台灣海陸運輸公司(TMT)神秘的蘇老闆(蘇信吉，Mr. Nobu SU, Nobu還是個日文名字，若信吉二字皆以日語發音大概是Nobuyoshi)買了這搜韓國製的「鯨魚號」，但在墨西哥灣漏油事件發生後，他要求將船改裝成除油船。船在葡萄牙改裝完成後，就立刻駛向墨西哥灣。蘇老闆的動機為何？連登船採訪的ABC的記者都不禁要問。

很可惜，上周末兩天的測試結果是「無法確定」(inconclusive)，不然這要一艘龐然大物來除油，應該比起那些現在在墨西哥灣以漁船改裝成的除油船的效率要高許多。

我想台灣海陸運輸公司(TMT)的蘇老闆看到了機會，並且寶握這個機會。剛好他有一艘剛交船的大油輪，如果能有效除油，就算BP不願與他簽訂除油合約，美國的民間或政府也會逼BP就範。這就是創業家的精神吧！而且是高風險的投資，當然相對的，如果成功也是高利潤。能保護環境，又能賺錢，真是樁好生意！－－希望「鯨魚號」真有台灣海陸運輸公司(TMT)所宣稱的能耐，墨西哥灣漏油事件的衝擊可以盡速減緩，一方面也讓台灣的商人賺到錢。

船東說第三天的策是情況良好。但是淺海區也限制了「鯨魚號」的運作。BP與Coast Guard 最快今天就會決定是否租用「鯨魚號」，請參考下面這一則ABC的報導。




 2010.7.13 (04:00am TW Time) update: 
The Taiwanese supertanker A Whale, said to be able to collect some 21million gallons of oily water per day, is still being evaluated to seehow effective it would be in helping the gulf spill.

 2010.7.18 補記：
美國海岸防衛隊少將祖昆夫特十六日表示，經過兩週大規模的測試，被寄予清除墨西哥灣油污厚望的台灣汲油船鯨魚號成效不彰，他說，鯨魚號回收的油量幾乎掛零，「我們在油槽中發現的盡是水，所以非常沒有效果。」他宣布，鯨魚號將不會用在清油任務上。
http://www.libertytimes.com.tw/2010/new/jul/18/today-int6.htm


台灣除油船鯨魚號 風浪大延遲撈油
【聯合晚報╱國際新聞組/綜合報導】
   
2010.07.06 03:12 pm

號稱全球最大除油船的台灣除油船「鯨魚號」，最快6日就可以正式獲准參與美國墨西哥的撈油作業，為清除墨西哥灣海面油污作業帶來了希望。在此同時，英國石油公司（BP）因墨西哥灣鑽平台漏油而付出的代價已突破30億美元。

「鯨魚號」原定5日完成48小時測試，可是由於海上風浪太大，只得延長測試時間，並根據現場狀況調整作業和裝備，以提高撈油效能。

如果一切順利，「鯨魚號」最快6日就可以正式獲准參與撈油作業。擁有這艘船隻的台灣海陸運輸公司(TMT)希望與BP訂約協助清除油污，並正準備出動另外兩艘撈油船。

美國海軍的MZ-3A型氣船也可望在6日抵達墨西哥灣，以協助偵測油污、指揮撈海船，以及尋找可能受到油污威脅的野生生物。

這種氣船可以在空中停留長達12小時，操作也比飛機或直升機省錢，而且能夠監督更廣大地區。

同時，有關官員說，部署重油回收裝置使清理作業大有進展，而未來數周這種裝置將增加到1000個，以吸收傳統撈油方法奈何不了的厚重稠油。

BP說，迄今因應這個事件的開支已達到大約31億2000萬美元，包括因應和圍堵漏油、開鑿解壓井、向受影響各州提供贈款、理賠和支付聯邦費用。

在美國總統歐巴馬強力施壓下，BP上個月同意停止分紅，以及撥出200億美元成立基金，以因應漏油事件所需。

BP正出售一些次要資產，以籌募100億美元，可是公司發言人5日駁斥BP正向其他石油集團、亞洲和中東的主權財富基金求助，以免遭到敵意併購的報導。

http://udn.com/NEWS/WORLD/WOR3/5707768.shtml



Tar balls from Gulf disaster reach Lake Pontchartrain, shores of Texas
By the CNN Wire Staff
July 5, 2010 -- Updated 2252 GMT (0652 HKT)

New Orleans, Louisiana (CNN) -- Tar balls linked to the worst oil spill in U.S. history have reached into Louisiana's Lake Pontchartrain and hit the beaches near Galveston, Texas, authorities in those states reported on day 77 of the disaster.

Easterly winds and high waves that hindered skimmers drove blobs of weathered oil up into the eastern end of the lake, which sits north of New Orleans, said Anne Rheams, executive director of the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation. She estimated the amount of oil that has reached the lake at less than 100 barrels, with no hydrocarbon smell.

"They are about the size of a silver dollar, maybe a little bigger, kind of dispersed in long intervals. It's not as dense as it could be, so we're thankful for that," she said.

The Coast Guard reported over the weekend that a shift in weather patterns could send more oil toward sensitive shores in Mississippi and Louisiana, and bad weather over the past few days has significantly hampered cleanup efforts. Rheams said that pattern was expected to persist for at least three more days.

Rear Adm. Paul Zukunft said Friday that the prospect of oil reaching up into Lake Pontchartrain "is where I'm losing the most sleep right now."

"I'm going to look, and if I see even sheen, I'm going to push to make sure that we're moving every and all available resources to respond to this

Tar balls had previously been spotted in Rigolets Pass, which connects the lake with Mississippi Sound. Officials in Orleans and St. Tammany parishes have been using heavy booms, barges and skimmers to defend Pontchartrain since the early days of the disaster, but Rheams said high waves and strong easterly and southeasterly winds have complicated the effort.

"The main thing is that they are an indicator that it could be coming more so this way," she said.

State officials closed a swath of the southern part of the 630-square-mile lake to fishing following the discovery, but there was no sign of an impact on wildlife as of Monday, Rheams said.

And in Texas, about 400 miles west of the ruptured offshore well at the heart of the spill, Coast Guard Capt. Marcus Woodring said the total volume of tar balls found over the weekend amounted to about five gallons. And while authorities weren't sure how they made it that far, tests confirmed that at least the first batch collected came from the Deepwater Horizon spill off Louisiana, he said.

None were found Monday, and the area's beaches and waterways remained open, Woodring said. The tar balls were less weathered than researchers would expect, leading to suspicions that the oil was either stuck to the side of a ship's hull or mixed in with ballast water from a passing vessel, Woodring said.

Tar balls are fairly common along the Texas coast, in part because of seepage from undersea oil deposits or from sunken vessels, he said.

A federal task force has estimated that between 35,000 and 60,000 barrels (about 1.5 million to 2.5 million gallons) of oil have been gushing into the Gulf daily since April 22, when the Deepwater Horizon oil rig sank in the Gulf, two days after it exploded in flames. The accident left 11 workers dead and uncorked an undersea gusher that well owner BP has been unable to cap for 11 weeks.

Meanwhile, weekend tests of the A Whale, a converted cargo ship its owners say is the world's largest oil-skimming vessel, turned out to be inconclusive, its owners reported.

Bob Grantham of TMT Shipping Offshore said rough seas over the initial 48-hour testing period made it difficult to determine the skimming results, but he expects more typical sea conditions over coming days will allow more testing. TMT will work with the Coast Guard during the extended testing period "to make operational and technological adjustments aimed at improving skimming effectiveness, given the actual conditions we are encountering in the Gulf," Grantham said.

The A Whale spent the weekend attempting to separate crude oil from seawater in a 25-square-mile area north of the ruptured BP oil well that's caused the largest oil spill in U.S. history. Taiwan-based TMT says the ship can skim about 21 million gallons of oil a day, about 250 times the capability of the modified fishing vessels now being used in the Gulf.

More help is on the way in the form of heavy oil recovery devices, or HORDs. The Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center says that just weeks after the first HORD was successfully tested in the Gulf off the Alabama coast, the devices are making the cleanup much more efficient and effective, especially in collecting the thick, heavy oil that hampers traditional skimming methods. They are also able to clean up the extremely light and difficult-to-remove sheen left on the water's surface after skimming.

Eight to 10 HORDs, originally dubbed tarball retrieval devices, are being manufactured each day in shipyards in Pensacola, Florida, and Bayou La Batre, Alabama. Up to 1,000 units are expected to be manufactured and put into service, according to the Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center.

The disaster has scared tourists away from the Gulf Coast and prompted the federal government to close a third of federal Gulf waters to fishing and impose a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil drilling -- a severe blow to states where resorts, fisheries and oil are pillars of the economy. BP said Monday it has spent more than $3 billion on efforts to contain and clean up the spill and pay claims leveled by idled workers.

The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration extended the fishing closures by about 1,100 square miles on Sunday, adding the waters off Louisiana's Vermilion Bay to the off-limits zone. Vermilion Parish President Wayne Touchet said Monday the new closures will hamper local fishermen, but he expects the restrictions to be lifted soon as the weather shifts.

"We weren't really affected by the oil spill until now. At the beginning of the oil spill, we had some closures in state waters, in fishing and oystering areas. Those areas reopened quickly," Touchet said.

"Now, it's the height of shrimping season and (we) have closure in federal waters. Most of our shrimping is in near-shore waters, but they closed at 6 a.m. this morning due to the season to prevent overfishing," he said.

And a tropical disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico, about 50 miles southwest of Morgan City, Louisiana, loomed as a new potential threat Monday evening. The National Hurricane Center reported that there was a 60 percent chance that the disorganized, low-pressure system could develop into a tropical storm before moving inland Monday night or Tuesday.

Since the system is so close to shore, it is not likely to have much time to develop. But it could dump up to 2 to 4 inches of rain on the area as it moves onshore, the hurricane center reported.

BP said it got about 24,955 barrels of oil out of the water Sunday. And the use of burning and dispersants appear to be breaking up the large, uninterrupted tracts of oil that have plagued the Gulf in recent weeks.

Charles Gaiennie, a spokesman for the joint oil spill response, said Monday that aircraft flying over the Gulf are not encountering contiguous patches of oil at the same rate as before. He credits the "proactive response" and, ironically, the rough seas that, while they have somewhat limited the collections operations, have broken up the oil patches.

BP said Monday it is making progress on the long-term solution to the leak -- two relief wells. BP said the first relief well has reached a depth of 17,725 feet and is on its sixth "ranging" run, using an electromagnetic field to determine where best to intersect with the main well for "kill" operations at a target depth of around 18,000 feet. The second relief well is now 13,871 feet deep, BP said.

CNN's Elizabeth Mayo, Dave Hennen, Vivian Kuo and Aaron Cooper contributed to this report.

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/07/05/gulf.oil.disaster/index.html



BP Oil Spill: World's Largest Oil Skimmer Arrives in Gulf of Mexico
ABC News Goes on Board Taiwanese Billionaire's 'Whale' of a Ship
By JEFFREY KOFMAN and BRADLEY BLACKBURN



BOOTHVILLE, La., July 1, 2010 —

Of the thousands of people who've come forward with big ideas for cleaning up BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, one company has come forward with a giant idea it claims could collect hundreds of thousands of barrels of oily water per day and make a whale of a difference.

The company's massive skimming ship currently floating off the Louisiana shoreline is called, literally, "A Whale," and with good reason. The 1,100-foot long tanker is 10 stories tall, stamped with a blue whale on the side of its bridge, and has been specially retrofitted by its owner, TMT Shipping of Taiwan, to collect oil from the Gulf.

Upon hearing about the oil spill, now the largest ever in the Gulf of Mexico, the owner of the ship, mysterious Taiwanese billionaire Nobu Su, ordered his engineers to cut vents in the bow and redesign the tanks inside, creating the largest skimming vessel in the world.

They claim that the monster can do in two weeks what 500 skimming boats have accomplished in two months' time.

"We can effectively skim about 300,000 to 400,000 barrels per day," said the ship's captain, Sanio Radhakrishman.

There's no question that more skimming capacity is needed. Skimming boats are still docked because of the effects of Alex, a tropical storm moving over central Mexico.

Jindal Expresses Anger Over Federal Response

Near Barataria Bay, La., the state's Republican governor, Bobby Jindal, asserted his frustration with the cleanup efforts, noting that he asked President Obama a month ago for help cutting through the bureaucracy.

"What is frustrating is they just don't get it in Washington, they just don't have a sense of urgency," he said, calling on the federal government to approve his plan to build a barrier of rock pilings to keep the oil at bay. "It is ridiculous when they think rocks in the water are more dangerous than oil."

Feds Not Sure If A Whale Can Work

But the government has moved quickly to give A Whale a shot on the water. It soon will give the ship a test, but no one is sure whether the vessel will actually work.

"We're anxious to find out how effective it will be," said Adm. Thad Allen, the national incident commander. "But it is a very large ship that's been converted to be able to recover oil, and we'll see how it goes."

Today, ABC News went aboard A Whale and descended deep into the bowels of the ship to see firsthand how it is supposed to work.

In the Gulf, the ship will take enough water into its ballasts that the jaws are level with the surface of the water.

"The oil water will be coming through those jaws, going through those gates," said Chief Officer Moham Bhist, as he gestured toward the grilled openings cut into in the bow, about a foot tall.

The oil-water mix will be pumped through those openings into holding tanks, where simple science takes over. Like a giant decanter, the oil will float to the surface, where it will be skimmed off. The remaining water then will be pumped back into the Gulf.

Dirty Water In, Cleaner Water Out

While the skimming process may not remove every drop of the oil, the ship's crew says it could help cleanup efforts tremendously.

"Whatever we are taking in, that is more dirty as compared to what we are pumping out," said Bhist.

Still, it's never been tried before with a ship of this size. It's a high-cost, high-stakes experiment, and Su, the owner of the ship, simply decided to do it on a whim. He retrofitted the tanker and sent it to the Gulf on his own dime. The ship sailed to the Gulf with no prior permission from BP or the Coast Guard to help in the cleanup effort.

What Motivates Mysterious Billionaire?

Nobu largely was unknown out of shipping circles, and the crew offered little explanation as to his motivation.

"He's a great guy," offered Radhakrishnan.

With so much oil in the Gulf and so much pressure to clean it up, federal officials certainly hope that his idea will work.

"We have high hopes for anything that can be effective down there," said Adm. Allen.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2010 ABC News Internet Ventures
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/bp-oil-spill-super-skimmer-whale-promises-cleanup/story?id=11067664

台灣海陸運輸公司 前身信榮航運 海運界怪咖 船舶買賣有一手