cod, once on the brink as a result of decades of over-fishing, has now recovered to an extent that the public should start eating it again with enthusiasm, one of the world’s biggest wildlife charities has said.

In a rare wildlife conservation success story, the charity WWF said the fish renowned for its flaky white chunks was being caught sustainably off the shallow cold waters of north and eastern Britain for the first time in a decade. Stocks of the fish have risen by 52 per cent from their historic low four years ago because of a combination of cuts in landing quotas, and conservation techniques which have reduced the number tossed back dead into the sea.

Scientists say the fish threatened with extinction is back on the menu again
By Martin Hickman, Consumer Affairs CorrespondentSaturday, 15 May 2010Although stocks are still low by historic standards, the recovery could prompt British supermarkets to start stocking North Sea cod again.North Sea cod, once on the brink as a result of decades of over-fishing, has now recovered to an extent that the public should start eating it again with enthusiasm, one of the world’s biggest wildlife charities has said.In a rare wildlife conservation success story, the charity WWF said the fish renowned for its flaky white chunks was being caught sustainably off the shallow cold waters of north and eastern Britain for the first time in a decade. Stocks of the fish have risen by 52 per cent from their historic low four years ago because of a combination of cuts in landing quotas, and conservation techniques which have reduced the number tossed back dead into the sea.

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HTC HD2 and CSL 1010 in Hong Kong: Service; what service?

I proudly bought my first smartphone last December. In effect, as I am a PC user, I had been waiting for a Windows phone with similar functions to the i-Phone.

Once the HTC HD2 became available in Hong Kong, I immediately sought to purchase one for my professionnal use.

I quickly found out Hong Kong CSL Ltd was the exclusive distributor for the HD2 with their 1010 “High performance” network so I ran to the closest outlet in Tsuen Wan and bought this technological marvel signing on at the same time for a two year contract with the provider.

As I run a company and travel a lot, communicating all the time with suppliers and clients; I was very pleased to suddenly get easy access to Skype, Email and Internet “on the go”.

Even though HTC HD2 is regularly unstable and tends to lag or freeze a little too often, I accepted the negatives for the positives and worked happily with my new phone for 4 months.

3 days ago, my phone started acting up; I lost the capacity to sync with my Sony Vaio, so I performed a hard reset. Following the reset, the PC would still not recognize the phone so today, I took it to the outlet I bought it from.

The charming staff tried their best to fix my problem, but finally had to admit  my HTC HD2 needed to go back for repair.

As 1010 CSL is my service provider, I immediately asked for a replacement equivalent phone for the durantion of the repair. Something I find completely normal in view of the high cost of the phone (close to 6000 HKD) and the fact that I am also a customer of 1010 CSL, and that they are also the exclusive distributor in Hong Kong of the HTC HD2.

The only replacement phone they could offer me was some old Nokia, that wouldn’t fetch 10 HKD in Sham Shui Po. As I complained bitterly but politely about this fact, one of the charming staff offered to lend me his own smartphone for the period of the repairs; an offer I promptly refused!

They finally found an old Nokia E71 for me, which I must say, does nothing more than remain usable as a phone due to age and excessive maltreatment as a demo phone in their shop.

What a disappointment and what a poor service!

I wonder how companies such as 1010 CSL and HTC in Hong Kong can get away with providing such a crappy service to their premium clients, or is it that no-one complains!

As I have managed companies and done plenty of business travel for the last twenty years, always spending a fortune with mobile communication providers; I have been used to another level of service in Europe. In fact, I haven’t bought a phone for the last 15 years, although i always used the latest models. The providers always seemed to value my clientèle in view of my phone bills.

This is clearly not the cased in Hong Kong’s  jungle where customer service is a word not found in the local dictionary.

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Are you eating farmed seafood?

So this is what we are getting instead of  WILD  FISH!

I say: WELL DONE, GOOD JOB!

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Chinafish 2010 banquet dinner speech.

Chinafish is celebrating twenty years of successful expansion at a time when the worldwide fishing tackle industry is confronting the worst crisis of its recent existence.

Instead of reaping the benefits of their emerging domestic market the Chinese fishing tackle manufacturers are now facing a prolonged and deep worldwide recession that is shaking their base and damaging their outlook for the future.

I have always believed that one point of growth in European GDP created 10 points of growth for the fishing tackle market. With a negative 2% growth in Europe in 2009 it is not surprising to hear that sales of fishing tackle fell in the order of 30% or more in some European countries, a fact that has brought dismay to the manufacturing industry and is still not showing any real signs of long term recovery.

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Bluefin tuna has been fished to the brink of extinction!

The EU must not let Malta destroy the king of fish!

From The Times, January 19, 2010

By Frank Pope

Two weeks ago a single bluefin tuna sold in Japan for a surreal £111,000. The price of this fish, which ends up in the best sushi restaurants, will carry on rocketing so long as the tuna population keeps plummeting.

The Mediterranean tuna industry, which has taken tens of millions of euros in subsidies, has fished the bluefin to the brink — stocks are within three years of total collapse.

Europe could ban trade in the bluefin — but the nationalistic fervour of one man, Joe Borg, the EU Fisheries Commissioner, is a huge obstacle. So why Mr Borg’s opposition to a ban? Could it be that he is from Malta, where the economy earns €100 million a year from the bluefin? Continue reading at TIMES ONLINE

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Weihai 2010 production jeopardised again in peak shipping season!

CHINA is once more suffering from coal shortages because of the lingering cold weather, and electricity rationing continues in five provinces and municipalities, including the country’s major coal producer, Shanxi Province.

Decreasing coal reserves in 598 major power plants could last for nine days. Coal storages in 205 plants could last less than seven days, an alarming level, officials said.

The situation worsened in 11 percent of the power plants where coal reserves could not support three days of power generation.

Any time coal reserves go lower than three days, coal-fired power plants must shut down. Eleven percent of the key coal producing provinces’ power plants are close to getting to that point. Coal reserves at power stations are in dangerously short supply.

Shanxi, Shandong, Henan, Hubei and Chongqing  are facing electricity rationing because of power shortages.

Many fishing tackle factories in Weihai are presently operating with only two days of power supply per week.

Production delays will be further affected by the upcoming Chinese New Year holidays and the usual slow start that follows as labourers switch jobs.

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