Showing posts with label Port Fourchon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Port Fourchon. Show all posts

Monday, September 08, 2008

Got oil?


For many Americans, the first news of what Hurricane Gustav really did hit might come at the gas pump.

Here, from the
Houma Courier, is what you haven't seen on the TV news . . . or in your local newspaper:
More than $1 billion worth of oil and gas per day is not reaching U.S. markets because of damage done by Hurricane Gustav, the director of one of the largest Gulf of Mexico industry supply ports said.

Channels leading to the Gulf of Mexico oilfield clogged by storm debris and lack of electricity at Port Fourchon are the leading problems, said Ted Falgout, executive director of the Greater Lafourche Port Commission, which operates the Fourchon site.

Channels leading to the Gulf of Mexico oilfield clogged by storm debris and lack of electricity at Port Fourchon are the leading problems, said Ted Falgout, executive director of the Greater Lafourche Port Commission, which operates the Fourchon site.

Progress toward recovery was made Friday when the port’s Belle Pass Entrance Channel opened to vessels.

Falgout and other officials said losses would have been greater if the storm, which made landfall at Cocodrie Monday morning as a Category 3 with 110 mph winds, had stayed true to initial projections and ramped up to a Category 4.

Port Fourchon officials worried that the storm would cause the catastrophic consequences predicted in an April report, which details the economic impact of a three-week work stoppage.

The report said a storm like Gustav could cause billions of dollars in lost oil revenue and tens of thousands of lost jobs across the country.

Those scenarios did not materialize, officials and economists agreed. So far, no official estimates have been made concerning the overall effect Gustav will have on oil.

The port continued operating after the storm, and remains on track through generator power, as officials wait for traditional electric service to be restored.

“Clearly right now, there’s probably a billion dollars per day of oil and gas unavailable to the American public that this port plays some role in furnishing,” Falgout said, noting that damage to rigs several miles offshore could play a role in the overall equation.

The oil-speculation markets do not appear to be responding to such predictions, however.

“Apparently what the market is telling us is the damage to the Gulf was not bad at all because oil prices have actually fallen in the face of this,” said Baton Rouge-based economist Loren Scott. “My understanding is 2.3 million barrels of oil were not processed because refineries were down. Maybe we will still seek a spike in oil prices when it becomes clear power is out.”
WELL, I GUESS if the press isn't covering it, maybe the billion-dollar-a-day shortfall of oil and gas didn't really happen.

But if one day next week some soccer mom pulls up to the Exxon station in her SUV and her wallet is $10 lighter than it was after the last fill up, will America then care about Louisiana and the missing wetlands that used to protect the oil-and-gas infrastructure?

No, it won't. That is because gasoline grows on trees at the Exxon-Mobil orchards somewhere in Texas, where the mean gas farmers plant fewer and fewer petroleum trees every year to keep prices artificially high.

Um hmm. It's true.

And you heard it here first. Oh . . . and remember that Ike's coming.

Saturday, September 06, 2008

'Now do you care about Louisiana?'


Large swaths of south Louisiana remain dark and in shambles five days in Gustav's wake.

Because the blackest of the blackouts and the shambliest of the shambles lie not within the woebegotten borders of Orleans Parish, the plight of Louisiana is no big whoop to the national media.


IF THE NATION'S ARBITERS of newsworthiness happened by accident to take a look at Friday's Times-Picayune -- after all, it is a New Orleans newspaper -- they might want to rethink their lack of attention to what was hit by the "bullet" the Crescent City dodged:
Three days after Hurricane Gustav made landfall, more than 95 percent of Gulf of Mexico oil production is still shuttered and a key hub for the offshore petroleum industry remains without power.

Gustav slammed into Port Fourchon, a hub used by more than 60 companies to service Gulf rigs and platforms, before coming ashore in Cocodrie on Monday. Port Fourchon also houses the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, a facility that receives about 12 percent of the nation's oil imports.

Director Ted Falgout said Thursday that Port Fourchon may not be able to receive power for four to six weeks. He also said storm sediment and stones displaced from a jetty may leave one of the port's channels impassable for as long as a week.

Meanwhile, the energy sector is beginning to reoccupy its facilities in the Gulf of Mexico, although the bulk of oil and gas production remains shut down. More than 87 percent of the Gulf's natural gas production remained shut down on Thursday, down from 92 percent on Wednesday. More than 95 percent of Gulf oil production remained shut down on Thursday, the same amount as Wednesday.

As of Thursday, 73 percent of the platforms in the Gulf and 52 percent of the rigs in the Gulf remained evacuated. Platforms are the offshore structures from which oil and natural gas are produced. Rigs are offshore drilling facilities.
DOESN'T THIS MEAN that the United States has just lost a pretty big slice of its oil supply for the foreseeable future? And isn't that a big deal?

As a T-shirt popular down on the bayou says,
"Now do you care about Louisiana?"

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Bullseye: Your gas tank


Michael Moore says Hurricane Gustav is "proof there is a God in Heaven."

WELL, IF THAT'S THE CASE, what does it say that this is the bullseye of God's "judgment"? Would that make the target of divine wrath not the Republican National Convention and George W. Bush but, instead, Americans' gas-guzzling, wasteful ways?
Hurricane Gustav has been a Category 3 all day - At 11pm EDT, NHC continues to say that 'some intensification is possible tonight'. 0Z (23:00 EDT) models have increased damage forecasts a bit from six hours ago, but not a lot; however, this can change if it weakens further or re-intensifies or has different landfall track and speed, etc. The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, or LOOP, and Port Fourchon, which has historically been a land base for offshore oil support services in the Gulf, is still directly in the path of Gustav and is expected to take damage. As you will see below, a good bit of oil and natural gas is also expected to be taken offline: some for a few weeks, some for much longer, according to Methaz' models.

Matthew Simmons, of Simmons International says:

LOOP is the only facility in the Gulf to unload VLCC tankers which carry over 2 million barrels of crude. They can in theory be "litered" by unloading onto smaller tankers that can make it into the Gulf Coast ports but this is very lenghty timing and the spare capacity of these smaller tankers is slim. We get about 1.2 million b/d of crude imports through Loop. (+/- 10%)
TO SUMMARIZE the above discussion on The Oil Drum blog . . . Got oil?

Port Fourchon (FOO-shon): Remember that name. And remember places like Port Fourchon and the port of New Orleans are why rebuilding Louisiana's wetlands is important.

Oh, wait . . . we didn't care about Louisiana's wetlands? Oops. Our bad.