oil spill in gulf..help?

can fungus be used to help clean up the oil spill in the Gulf Of Mexico? 

Bush should have never relaxed the safty requirements for such a thing to happen.  Clinton put those safty precautions in place for a reason. 

What can be done to help clean up this disaster? 

  The book 'Mycelium Running' indicates that fungi could work well. I don't know about in the water, though.

This is cool and I plan to collect hair and pantyhose.

What can be done to help clean up this disaster?

Evidently we didn't have a disaster plan for Macondo therefore we don't know the answer. BP received a categorical exclusion from our National Environmental Policy Act in April of 2009. That being said, Audubon is assisting in the coordination of volunteer efforts. They provide many opportunities to help from data entry in the comfort of our own homes to physically cleaning oiled birds on site-
http://www.audubonaction.org/site/Survey?ACTION_REQUIRED=URI_ACTION_USER_REQUESTS&SURVEY_ID=3400

We cannot change events from the past. Our only hope is to learn from them to affect positive change. Here are events from our recent past that provide insight into challenges facing us-
http://www.propublica.org/documents/item/bp-initial-exploration-plan-for-gulf
BP submits exploration plan in March of 2009


http://www.subseaiq.com/(X(1)S(vh1t4mypqotqat2v4o33rl55))/data/Project.aspx?project_id=562&AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1

Mar. 2009 - BP submitted an Initial Exploration Plan to MMS for its Macondo prospect in the GOM to drill and temporarily abandon two exploration wells (A & B). The company plans to use a semisubmersible, possibly Transocean's Marianas, to spud the wells in April 2009.

http://www.arguewitheveryone.com/general-political-discussion/121162-obama-administration-approved-offshore-louisiana-oil-drilling-plan.html

Oops: Macondo Driling Plan Was Submitted, Approved Under Obama Administration

http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpps/news/dpgonc-obama-offshore-drilling-fc-20100331_6839245

President Obama announced Wednesday that the U.S. would expand its domestic offshore oil and gas exploration efforts, in a move that was expected to draw criticism from both sides of the energy debate.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64517H20100506

U.S. regulators exempted BP Plc from a detailed environmental review of the exploration project that ultimately resulted in the deadly Gulf of Mexico explosion and subsequent oil spill, documents show.

Greed, not public interest will be served if we remain silent while our government forges ahead approving Tiber-
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/278649

BP PLC (BP) discovered oil in its Tiber field beneath the Gulf of Mexico. The discovery is called the “holy grail” for the U.K. energy company.

http://feww.wordpress.com/2010/05/01/obamas-energy-security-falls-around-his-ankles/

39 rig blowouts in the Gulf between 1992 and 2006: MMS Study

Most happy to modify per request May 28, 2010. Removing link to petition site. I am sorry. I can't honor the request to post the petition at a personal blog or website for others to follow, I don't have one. 

This is cool and I plan to collect hair and pantyhose.

jennifer:  I hope this does not mean you will have to change your photograph to a bald person!

Dirt Ball:  I hope there will be a follow-up on your son's impressions of the situation there.

I wrote a blog post about this and part of the solution I explain there actually involves mushrooms.

http://cristianlavaque.com/2010/05/10/the-best-oil-spill-cleanup-solution

I just learned about using mushrooms for phytoremediation in this thread from Emerson White.

https://permies.com/bb/index.php?topic=4018.0

A trick that I've heard gardeners use for killing a neighbors tree with out getting caught was to drill a hole in at an angle and then drip in some gas every few days. Perhaps diesel oil would also work, and you could come in after words with a HUG to make sure the soil is not contaminated.


Woops the HUG link did not transfer.  Its on this page.  Scroll down to the HUG kit.

http://fungi.com/kits/outdoor.html#LKHU

Dirt Ball,

Any chance you can move that big post into a blog or something on another site and then make a link to that from here?  I'm trying to keep a pretty tight ship here of avoiding political discussion (with focus on building good things instead of wagging one's finger at the folks doing bad things). 

Thanks!

jennifer smith i am sorry i had forgotten you had actually opened a thread on this and I started a nearly twin thread i thought I remembered you had only commented in some other thread.
  On this thread  i said paul stamets could clean up oil with mushrooms, i think i thought that soemone else would expand on that, later i decided to write more about how and started a thread with nearly the same name as this .
      He says ayster mushrooms gobble up petrol and turn it into oyster mushroom with no trace of oil in ithe mushrooms though he does not know if they might not be full of some heavy metal that could be in oil, so they should not be eaten till you get them tested.
  he didnot test for metals with the mushrooms he used to clean up petrol.  He tells of bvarious way sof growing mushroom mycelium in sacs of straw or chips pof wood or dowels that then you can take to a sight that needs cleaning so you have a good growth of mushrooms to get going in the place that is polluted.  He calls mats of mycelium, mushroom spawn. agri rose macaskie.

      What i want to know is it could it be that the remedies they are trying to stop the leak are such as will let them recuperate the use of the well later instead of things that will be much more likely to stop the flow but will spoil all chances of ever reopening this well.
    This mud they are putting in is somthing they use for drilling according to what people say, that must mean that you can later take it out and get the oil flowing again. If they are risking greater ecological damage so they can still use this broken well, the only suitable expression is, "I will kill them",  I dont mean it literally, i am against the death sentence, i mean it is neccessary to be very very cross with them. agri rose macaskie.

Something to consider which I found while reading a similar discussion at an organic gardening forum. It parallels rose macaskie's concerns regarding the potential for greater ecological damage-
http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Debating+Synthia+genetically+engineered+life+form/3072270/story.html

drit ball, it is true that genetic engineering is a danger but at the moment we have the disaster in the gulf and if you let yourself be distracted you wont be efficient there. The disaster in the gulf is disgusting and terrible and there should be no distractions to dealing with it, if they can stop the oil they can make it a bit less terrible. We have to get them to shut down the flow or make absolutely sure they are really focused on it.
   Are BP looking for the sure way to block the flow or for the way that will allow them to use the well again? If they stop the flow with mud and then a bit of concrete on top they can remake the top of the pipe and reopen the well maybe .
       The amount of oil coming out is such that they should not be messing around, they should be shutting off the well in the way most certain to work quickly not in the way that would allow them to use their hard work again.
    Also they talk of spending a lot of millions on the disaster already if they are earning billions they could be spending all of their profits on this not just a billion but several this mounth and several more next when they will be earning more billions. They are talking about what they have spent because they are so sure that people who only know about the money they spend on their families will be impressed and feel as if BP is being generouse. People like countries who are working in billions not millions will know that the money bp has spent is not so much and they are not being generouse and the public should know it. How much money have the gulf businesses been losing in the same time for example or what are the costs of the material losses  of these businesses  that is a figure we should have before we get to thinking about the money BP has spent .
  Also though BP is British these companies are like terrorism multinational and don't obey the laws of any country and they are enormouse. My father was a lawyer for Shell, so he knows, it is he who told me that multinationals are enormouse and above laws because they dont, in a way belong to any one country they are multinational though their shares are held more by the british or whatever.
  It seems you don't have to do genetic engineering to produce things that eat petrol and such you just have to feed microbes with sugar to get them busier than usual that is what they are doing in a clean up site that they are now cleaning up, they talked about it on the news a few weeks ago. Mind you such enormouse amounts of oil are another thing.  agri rose macaskie.

      I feel bad if i talk politics but would not Martin Luther King say, that if you don't you are one of those who sees and does not do anything.
     If you are adult can you not talk of emotional subjects and even subjects that hurt because it is hard to talk of politics without being thought  irresponsible or receiving that adjetive because either you will be messing up the system or messing up the underpriveledged.
     The story of Pokemons and i am a pokemon generation mum, is that you go around fighting your battles, you pit your best against the other persons and that makes you a good fighter. It is a, things get cleaned up in the wash type idea, "lets all be strong take it and give it, if not nothing will get thrashed out", is i think the reasoning.  Politics do come into permaculture maybe it should just be the ideas of Bill Mollisons not other types of politics or the whole forum would be dedicated to politics. I say anythign critical and some contributer to the forum whose work i enjoy disapears like sue munroe a year ago. Its horrible. agri rose macaskie.
   
   

     
  How to stop the oil.
     I read but only once, I hope its right, that the tubes they put in to the oil well to  get out the oil are put deep in to the oil layer to the bottom of the underground oil lake, where all the weight of the oil above pushes down on the lower oil making the pressure very high, and that is what makes the oil shoot out of the bore hole.
     If you put down through the pipe an explosive and detonate it when it has got through the rock layer in the pipe to a place that is level with the top of the oil layer and explode it sutting of the pipe where its level with the surface of the underground oil lake  were there would be no pressure and the oil would not be forced up through the pipe. the oil wouldstop gushing out and then you could fill the hole and so stop the problem of more and more ioil going into the golf.

       Maybe they can get a saw down the pipe and and cut it off were it is level with the top of the oil but someone said that they are drilling so deep that the pipes have had to get very thiick to stand the pressure and its hard to cut through them.

        I don't know  if you can make an explosion in an oil well, i suppose that there will not be enough oxygen in the well for the explosion to spread through all the oil. agri rose macaskie.

Jennifer Smith  "listenstohorses" wrote:
can fungus be used to help clean up the oil spill in the Gulf Of Mexico? 

Bush should have never relaxed the safty requirements for such a thing to happen.  Clinton put those safty precautions in place for a reason. 

What can be done to help clean up this disaster? 

Yes, Oyster mushrooms can actually be used to clean up oil.  People of the CA SF Bay Area used it with their last oil spill.

Rose,

A lot of rock is pushing down on the oil, as well. About two miles worth.

Here is a diagram similar to yours, but more to scale:

Depth of Deepwater Horizon, illustrated

The oil deposit is not shown, but sits almost entirely below the three-mile-long well bore.

Unless there is a barrier above the oil, there will be pressure enough to force it out. Even if the rock above it were only as dense as water, pressure at the top of the oil deposit would be 500 atmospheres, while pressure at the blowout preventer is 150 atmospheres.

It's sort of a Moria situation, in my obnoxious opinion.

Somebody may have said this but in the sf bay area they successfully used hay innoculated with oyster mushrooms to help cleanup and dispose of the oil. I'm sure if you google sf oil spill mushroom cleanup you'll find something