Environment question if the water is unsafe why pump it back in the ocean?

[DanCa]

So why are we flushing it back out in the ocean? This has been bugging me all day. I have got a bad feeling about this.

[indigo]

1. And I have a bad feeling

that the answer is: we have no other choice at present. Perhaps after the job is done, they'll send out clean-up specialists (think Exxon Valdez).

[DRoseDARs]

2. Because that's never really stopped us before...

Recent environmental laws notwithstanding.

[roguevalley]

3. me too. there is no place else to put it. the coast underwater systems

are showing die-offs deep down already. this can't help.

[greyl]

4. Earth will magically turn our debris

into our food because god made the earth for us to conquer and rule.
/sarc

[Benbow]

5. Do we need another Aral Sea?

Polluted ocean - nil life - polluted land around it - no safe drinking water - DNA damage - soaring incidence of cancers?

Can we not repeat what happened to the Caspian Sea, Lake Baikal ...

[charlie]

6. Makes for tastier shrimp

That's probably what they'll be telling us in a few months when the gunk percolates up into our food supply.

[Journeyman]

7. "The Solution to Pollution is Dilution. . ."

or some such short-sighted view as that.

[AtomicKitten]

8. Actually it's going back into the lake.

Not that that makes it any better. Yikes.

[DoYouEverWonder]

10. Going to the lake first is better

The lake is already polluted anyway and by putting the water there first it can filter through the lake and the marshes before it gets to the gulf.

This is a standard practice all over for getting rid of pollutants. It won't get rid of everything but it help a lot.

[DanCa]

9. I keep flashing on the picture of Bart Simpson catching the mutant fish.

If any good comes from this horror hopefully it'll push environmental issues to the fore front.

[MercutioATC]

11. They did the same thing after Camille.

Simply put, it's a matter of priorities. If you want NOLA dry anytime in the next 2 or 3 years, you simply can't take the time to treat all of that water...

[doc03]

12. Just what are they supposed to do with it? Leave it there

for years while they build water treatment facilities to clean it up?

[tx_dem41]

13. What makes you think the Gulf is "safe" to begin with?

The Mississippi River, which is TOXIC to begin with, pumps billions of gallons of toxicity into it probably on a daily basis. The Gulf has several "dead" zones along the coast and has for years.

Why do you think 'dem oysters are so tasty?

[greyl]

14. nice facet :) nt

[slor]

15. I contacted Changing World Technologies...

to see if they could run it through Thermal Depolymerization. No response yet.

[Fescue4u]

16. No other choice

the water *is*

And theres a shitload of it. We simply do not have the technology for a good solution.

3 choices:

1) Abandon New Orleans as a Toxic Wasteland. Expect the toxic wasteland to leach out and contaminates everything around it.

2) Pump the water into the ocean, let the chips fall where they may

3) Spend years building a facility to process the LAKE of water and then pump it out. In the meantime N.O decays and the toxic wasteland leaches out and contaminates everything around it.

Either way, we're fuked.

[greyl]

17. It all depends on how much money it's worth, again.

Millions of barrels, pipelines, tankers, barges, war - "Texas Sized" terms all relevant to the discussion of oil dependency and civilizational superiority, but not relevant to the (inculcated) discussion of ending our abuse of Earth and caring for the weakest among us.

[Barad Simith]

18. You must be one o' them people what don't believe Jesus is coming back

Git on board, sonny. This earth is cursed -- has been since Eve tempted Adam with the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A little more pollution ain't gonna make much difference.

Don't worry, boy, Jesus will return before things git really bad. It's in the New Testament somewheres, I dunno, I can never find it but the preacher says it's there.