The Stained Earth, Courtesy Of BP

The beautiful and crystalline Blue Marble is now the Stained Blue Marble, created using NASA’s spectacular view of Earth and one of the scenarios for the spreading of BP’s oil, as simulated by the US National centre for Atmospheric Research.

While the NCAR says that their computer simulation shows one of the potential scenarios for the oilpocalypse spread—applying sea currents and typical weather on a neutral dye, not on actual oil—I couldn’t resist overlaying it over the complete image of the Earth. Seeing what could be the extension of this catastrophe in relation to our entire home planet—only 132 days after the start of the deadly flood—gives the whole disaster a complete new dimension.

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Scenes from the Gulf of Mexico

Based on recently revised estimates, BP's ruptured oil well at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico continues to leak 25,000 to 30,000 barrels of oil a day. The new figures suggest that an amount of oil equivalent to the Exxon Valdez disaster could still be flowing into the Gulf of Mexico every 8 to 10 days. Despite apparent efforts to restrict journalists from accessing affected areas, stories, video and photographs continue to emerge. Collected here are recent photographs of oil-affected wildlife, people and shorelines around the Gulf of Mexico on this, the 51st day after the initial explosion.

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Caught in the Oil

A short entry from Boston.com. AP Photographer Charlie Riedel just filed the following images of seabirds caught in the oil slick on a beach on Louisiana's East Grand Terre Island. As BP engineers continue their efforts to cap the underwater flow of oil, landfall is becoming more frequent, and the effects more evident.

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The Relentless Pursuit of Extreme Energy

Yes, the oil spewing up from the floor of the Gulf of Mexico in staggering quantities could prove one of the great ecological disasters of human history. Think of it, though, as just the prelude to the Age of Tough Oil, a time of ever increasing reliance on problematic, hard-to-reach energy sources. Make no mistake: we’re entering the danger zone. And brace yourself, the fate of the planet could be at stake.

It may never be possible to pin down the precise cause of the massive explosion that destroyed the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig on April 20th, killing 11 of its 126 workers. Possible culprits include a faulty cement plug in the undersea oil bore and a disabled cutoff device known as a blow-out preventer. Inadequate governmental oversight of safety procedures undoubtedly also contributed to the disaster, which may have been set off by a combination of defective equipment and human error. But whether or not the immediate trigger of the explosion is ever fully determined, there can be no mistaking the underlying cause: a government-backed corporate drive to exploit oil and natural gas reserves in extreme environments under increasingly hazardous operating conditions.

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