this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2023
222 points (99.1% liked)

World News

39135 readers
4008 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News [email protected]

Politics [email protected]

World Politics [email protected]


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

Authorities in the South American nation of Ecuador have confirmed that an oil spill released about 1,200 barrels into the Pacific, contaminating kilometres of oceanfront.

Rafael Armendariz, transportation manager for the state-owned oil firm Petroecuador, confirmed on Thursday that the incident took place a day earlier when a tank in the marine terminal in the port of Esmeraldas surpassed its capacity.

“It is estimated that around 1,200 barrels were spilled,” Armendariz said at a press conference. “Not all of them fell onto the beach. A part was contained by the pool inside of Petroecuador’s facilities.”

About half of the crude spilled out of Petroecuador’s facilities, spreading across about 4km (2.5 miles) of Las Palmas Beach, a popular destination for recreation and tourists.

An investigation into the cause of the spill is taking place. General Manager Ramon Correa said problems like negligence, mechanical damage or sabotage could not yet be ruled out.

Esmeraldas is about 150km (93 miles) south of Ecuador’s northern border with Colombia. The company says it has controlled 90 percent of the spill’s impact on land and 60 percent at sea through initial cleanup efforts.

Environmental Minister Jose Davalos told the TV station Ecuavisa the spill could affect wildlife such as birds and crustaceans. He expected the cleanup to take about a week.

Davalos noted that he is awaiting an assessment from Petroecuador before deciding on appropriate penalties.

top 19 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] ixodis 23 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Why do they have guns out? Is it because the oil is black?

[–] assembly 6 points 1 year ago

They heard oil and made invasion plans.

[–] There1snospoon7491 5 points 1 year ago

So are their guns.

Quite the existential crisis one would think.

[–] A_A 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Deepwater Horizon oil spill had a total discharge of 4_900_000 barrels = 4.9 MMbbl, 210,000,000 US gal; 780,000 m^3^

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And BP still exists... We, as a species are a colossal failure.

[–] A_A 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You think we are a failure ? Say that to the dinosaurs : they had millions of years and never built Rockets to prevent asteroids from destroying them. We did it in just a few thousand years.

[–] pepperonisalami 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I think he just meant that we are a failure to our own ideals, for such a smart species we failed to be responsible or keep these companies accountable. Lets say that dinosaurs had millions of years of existence and we achieved more in thousands of years, but wouldn't it be a shame if our achievements is what led us to our own extinction? Icarus's fall would be nothing in comparison to ours, and that in itself can be considered a failure.

[–] A_A 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Constructive criticism of our own species is very good ... I don't want it to become a social disease. Young generations have mental issues and anxiety looking toward the future.

[–] pepperonisalami 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Well, I totally agree with you. I somewhat fall into that category as well (younger-ish generation anxious for the future).

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I’m a Millennial and I feel sorry for Zoomers and they’re only a few years younger than me.

Those Alphas are fucked if this rapid spiral downward trend continues.

[–] player2 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I used to work in the oilfield and my reaction was also, oh, only 1200 bbls? That amount is pretty small in terms of the spills we saw or heard about locally regularly, however that was in the middle of North Dakota and this is on a beach and ocean marine life which makes this so much worse.

[–] A_A -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

~~no, not in North Dakota ... :
"Authorities in the South American nation of Ecuador have confirmed ..."~~
Edit : Oups ! Sorry for that. Thanks to @[email protected] for calling this.

Ok @[email protected] i think I get it this time :

Name enviro. Nb. barrels bad ?
D.W.Horizon at sea 4.9e6 1k x😬
Ecuador beach 1.2e3 😑
N.Dakota on land 1.2e3 🙄
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I believe they were referring to the spills they had personally seen/heard about.

[–] player2 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Aside from actually hurting animals, a beach spill is really bad optics / PR. I know it won't really impact the earth as a whole, natural oil seeps let lots of oil into the ocean every day, but beach spills make headlines.

[–] mayo 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

1,200 barrels is about 2,040 MWh.

4.9 million is 8.3 million MWh.

1 MWh can power a house for about a month or toast 89,000 slices of bread.


Possibly first time in my life I've seen someone use _ instead of , in number format.

[–] A_A 1 points 1 year ago

Decimal_separator (at wikipedia)

I would put a non-breaking space but I don't know how to write a non-breaking space in Lemmy 😌