Iraq seems to have a big problem with oil pipelines leaking into their rivers.

And you're implying that black swans don't exist.

Like the Exxon Valdez and Chernobyl.

There's a good reason that NIMBY's are a growing segment of our pop.

Arkansaw of Samuel L Clemens

"Solved" does not mean that leaks never happen. What most of us do not have here is data that tells us what the rate of leakage ought to be, along with what the rate of leakage actually is. The first number would tell us what is technically feasible. The second number would tell us how close the oil companies are to maintaining that feasibility or if they are slacking off and letting pipelines corrode away (as we saw with BP on the north slope). Does anyone here have access to that sort of data or something similar that would allow us to get a good idea of whether these political concerns are realistic or not?

"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Dr. Albert Bartlett
Into the Grey Zone

There is opposition to TREES in Iceland. Very few trees in living memory (places names persist with forest names though).

The attitude of the Icelandic Forest Service is to back off where resistance appears and plant elsewhere. Come back in 25 or 40 years when people have changed (a new crop of people as one put it) and are more used to seeing trees.

Best Hopes for a Rush to Wind,

Alan