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  • With Rudd gone, Libs are on a loser

     

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    Lindsay Tanner’s planned retirement is a major blow. If Gillard stumbles, my prediction stumbles with her. She needs a good start to move on from the chaos of recent days.

    Judging by her first speech as PM and her first question time performance, Gillard has what it takes to make Abbott look shrill when he attacks her.

    Abbott’s poor personal ratings might not have mattered when the prime minister was more unpopular. But if voters give Gillard a chance, such a honeymoon will turn attention back on to Abbott. That will flow on to attention to his policies, his team, and whether the Liberals have learnt the lessons of Howard’s defeat. Voters don’t like to admit they were wrong and that is what they would be doing by ousting Labor after just one term.

    With Rudd at the helm voters were seriously considering it; with Gillard they might decide to give Australia’s first female PM the time she needs to succeed or fail on her own terms.

    Abbott wants to remind voters that it is the same failed government with a different leader. That argument only works if voters agree that Labor has been a failure. Yes they have had their problems, major problems, including with policy delivery.

    But the three biggest problems with Rudd’s first term were his autocratic style, his sudden unpopularity and his unwillingness to consult.

    All three are now gone, so watch out Tony Abbott, I say.

    106 comments on this story

  • New ocean’ will split Africa”

     

    “Parts of Afar are below sea level and the ocean, the sea is only cut off by about a 20-metre block of land in Eritrea,” he said.

    “Eventually this will rift apart, the sea will flood in and will start to create a new ocean, and eventually the Somalia plate will drift off and we’ll have a smaller Africa and a very big island which floats out into the Indian Ocean.”

    – BBC

    Tags: science-and-technology, geography, geology, ethiopia

  • Rio declares RSPT dead

    Let’s hope he is right.
     
    Neville Gillmore.
     

    Rio declares RSPT dead

    Friday June 25, 2010, 5:00 pm
     

     

     

     

    The head of Rio Tinto in Australia says the mining super profits tax, in its previous form, is dead.

    Sam Walsh made the comments at the opening of the company’s new operations centre in Perth.

    “I think the tax as it was originally described, is dead, I think what we will see is something that will enable projects to go ahead and I’m very hopeful that will be sooner, rather than later,” he said.

    He says he is hopeful the change in prime minister will allow industry and government to make progress on the resource rent tax, and resolve the issue before the next federal election.

    “I’m very hopeful that with the recent changes in the structure of the Government that we can actually get in and engage and negotiate,” he added.

     

     

     

     

     

    More Quotes and Company Information

  • Change came even faster than the plotters knew

     

    She gave no commitment but said she wanted to sound out friends, including colleagues Warren Snowdon and Brendan O’Connor, and importantly, Kim Carr, the Victorian Left powerbroker who had installed the Rudd-Gillard team in 2006.

    Enthused, Senator Feeney sought out Don Farrell, the South Australian senator and powerbroker. The Victorian Right was split and Senator Farrell would help unite it behind Ms Gillard.

    They started counting numbers.

    Bill Shorten, the Victorian Right MP, had approached Ms Gillard the week before and asked her to stand. He saw her again on Wednesday. By late afternoon, after question time, momentum was building but had not reached critical mass. The Left was oblivious to what was going on and the traditional heavyweights such as Senator Faulkner were out of the loop, but Senator Arbib was working the NSW Right. By early evening, most of the faction had swung behind Ms Gillard.

    Earlier in the day in Sydney, the right-wing Australian Workers Union had a leadership meeting that, included its two heavyweights, Paul Howes and Bill Ludwig.

    They were unaware of any looming spill and resolved to support Rudd.

    However, around 6pm, as news of a push was growing, Mr Howes was shown internal ALP polling which showed the government was facing wipeout in NSW. Mr Howes and Mr Ludwig jumped into action and threw their support behind Ms Gillard. This galvanised the Right nationally.

    Howes called Wayne Swan, of the Right, who was shifting towards Gillard. After talking to Mr Howes, Mr Swan agreed to stand for deputy.

    The Left realised the challenge was serious. Supporters of Laurie Ferguson, for whom Gillard had found a safe seat in western Sydney after his was abolished, joined the stampede.

    By the time Ms Gillard went to see Mr Rudd at 7.20pm, he was doomed.

    Shorten retired to the Hoang Hau Vietnamese restaurant in Kingston.

    From there, he was working two phones and writing down names.

    With him were four South Australians from the Right: the Sports Minister, Kate Ellis, Senator Dana Wortley and two former federal MPs, David Cox and Martyn Evans.

    Rudd was inside his office with Ms Gillard and Senator Faulkner for three hours. It is believed they tried to talk him into standing down.

    At 10.30pm, a defiant Mr Rudd emerged and said he would fight at a leadership spill scheduled for 9am.

    By daybreak, it was estimated Ms Gillard had about 83 of the 112 votes. Anthony Albanese told Mr Rudd he was doomed and should not contest to spare humiliation

  • Managing Offshore Oil Risks

     

    Managing Offshore Oil Risks

    Julia Aasberg, Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty (AGCS)

    “This will be a significant insurance loss of more than a billion dollars and our expectation is that rates and terms will harden” (Photo: Allianz)
     

     

    What caused the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon semi-submersible drilling unit?

    It’s too soon to tell. However, we know there was a fire and explosion following a control of well event and the exact sequence of events is under investigation. What is interesting is that they had already struck oil and were in the process of completing the well for later production.  This process is usually regarded as lower risk than when actually drilling 13,000 feet deep into the seabed.

     

    Do we know if the problem occurred on the platform or on the seabed?

    Something happened during the completion operation in the well bore. The drilling crew was installing a casing into the well to prepare it for oil and gas production. Customarily, a special mud is pumped down to create a hydrostatic pressure to counteract the pressure from the oil reservoir.

     

    Something upset this balance and it is believed that an uncontrolled flow of oil and gas rose up to the drilling rig, found a source of ignition, and caused the explosion that ultimately sank the rig.

     

    What happened after the explosion?

    Tragically, among the 126 people on board, 17 were injured and there were 11 fatalities. Two days after the explosion, the unit sank and since then the well has continued to leak.

     

    BP is the majority owner of the lease/well and Transocean was hired by BP to drill this and other wells under a long term contract. They will be working closely together to bring the well under control and, in addition, BP has the primary responsibility for cleaning the oil pollution. 

     

    Was this well known to be especially dangerous?

    When there is drilling into a rock formation that has been there for thousands of years with trapped oil and gas the expectation is that there will be pressure, evidenced by the surveys or other well data. BP will have performed extensive surveys and compared them to other well data to establish a design for the well. Based on the information currently available, we do not believe this presented an abnormal risk

     

    You are talking about one borehole, but apparently there are several leaks.

    Yes, after the unit sank it landed on the ocean floor some 500 meters away from the original well. The riser tube that connects the seabed equipment to the drilling rig was ruptured in two places when the drilling rig sank. We understand that oil is leaking from the riser tube and possibly the seabed equipment.

     

    BP is trying to install some sort of metal dome on the well to stop the flow of oil. How would that work?

    BP developed a giant dome to sit over the leaks to contain the oil allowing it to be siphoned up to a tanker rather than let it float to the surface.

     

    Another idea is to drill once again into the oil reservoir. What would that achieve?

    That’s happening right now. There is another oil rig already on site and they are drilling a relief well into the original well bore to attempt to stop the flow. This is achieved by pumping heavy drilling mud through the relief well into the original well bore to stop the uncontrolled flow of oil. This may take 2 to 3 months

  • Big Oil plays jobs cards as it fights offshore=drilling moratorium

     

    Did we mention jobs? Gulf Coast media are chiming in with stories about the moratorium’s ripple effect through local economies and scientists who think the moratorium goes too far.  The New Orleans Times-Picayune recently weighed in with an editorial suggesting that for all his public sympathy for Gulf workers, Barack Obama is guilty of “myopia”:

    President Obama has not heeded the voices urging him to reconsider the scope of the moratorium. Those include engineering and oil industry experts consulted by the administration, who are calling the broad moratorium a mistake that could cause more harm to the economy than the spill itself. They had endorsed different steps such as a moratorium on new drilling permits. They suggested a briefer halt at existing rigs, so that safety tests could be conducted. That’s still a viable strategy. A more nuanced approach would be far wiser and more compassionate than the punishing shutdown that the White House has ordered.

    Not our problem:  During his meeting with BP execs last week, Obama did try to get the company to cover lost wages from the drilling moratorium.  But, as Jonathan Weisman noted in The Wall Street Journal, BP’s lawyers successfully argued that it shouldn’t be responsible for costs directly related to a government ban.  The oil giant eventually agreed to kick in $100 million for Gulf oil workers, in addition to the $20 billion fund to cover spill damages, but that’s probably not enough to cover even a month of lost salaries for rig workers. 

    Putting the people in petroleum: The oil companies, with help from the American Petroleum Institute in Washington, are building their case that when the feds impose drilling bans or otherwise ratchet up regulations, they end up hurting those previously known as “the small people.” As Elizabeth Williamson points out in The Wall Street Journal:

    President Barack Obama’s six-month moratorium on exploratory offshore drilling could strengthen the energy industry’s hand in regulatory battles ahead. The administration says the moratorium is part of a safety review that will “reduce the risk of a second spill by providing the time needed for further investigation.” But in a grassroots effort that reveals the contours of the lobbying battle to come, oil executives and lobbyists point to the moratorium as Exhibit A that more government regulation won’t protect livelihoods in the Louisiana oilfield.

    From sea to sheening sea: No matter how the court fight over the Gulf moratorium turns out, the war over deepwater drilling is only going to get uglier. Big Oil is banking on deep-sea exploration to keep the profits rolling in, as Steve Mufson explains in The Washington Post: 

    Within five years, global deepwater production is expected to rise by two-thirds, to 10 million barrels a day, according to Cambridge Energy Research Associates. That’s equivalent to the amount of crude oil that the world’s largest exporter, Saudi Arabia, produces.

    And you thought you’d heard the last of “Drill, baby, drill.”

     Randy Rieland is a writer who lives in Washington, D.C., but tries to spend as many weekends as possible at his cottage in the Shenandoah Mountains of Virginia. He also actually remembers the first Earth Day. You can email him at randy.rieland[at]gmail[dot]com.