Welcome, MMS OCEAN ENERGY EXPLORERS!
Did you know that oil can be found in the ocean floor?
Some of this oil comes out of the ground through cracks in the earth that geologists
call natural oil seeps. Another way oil comes from the ocean floor is through drilling.
MMS' job is to watch over the oil companies as they drill for oil in the ocean and make
sure that they get the oil out of the ground safely. To do this, MMS has scientists,
engineers, and technicians to inspect how the oil gets out of the ground and to study the
surrounding ocean environment.
In the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of central and
southern California, oil is being taken from the ocean floor every
day. In fact, this area of the ocean is producing about 78,000 barrels of oil a
day...that's a lot of oil!!!
Oil companies use big steel structures, called offshore platforms, to assist them in
getting oil out from beneath the ocean floor. These platforms are like big skyscrapers or
a mini city in the ocean. In the future, America may begin to explore renewable
energy opportunities, such as harnessing energy from wind, waves, and currents,
in our ocean environments. In fact, did you know that America is currently
reviewing a proposal for the Nation's first offshore wind park?
Check out the sections in the Playground and learn about MMS - its scientists, offshore
energy production, and our ocean environment - as well as how MMS works with students
in the areas of science and math. In the Playground, you will find lots of pictures and an
activities workbook called Petroleum and Our Environment.
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Fun MMS Science
Activities, Puzzles and Other Cool Stuff! |
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Hidden Oasis
by MMS Biologist Greg Sanders
El
tecleo oye para ver nuestro vídeo Ocultado del Oasis en español.
Educational
poster summarizing three ongoing research projects that study
habitats found beneath California offshore platforms. This poster can be
obtained at no charge from the Minerals Management Service, Pacific
OCS Region, Attn: Public Information Office, MS 7000, 770 Paseo
Camarillo, Camarillo, CA 93010. Telephone orders are accepted at
1-800-6-PAC-OCS, or fax orders to
805-389-7689.
Also
available for download in DVD-compatible format by clicking |
HERE!
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The ISO format used for this download is the format
most commonly used for creating disk images for distribution of
large programs over the internet. After the download is complete,
the end user's best option is to burn or copy the download onto a CD
or DVD. |
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National Energy Development (NEED) Project:
Career Chat
with a Biologist features an
interview with MMS marine biologist Donna Schroeder. Reprint
from CAREER CURRENTS, Dec. 2007/National
Energy Development (NEED) Project. |
&
Bookmark |
Power Your City
Trying to compare
energy types is a challenge. The purpose of this project is to convert
various energy sources used in California into common units so that
they can be compared readily. The amount of space occupied by each
facility or unit is provided so that you can compare their land. These
assumptions and calculations for the numbers used in the bookmark are
provided in this paper.
Click here for
BOOKMARK
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Watts it to You?
Explore ways to make Golden County energy
self-sufficient through inquiry, cooperative problem-solving and
negotiation. |
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Ocean Energy Explore oil seeps,
currents, wave and wind energy, and drill for oil in the ocean.
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Marine Archaeology
California's history is very exciting, made of day-to-day events that start
with the Native Americans and continue to this very day. |
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Petroleum and
Our Environment - Coloring and activities
workbook.
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The
Ocean's Sand, A Natural Resource
What is Sand and Gravel and why do we
need it for our beaches?
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Marine
Archaeology Study those places and
objects that tell us how the early people of California used the sea.
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Visit the
OHMSETT National Oil Spill Response Test Facility managed by the MMS |
Download Acrobat Reader Free
to view and print PDF files. |
Other Energy and Ocean-related Kids' Sites:
Did you know ...? |
What are the
offshore platforms used for? |
How big are
the platforms? |
The
offshore platforms are used to produce crude oil and natural gas from deep
beneath the sea floor. |
Some platforms can weigh nearly 70,000 tons and are over 1,200 feet tall.
That’s taller than the
Empire
State Building! Platform jackets, or the bottom of the platform hidden
mostly beneath the ocean’s surface, weigh close to 43,000 tons – that’s
about the weight of the Titanic! The smallest platform off the
California
coastline, called Platform Gina, weighs about 1100 tons. |
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Where is oil
and natural gas found? |
How do they
get the oil and natural gas from the ground? |
Oil and
natural gas are found in the ground, trapped in layers of rock called
deposits. There are different ways to find out where the oil and gas are
deposited. After it is determined where a large deposit of oil and gas
is, the area is often given a name and called a field. For example,
the Ventura Avenue Field. |
It’s not easy! First, they must drill a hole in the bottom of the sea
floor. To drill for oil and gas, long sections of pipe are connected
together with a bit at the end. A large steel tower called a drilling rig
is used to connect the section of pipe together and rotate the pipe so that
it can drill into the ground. For oil and gas deposits far from where the
drilling rig is they use what is called directional drilling. Directional
drilling is where you drill down into the earth and out into all different
directions, finding oil and natural gas in different zones. Then they have
to pump the oil, natural gas, and water out of the ground and onto the
platform. |
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How do they
get the platforms in the middle of the ocean? Do they float?
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How does oil
and natural gas help me? Why is it important to have oil and natural gas? |
Men and women work very hard to build platforms that are going to stay in
the ocean for sometimes over 20 years. The bottom portion of the platform,
called the jacket, is built on land in a yard. The bottom is then placed on
a boat called a barge and sailed out to the place in the ocean where they
want to build a platform. Then, they hoist the bottom into the ocean. This
is called a launch. The bottom of the platform then floats until they use a
technique called control flooding to sink it into the ocean. They use large
machines that act as hammers to drive it into the ground. Other pieces of
the platform called the modules, or collectively the deck, are added to the
bottom. These modules include production facilities, crew quarters, and a
drilling rig. It’s a lot like putting Legos together! The platform is
actually many different pieces put together to build one large functional
platform. |
We use oil and natural gas to produce different forms of energy. Energy
helps us to generate electricity, produce gasoline for our cars, heat our
homes, and make many different plastic products like computers or video
games. |
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Are there fish
living on the platform? |
Where does the
oil and natural gas go after they’re taken from the ground? |
Many fish live on the bottom of the platform, as well as sea lions on the
bottom rungs of the platforms. Offshore platforms provide some of the most
diverse habitats for sea life. Hard surfaces are homes to barnacles and
mussels, while the underwater portion of the platforms serve as artificial
reefs. |
After being pumped from the ground, the oil and
natural gas are put into pipelines that go to a processing facility so that
they can be used for energy to heat our homes, provide us with electricity,
fuel our cars, as well as many other uses. |
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Are the
platforms safe? |
How do the
people get on and off the platform? |
Crews that work on the platforms always have to take precautions to make
sure the platforms are a safe working environment. There are risks that
exist, yet safety inspections and procedures are in place so that no one
gets hurt. |
There are two ways people get on and off the platforms, depending on which
platform they’re at. Some board a boat which goes out to the platforms.
Large cranes can then carry the people and equipment from the deck of the
boat to the platforms 150 ft. onto the upper deck. Another way to get onto
the platform from the boats is by a swing rope. Crew members and other
visitors grab onto a long rope and swing onto the bottom of the platform.
Another way to get to some of the platforms is by helicopter. The
helicopter can actually land on the deck of the platform! |
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Do the crews
on the platform live there? |
How much oil
and natural gas do we get from the offshore platforms? |
The crews of the platforms don’t live there, yet they spend a great deal of
time on the platforms! Crew members stay on the platform seven days at a
time. They work 12 hour days, either day or night shift. After seven days,
they are able to go home to their families for seven days. On most of the
platforms, there’s a cafeteria, gym, TV and game room, bathrooms, showers,
and sleeping quarters. |
Twenty-three platforms are producing some 80,000 barrels of oil a day and
about 145 million cubic feet of gas per day from 43 of the leases off the
coast of Southern
California. |
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What if the
oil spills? How do they clean it up? |
Do oil spills
hurt the animals? |
If an oil spill occurs, the platform crew members try to shutdown the source
of the leak and then notify local, state, and federal agencies, including
the Minerals Management Service. Companies such as
Clean Seas and Marine Spill
Response Corporation come in to respond to the incident with safety and
specialized oil spill response equipment. The response teams first figure
out if it is safe to clean up the spill and then use buoys to mark where
exactly the spill has occurred in the water. Because oil floats on water,
the response team uses a floating boom that acts like a wall to contain the
oil in one location. Then, they use skimmers, or large brushes, to remove
it from the water. The Minerals Management Service has an oil spill
response research program that looks at new ways to clean up oil and improve
methods we now have available. The Minerals Management Service reviews and
approves the oil company’s oil spill response plan and conducts surprise oil
spill drills. They also inspect their oil spill response equipment to make
sure that they are prepared to respond to a spill. When practicing how to
clean up an oil spill, they don’t actually put oil in the water. They
simulate what an oil spill can look like using pads in the water so that the
response team has a target to clean up.
Between 1972 and
2000, U.S. Outer Continental Shelf offshore pipelines and facilities
accounted for only 2 percent of the volume of oil spilled in U.S. waters.
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Oil spills affect different kinds of marine life, just as any man-made
disaster affects the ecosystem. Animals like dolphins and whales are
not
bothered
by oil, yet animals and organisms that live or spend much of their time on
the surface of the water tend to be affected, such as birds who sleep on the
water. Also, animals with fur, such as sea otters, can have trouble. There
are many rehabilitation centers up and down the coast of California that
help animals recover from occasional oil spills. |
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Are the
offshore platforms just in California? |
How many
offshore platforms are there? |
There are offshore platforms around the world! In the United States, there are
offshore platforms off the coasts of California
in the Pacific OCS Region and in the Gulf of Mexico OCS Region off the
coasts of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas. |
There are more than 6,700 production platforms worldwide. Over 4,000
platforms are in the U.S. waters alone. Off America’s West Coast, there are
23 platforms that are producing oil and natural gas from 43 active leases on
the Outer Continental Shelf in federal waters. The Outer Continental Shelf,
or OCS, is the offshore coastal land beneath the ocean. |
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Does the
government own the platforms? |
I heard that
fossil fuels are going to run out someday… is that true? |
No, the government does not actually own the platforms. Oil and natural gas
companies, such as Venoco, Aera, Nuevo, Arguello, POOLLC, and ExxonMobil own
the platforms; the Minerals Management Service serves as a regulatory agency
and makes sure the platforms are safe and working properly. Oil companies
also pay MMS for the right to drill and produce oil and natural gas from the
leases. MMS receives a royalty, or a portion of money made, from the oil
companies. |
Since oil and natural gas are not renewable energy sources, scientists
predict that someday we will no longer have fossil fuels. However, many
kinds of energy are being studied and used today, such as wind and tidal
energy that are renewable. |
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What kind of
people work on the platforms? Are they engineers? Scientists? |
What is
natural gas? Is it a gas, or is it a liquid like gasoline? |
Many different kinds of people work on the platform. There are machinists
who replace equipment, electricians who monitor all electrical systems, and
technicians who replace parts. On many platforms, crew members share
community responsibilities, such as making the meals. |
Natural gas is a gas that is used to create products, such as gasoline. It
is a mixture of hydrocarbon gases that occurs with petroleum deposits,
principally methane together with varying quantities of ethane, propane,
butane, and other gases, and is used as a fuel and in the manufacture of
organic compounds. |
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How do they
find the oil and natural gas? Is it buried in the ocean? |
Scientists work with engineers to design new ways to find oil and natural
gas under the ocean’s sea floor. Millions of years ago, the coastal region
was under water, part of a rich coastal ocean. Water was full of tiny
plants called diotobes. After they died, they left behind microscopic
skeletons which pilled up as a thick layer on the sea floor. As the years
went by, mud and sand pilled on top of the organism remains, and because the
sea floor heated up, the organic materials were pressurized and slowly
changed into tar, oil, and natural gas. In the last few million years, the
region has been in a slow-moving geological collision. Sea layers were
shortened, wrinkled, and broken. Oil in rock layers were trapped under
folds. Eventually, oil and tar escaped to the surface creating a natural
seep. |
Other MMS Regional Kids' Sites:
For more information:
John Romero,
Public Affairs Officer
U.S. Department of the Interior -
Minerals Management Service
770 Paseo Camarillo,
Camarillo, CA 93010
(805) 389-7533
Web Master:
Nollie
Gildow-Owens
Page content last updated 7/30/2008
Page last published 7/30/2008
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