The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

Can Kevin Costner Save the Gulf?



It was treated as an oddball twist in the otherwise wrenching saga of the BP oil spill when Kevin Costner stepped forward to promote a device he said could work wonders in containing the spill's damage. But as Henry Fountain explains in the New York Times, the gadget in question — an oil-separating centrifuge — marks a major breakthrough in spill cleanup technology. And BP, after trial runs with the device, is ordering 32 more of the Costner-endorsed centrifuges to aid the Gulf cleanup.



The "Waterworld" actor has invested some $20 million and spent the past 15 years in developing the centrifuges. He helped found a manufacturing company, Ocean Therapy Solutions, to advance his brother's research in spill cleanup technology. In testimony before Congress this month, Costner walked through the device's operation—explaining how it spins oil-contaminated water at a rapid speed, so as to separate out the oil and capture it in a containment tank:



The device can purportedly take in thousands of gallons of oil-tainted water and remove up to 99% of the oil from it. On Thursday, BP posted to its YouTube page a video of the news conference featuring Costner and BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles announcing the news.



"Doug Suttles was the first guy to step up in the oil industry," Costner said at the presser, "and I'm really happy to say when he ordered 32 machines, it's a



signal to the world, to the industry, where we need to be."



Suttles said the additional machines will be used to build four new deep-water systems: on two barges and two 280-foot supply boats.



"We tested it in some of the toughest environments we could find, and actually what it's done — it's quite robust," Suttles said. "This is real technology with real science behind it, and it's passed all of those tests." He added that Costner's device has proved effective at processing 128,000 barrels of water a day, which "can make a real difference to our spill response efforts."



In his congressional testimony, Costner recounted his struggle to effectively market the



centrifuge. He explained that although the machines are quite effective, they can still leave trace amounts of oil in the treated water that exceeds current environmental regulations. Because of that regulatory hurdle, he said, he had great difficulty getting oil industry giants interested without first having the approval of the federal government.



It's true, as



Fountain notes in the Times, that innovation on spill technology has been hobbled in part by the reach of federal regulation — though Fountain also notes that oil companies have elected to devote comparatively little money for researching cleanup devices in the intensely competitive industry.



Costner said that after the device was patented in 1993, he sought to overcome oil-company jitters by offering to allow U.S. oil concerns to use it on a trial basis. He'd extended the same offer to the Japanese government in 1997, he said, but got no takers there either.



— Brett Michael Dykes is a national affairs writer for Yahoo! News.



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_ts2851



It's worth the time to go to the site and watch his statement to Congress.



Personally I think he's got a winning idea and I'm rather appalled (though not surprised) that both government and industry ignored him until now.

COMMENTS

-

---

birra
13:45 Jun 26 2010

At a time like this, they need to consider every possibility that has credible science behind it.



I mean - hello - a centrifuge is designed to separate liquids of differing densities. Science has been using them for ages - why not consider this option?



And he was in better movies than Waterworld for chrissakes... No Way Out, for example... and he got to touch Sean Young's boobies.



*jealous*

---

Oceanne
14:07 Jun 26 2010

Every little bit helps and its good to see someone stepping up to the plate no matter how little or how much it could help.Which is a hell of alot more than we can say for most.I say go Kevin!!

---

KattrinaK
01:23 Jun 28 2010

Crazy lil' shit, but I'll give him that, if his brother's devices actually help filter out a decent amount of oil....I'd say that'd be worth a Nobel Peace Prize or a Knighting...hmmmf.... (Just don't serve Booze at the Event, I'd say ; )

---

POST COMMENT

~Feds Open Coastline up to oil damage~



The incredible ineptness of Obama and the federal government continues to astound, as they have halted the dredging of the Louisiana coastline which was being done to build sand berms to protect them from oil permeating the area.



Since these decisions make no sense, it needs to be investigated whether or not this is being based on ideologies of radical environmentalists which may have infiltrated the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department, which made the decision.



In a letter to Obama, Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser, said this about halting the effort: "Once again, our government resource agencies, which are intended to protect us, are now leaving us vulnerable to the destruction of our coastline and marshes by the impending oil."



There needs to be an investigation into what is happening here, and why these type of outrageous decisions are being made. The federal government opposed the sand berms in the first place, finally giving in as pressure mounted to get the job done.



The idiotic statement was made that the berms could harm other parts of the environment. How stupid can people get? Of course they're government employees, so it's understandable.



In other words, let's allow the oil to come to wreck the environment, so we don't wreck the environment with sand berms. That's the reasoning, and the Obama administration needs to relieve these people of their duties and positions and start investigating why these outrages continue.



That is of course, unless Obama and the Democrats back these criminal actions.



http://commoditysurge.blogspot.com/2010/06/feds-shut-down-sand-berm-efforts.html

The many faces of Obama



Obama has said time and time again that he looks out for the "little people", the unfortunate, the poor and the middle class. He also has said that the environment is one of his most important goals.



Of course we've already seen in many areas that he doesn't exactly have a clue how to get things done and that he firmly believes government is the medication for all our ills. Well here is some pretty good evidence that Obama doesn't give a damn about the middle-class or poor and that the environment takes a back seat to foreign corporations.



There are 50,000 oil wells in the Gulf of Mexico and there has only been 1 major accident, the one we're dealing with right now. Thats a safety record of 99.998%, better than pretty much any other major regional industry of this size.



When 9/11 happened and nearly 3,000 people were killed with 6,000 injured the government suspended air traffic nationwide for 2 ~days.



The present oil spill began April 20, 2010 and then 10 days later Obama ended offshore drilling in the Gulf for 6 months.



Well Gulf drilling accounts for 23.5% of ALL US oil production and 17% of all jobs in Louisiana. And the government has been very slow to address these issues, of at all. This when US unemployment is at its highest rate in 27 years, nearly 1 in 10 people.



At the same time Obama was (and is) crippling local and state economies and increasing our dependency on foreign oil (as well as overstepping the legal boundaries of the Executive branch and the government in general, plus side-stepping free market systems in favor of a more fascist system) he has continued his support of foreign drilling.



In fact the Obama administration invested $2 Billion (with B) in Petrobras (Brazil's state owned oil company). Now aside from the the fact that OUR economy and people are facing huge problems so we don't really have $2 billion to give away to foreign companies it doesn't make much sense that Obama thinks it's OK to finance foreign drilling but wants to completely halt our own.



And if his motivation was environmental to halt our drilling why then does he give money to Brazil. Of all nations Brazil doesn't exactly have an environmentally friendly record, in fact they're raping the Earth with massive pollution, deforestation, water population, building huge dams etc.



An interesting note, George Soros has invested nearly a billion dollars in Petrobras. He also financed the "Center for American Progress" which helped build Obamas winning platform in 2008. According to Time Magazine "not since the Heritage Foundation helped guide Ronald Reagan's transition in 1981 has a single outside group held so much sway."



Another little connection is John Podesta. Podesta was the head of Obamas transition team, he was also the founder of the CforAP. His job was staffing top government agencies and picking the Cabinet members.



And when you add in that Petrobras had $15 billion in PROFITS last year you begin to wonder why they needed a loan.



Now I'm not one for conspiracies but when something is obvious, it's obvious.



Obama might be too cowardly to call the war on terror a real war but he's got the balls to declare war on the oil spill, which in reality is nothing more than a war on the American people and way of life.

According to some "god" exists only in our mind. Recent research has shown that the direct stimulation of an area within the right temporal lobe with small magnetic fields one can create the sensation that a "being" is out there, the sensation of god. They have termed this area the "god spot".



They point to this as proof that god is nothing more than an invention of the mind. More specifically they say that our brains created this notion of god to relieve stress associated with the realization that we shall die.



I take a different view. Humans are biological creatures and in order for God to communicate with us he must use the laws of nature he laid down. This means that he designed our brains with a "god antenna", an area that can pick up on the energy signals that God would need to send us in order for us to experience him. God exists everywhere, he made everything, everything comes from him and all things are energy so God would be the ultimate apex of all energy in this universe and any others that might exist. What this means is he would use energy to let us know he exists, to talk to us, to give us knowledge etc and since our brains operate on energy and can be affected by it, he would use specific frequencies that would allow our brains to pick up on him.



Also, because our brain is wired to pick up on God various problems within the brain (such as temporal lobe epilepsy) can cause us to think we are experiencing God when really it's just a malfunction of our "antenna". This would explain some of the questions people raise to try to prove that God is nothing more than an invention of evolution.







Just some thoughts.

COMMENTS

-

---

WhiteWolf
03:24 Jun 18 2010

*two thumbs up* :D

---

dabbler
23:20 Jun 20 2010

Interesting take on that study.

---

POST COMMENT

A sad day.

Rue McClanahan, 1934-2010





Rue McClanahan (Golden Girls as Blanche) died this morning at 1AM after suffering a massive stroke.



She had her family with her and died in peace according to her manager. She was 76.



http://www.showbizspy.com/article/205821/rue-mcclanahan-dead-at-76-manager-confirms.html





I really liked her and loved her role on The Golden Girls. It's kinda odd how these things always happen in threes. In a relativly short time Rue, Bea Arthur and Estelle Getty have all passed away.



She will be missed.

COMMENTS

-

---

ladySnowStrixx
17:07 Jun 03 2010

oh that is Sad We loved her Ob thought she was a classy and sexy lady , your right she will be missed

---

imagesinwords
17:43 Jun 03 2010

Actually- we've had a lot more than 3 pass as of late: http://deaths.debritz.net/ 8 celebrity deaths in the month of May.

---

imagesinwords
17:51 Jun 03 2010

Dennis Hopper, Gary Coleman, Paul Gray, Ronnie James Dio, Lena Horne, Lynn Redgrave, Peter Steele, Dixie Carter... more...



But- you are talking about the Golden Girls specifically as I read over. I just didn't think they were too, too close as Estelle died 2 years ago. They are elderly, so this isn't really too surprising.

---

dabbler
23:22 Jun 20 2010

I think she was just a hostess of SNL, not to long ago.

---

POST COMMENT