It's a common sense idea.
Every offshore oil well would have a relief well drilled concurrently with the main well. That way, if an off shore well begins to leak, the relief well is already in place. If this had already been a law, the Deepwater Horizon well would have blown on April 20th and by April 23rd or so the situation would have likely been under control. Three days of leaking vs. over one hundred days of leaking.
More below...
I'm no expert in the oil drilling business. Perhaps Fishgrease could give his input. But it seems to make sense on the surface. If the sure-fire solution to stopping a blown out well is to drill a relief well, then maybe it needs to be mandatory that the relief well already be in place before one drop of oil is harvested.
Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) introduced a bill today titled "Emergency Relief Well Act" that would make this the law of the land. From The Huffington Post...
Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) introduced legislation on Tuesday that would require oil companies to begin drilling emergency relief wells concurrently with any new offshore drilling sites off the coast of the United States. The idea is to preemptively ensure that the most surefire safety mechanism is in place should major eruptions or spills occur. It would not apply to sites currently operating in the Gulf.
LINK TO FULL STORY
Putting this law into place could virtually eliminate the risk of any future disaster with offshore drilling. It will increase the cost of each drilling operation, but so will any reform.
I like this idea because of it's sheer simplicity. Under this new law, virtually everything can go wrong and disaster can still be avoided. The oil company, the rig operator, sub contractors, government inspectors... all of them could miserably fail at their duties and still there wouldn't be a disaster of this scale ever again. Not even close.
I think this kind of legislation may be the key to continuing offshore drilling until we can phase it out with a transition over to clean and renewable energy sources. There still needs to be discussion, but so far it seems like a viable solution.
Here is some general information about how a relief well works...
How A Relief Well Works
Thanks for reading.