 | DrumBeat: August 19, 2007 | The Oil Drum | The Economics of Oil, Part I: Supply and Demand Curves (Detached Comment Thread) |  |
Hurricane Dean Update and Resource Aggregation Post
Posted by Prof. Goose on August 19, 2007 - 10:20am
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: cantarell, hurricane dean, louisiana, oil, peak oil, refining, shipping, texas, thunder horse [list all tags]
Folks, thanks for your great efforts in this thread. There's a lot of cool stuff down there! Now, if we just knew where Dean was going...so, continue linking to maps (esp. of Cantarell/Jack/Yucatan, but Texas and LA too), oil maps, NG maps, LNG stations, refinery maps, pipeline maps, shipping lanes, rig maps, news stories, weather, track predictions, strategic resources, and all that other stuff in this comment thread. Then I'll go through and start aggregating those for what looks more and more like it will be a very busy week next week. Ideas or assistance are always welcome. (New post on Dean as of 20:50 EDT 8/19 up top.)
Right click and click view image to see these full size, I want to keep them manageable for now.
If memory serves, Rita was initially projected to hit the Texas/Mexico border, and it ended up hitting close to the Texas/Louisiana border, so at this point I would think that the GOM assets are facing some very real potential risk.
I suspect that it is a question of when--and not if--that the the GOM assets get hit this hurricane season.
WT,
The danger for the GOM is there, but it takes at least another 2 days before we have a clue were Dean is gonna hit:
IN THE SHORT
TERM...THE GUIDANCE IS IN GOOD AGREEMENT ON A WEST-NORTHWESTWARD
TRACK TOWARD JAMAICA. THE OFFICIAL FORECAST WILL FOLLOW
THIS...WITH THE TRACK DOWN THE LEFT SIDE OF THE GUIDANCE ENVELOPE
DUE TO THE INITIAL MOTION. AFTER THAT...UKMET...GFS...AND
CONSENSUS MODELS CALL FOR A MOTION TOWARD THE NORTHERN YUCATAN
PENINSULA AND NORTHEASTERN MEXICO. THE GFDL CALLS FOR A MOTION
THROUGH THE YUCATAN CHANNEL TO THE TEXAS COAST...WHILE THE ECMWF
AND NOGAPS CALL FOR A MORE WESTERLY MOTION THROUGH THE CENTRAL
YUCATAN AND THE BAY OF CAMPECHE INTO MAINLAND MEXICO..
Roger from the Netherlands
I'm no hurricane expert, but in the "what if" department, what if Dean does show the same kind of turn that Katrina and Rita showed:
Katrina
http://flhurricane.com/googlemap.php?2005s12
Rita
http://flhurricane.com/googlemap.php?2005s18
Yep. It's going to be all about the "turning winds"...if Dean runs into a strong upper westerly (which is prevailing), then he'll turn...right now the shear forecast is relatively moderate, or so they're saying over at easternuswx.com.
Latest Dean thread:
http://www.easternuswx.com/bb/index.php?showtopic=140133&st=320
On August 17, 1915 a hurricane blew into Galveston. The storm surge was 12 feet causing waves as high as 21 feet. The dead were numbered at 275 in Galveston.
http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=23&id=1...
The 1900 storm was much worse. Follow the link, read the story, look at the pictures BEFORE you consider staying in the path of a major hurricane, particularly in low lying coastal areas. We have done a lot to mitigate the affects of storms and storm surge, but please don't play chicken with a major hurricane.
EDIT: Wikipedia reference to the same storm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galveston_Hurricane_of_1900
Mexican Oil reserves:
http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~leeman/MexOilReserves.gif
Mexican refineries:
http://www2.nrcan.gc.ca/es/es/NA-enrgpic2006/rpImages/5-04-e.gif
A Google earth mashup:
The green bars are representing 2005 oil production (blue bars for gas production). Click to Enlarge
The blue dots are representing the major oil platforms. Click to Enlarge
Those images were obtained using Google Earth using the tools given here.
I plan to add refinery positions soon.
For those not familiar with Google Earth it might be helpful to include some info on how to view the data. It's not immediately obvious what to do with a "KMZ" file, and finding the relevant info on the Google Earth website takes quite a bit of hunting and clicking. Here's a hint: don't download the kmz file to your computer, it's meant to be used as a network link.
Cheers,
Jerry
That's incredible Khebab.
Dean is moving further and further south:
Wow.
One of my favorite sites, TheStormTrack.com, has posted a Dean update.
Dean Preparing to Strengthen Significantly
It looks like everything is coming down to what happens around Jamaica. If it stays on course and plows right into the center of the island, that will dampen the intensity considerably, and that will also mean that the GFDL model track probably won't be "it". On the other hand, if the track nudges just a bit farther north, then it will roar right through the Yucatan straight and into the GOM, maybe as a Cat 5.
A lot of fate will be haning on the forecast updates over the next 24-48 hours.
This is a good site with blog to keep up with the latest news about Dean and the other storms that will likely follow this season:
WunderGround Blog
And ofcourse the National(USA) Hurricane Centre
Roger From The Netherlands
1:52 update courtesy TWC - winds now 125MPH!! badbadbad...
Yeah.. allready a CAT. 3 hurricane and still a lot more to come.
Roger from the Netherlands
For the "quick and easy" crowd you really can't beat the Tropical Storm Risk site http://tsr.mssl.ucl.ac.uk/ The pages load fast and are extremely easy to navigate, just click on the map to drill down into specific storms and forcast locations.
Cheers,
Jerry
Mexican off-shore field locations, including Cantarell:
Source: offshore-mag.com
Dear Consume More:
Excellent site. I never knew it existed. After poking around for a bit on their site, I found this detailed pdf map of US Gulf oil/gas fields/pipelines and who operates them.
http://downloads.pennnet.com/os/posters/2007_os_gommap.pdf
Let your views be known: www.cafepress.com/crashdummy
As noted by local meteorologists in New Orleans (whom I trust more than the Feds), the key point is the interaction of the Blue Mountains of Jamaica with Dean. 7.400' tall but small surface area, they can violently disrupt a hurricane and the interaction is not properly modeled.
A small displacement in the path can change the interaction from leading side (bad side) to eye to trailing side (good side). Good sized mountains in Hispaniola as well as some moderate size mountains in Eastern Cuba (the rest of Cuba and Yucatan is relatively flat).
Monday we will know more & better,
Best Hopes for the Blue Mts,
Alan
A useful graph for understanding the uncertainty in predictions and the past accuracy of forecasts.
Basically if the track comes within 300km of something important, 72 hours out - worry.
Typical 'Texas as target' dimension = 300km
Where do you get this information? I'm curious to see the correlation between storm speed and the daily drift (assume max turn is 100km/24 hours). I'd also like to see something showing storm speed over its total track.
This one is short on detail but nice to show the little folks & laymen.
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2005/hurricanes/interactive/fullpage.hurrica...
Click on the graph for a link to the source - UK Met Office
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_l...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantarell_Field
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pemex#Current_situation
http://maps.google.com/maps?ie=UTF8&om=1&z=7&ll=19.849394,-94.163818&spn...
Well, it's still way early but this is the latest run of the GFDL tracking model on Dean. Important to note that it is currently the eastern most outlier on projected path. But, this would put Dean near the center of the production assets and more bad news to folks in Louisiana.
http://moe.met.fsu.edu/cgi-bin/gfdltc2.cgi?time=2007081712-dean04l&field...
click the fwd button on right side
and that is almost EXACTLY the worst case scenario damage-wise...a Cat 5 at that angle hits just about everything important and puts us in bad shape for a while.
Chuck Watson has been mentioning just this kind of scenario, by the way...but it's early days on this thing.
We would need to see gasoline rationing if this scenario comes to pass wouldn't we? I mean the refineries all get hit, platforms, etc. This could be the straw the breaks the camels back and sends the US back to third world status. Am I being unduly alarmist?
'sends us to third world status;
Yes quite alarmist. Katrina destroyed a large American city and oil rigs, yes gas was expensive for a couple months but other than that most never noticed.
by the way solardude, did I find your picture online?
http://www.planearium2.de/bilder/wallpaper-char-tweek-1280.jpg
Things are quite a bit tighter than they were two years ago mr. antidoomer. Where do suppose those missing barrels are going to come from now?
Im not saying gas wont' get expensive, it will, and it might be a little tight. But to say the US will become a third world country because of a hurricane is quite fanatical.
It was/is a serious question. Can the US economy withstand a Cat5 hurricane right through the heart of its oil and gas infrastructure right now? I'm not so sure the answer is yes.
Don't worry the Fed will loan money to banks to cover the withdraws to buy that expensive gasoline <:/
Yes, it will send the US back to the third world. I suspect Iran and Africa would be the first places President Kaboom visits.
Holy crap. That really looks like the worst case scenario for NOLA.
It is fast moving and that minimizes the storm surge into Lake Pontchartrain, the Achilles heel of New Orleans.
PLENTY of wind damage in New Orleans.
OTOH, you could expect widespread damage on the West Bank and failure of the Harvey Canal with flooding of Algiers and West bank Jefferson and Plaquemines Parish.
Much higher % white people there that vote Republican, so I would expect significantly faster relief this time.
Best Hopes for the Blue Mts. of Jamaica,
Alan
I asked about this earlier and haven't seen a response yet - do fast moving storms stay fast moving, or does their speed change over the course of their lifetime?
I recall in 2004(?) one storm (Ivan?) just squatted over Florida and unloaded, causing lots of flooding and wind damage.
SacredCowTipper,
Weak storms have a tendency to stall out and give up huge rainfalls . Tropical Storm Alison, the one that flooded so much in Houston five or six years ago caused a lot more flood damage than Hurricane Rita, a category 5 the year before last. Bob Ebersole
Floyd was very slow moving, sat off the outer banks for 24 hrs. Very little wind damage, but so much rain pumped in that it put a considerable percentage of ENC under water.
Governor of LA is a democrat. The Governor is the only authority on deployment of State or National Guard assets for relief or any other reason.
Looks like the GFDL model has shifted the path to the south, making landfall right in the middle of Texas.
Some of the various models can be viewed here:
http://moe.met.fsu.edu/tcgengifs/
How oil prices are staying down today is baffling. Last year, if a CAT 3 was even thinking about Texas, prices on a Friday would have gone ballistic.
It's tempting to mortgage the house (if I could get a loan!!! :)) and buy more futures, but prudence forbids it.
Have a nice weekend everybody.
And would Prudence be the name of your wife?