Oil Reserves in Brazil:
While the possibility of Brazil becoming a major player on the global fuel economy is entirely possible, its probability is far less likely. 6 years ago they discovered a massive oil field off the coast, and this led to the idea of Brazil rising to power economically spreading like wildfire. But if these last few years have done anything, it has sobered up the general population to the idea that they may never have another opportunity to extract this oil and inherit a major role in the global economy. It has become much easier for companies to drill elsewhere, or even for them to invest in new technology like fracking. But I feel like the main reason that people are now running from this is because they want to avoid another BP Oil Spill in the Gulf. 6 years ago when they discovered the well, it was 2008, and not even 2 years after they discovered this massive underwater oil field, all the failsafes on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig failed, costing British Petroleum roughly $42.2 Billion, they lost nearly 4.9 Billion Barrels of Oil, which at the time cost $67.21 a barrel. In total BP lost approximately $371.53 Billion over this whole fiasco. No company wants to have a red mark that big in their financials like that, ever. Due to this whole event, it caused other oil and gas companies to look at offshore drilling with a much more somber outlook.
Petrobras’ discovery of the field offshore contains roughly 25 Million Barrels, which is sizable enough to allow for a Brazilian financial recovery and rise. But this would only be possible if Petrobras wasn’t riddled with corruption, thus preventing them from achieving any sort of advancement, final or otherwise. Petrobras’ corruption and desire for personal wealth has caused them to drag their feet on the chance to drill when they had the chance, and in the end, they ended up cutting off their nose to spite their face.
Now if we disregard the financial effects of this oil, and focus purely on the environmental effects, we realize that there are 2 main types of environmental effects caused by offshore drilling, ‘Operational Discharges’ and, as previously mentioned, ‘Oil Spills’. Operational Discharges are the waste products (solid, liquid, and gas) that are produced by the platform, while many of them are allowed to be dumped (some harmful, others not) it is impossible to regulate all of it. Operational Discharges can be further subdivided into ‘Drilling Discharges’ and ‘Produced Water’. Drilling Discharges are the waste products that are associated with the drilling process, including lubrication, cooling agents, fragments, etc… and as with the Operational waste, some of it is allowed, but not all of it can be regulated,some of the things that can’t always be caught can be very deadly. Produced Water is the water that is produced and extracted during the drilling. Much of this water has been in the rock for so long that it is imbued with toxic chemicals and properties, and thus is just as bad as releasing the toxins themselves.
Favelas and Urban Planning:
Favelas have a notoriously dangerous reputation, and are commonly associated with danger, violence, and gangs. But this isn’t necessarily true, Favelas have gotten a reputation as such because, as the BBC article says, “99% of the visitors are foreigners as Brazilians "don't have the slightest curiosity to get to know the favela, at least once in their lives" ”. This attitude, especially from foreigners, has arisen because Favelas are domestic, inner-city, housing, generally lived in by the destitute, and where there’s poverty, there’s crime, especially due to the human desire to get rich.
The police forces create things like the ‘Pacifying Police Unit’ (UPP) which became corrupt due to gang intervention, but, as seen later in the BBC article, not all of the police are corrupt, in fact many of them desire to make the Favelas a peaceful place for people to live, by removing the local gangs from power. Gangs rise to control in a vacuum, they can only be as powerful as the people let them be, but when the people give up on Governmental protection, this gives rise to the gangs. When this happens, it becomes incredibly difficult for the government, especially the police forces, to regain the trust and the power of the mass.
But not all is bad in the Favelas, there are people like Wellington Pereira, who is a self-proclaimed mailman, and a barber in a district of the Favela. Wellington has a stable job, and as he says “he has a good life thanks to his job. He managed to buy "a cosy house that has everything" - Internet, cable TV, bathroom, running water and electricity.” Life is always in perspective, people in places like the US are never happy unless they have the newest greatest thing, the best iPhone, the newest BMW, or the fanciest watch; yet when you see someone in a place like Rocinha, and they’re happy with their live, in a small house, with basic things like Internet and a TV, it really puts life into perspective.
Generally speaking, the less you have, the more you learn to appreciate it, and I feel that this is very much the case in these Favelas. These people have developed a strong identity with their ‘city in a city’. Even though life may be tough inside the Favelas compared to the soft lifes that many Americans have, and are perceived to have, with these strong community ties, it allows for them to have things that many people in the US don’t have, myself included, and that is a strong sense of community and belonging in the community.
As time has moved on, and the rough life of the Favelas has come to light, the Brazilian government has began to try and clean them up, and treat them like less of second class citizens. This is especially the case recently, with the 2014 World Cup, and the upcoming 2016 Summer Olympics, both taking place in Rio de Janeiro; these global events have caused the military to invade these Favelas and exterminate the drugs and gangs in favor of government taskforces and police regiments used to protect the people.
Water Quality (pollution) Management in Rio:
Life is tough in the slums and favelas of Rio, as I previously explained, and because of the lack of government infrastructure in these places, trash is allowed to pile up and be dumped in unsuitable places. When this many people live in such a confined area without the infrastructure necessary to function properly, the citizens living there must do what they can in order to survive. This includes dumping trash into their water supply, which is primarily the Guanabara Bay. When this much trash is dumped into a bay it becomes contaminated, and can no longer be used for what is used to be, which included bathing, and drinking.
With this water becoming so contaminated, it has become a major health hazard for, not only the visitors, but also the inhabitants, who rely on it for basic necessities. The water had become so toxic, that if you drank any of it, even a small amount, it can cause some pretty serious health problems, nothing extremely lethal, but if it is left untreated, it wouldn’t be a pretty picture.
This bay is what the Brazilian Olympic Sailing Team has been using to practice for the 2016 Summer Olympics, which is going to be held in Rio as well. It is not just the toxic waters they need to worry about either, the trash that caused this problem, is a problem within itself for these Olympic hopefuls. An Olympic sailing team shouldn’t need to worry about avoiding rubbish when navigating through their winds. As specified in this article, this is a sport of speed, and dodging the trash slows you down, dramatically; and this isn’t to mention how much of a setback it would be if they damaged the boat if they didn’t avoid a large enough chunk of garbage.
In order to hopefully use this bay in the upcoming Olympics, the Brazilian government claims to have initiated 10 ‘eco-boats’ whose job is to essentially remove the garbage, and clean the waters. As this article says “Fifteen cities surround Guanabara Bay. That means over eight million residents, producing over 18,000 litres of sewage per second.” This 18,000 l/s of sewage is a staggering 66% of the sewage produced, this means that only 34% is actually treated, and not just dumped into this bay, alongside the rest of the trash.
While the possibility of Brazil becoming a major player on the global fuel economy is entirely possible, its probability is far less likely. 6 years ago they discovered a massive oil field off the coast, and this led to the idea of Brazil rising to power economically spreading like wildfire. But if these last few years have done anything, it has sobered up the general population to the idea that they may never have another opportunity to extract this oil and inherit a major role in the global economy. It has become much easier for companies to drill elsewhere, or even for them to invest in new technology like fracking. But I feel like the main reason that people are now running from this is because they want to avoid another BP Oil Spill in the Gulf. 6 years ago when they discovered the well, it was 2008, and not even 2 years after they discovered this massive underwater oil field, all the failsafes on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig failed, costing British Petroleum roughly $42.2 Billion, they lost nearly 4.9 Billion Barrels of Oil, which at the time cost $67.21 a barrel. In total BP lost approximately $371.53 Billion over this whole fiasco. No company wants to have a red mark that big in their financials like that, ever. Due to this whole event, it caused other oil and gas companies to look at offshore drilling with a much more somber outlook.
Petrobras’ discovery of the field offshore contains roughly 25 Million Barrels, which is sizable enough to allow for a Brazilian financial recovery and rise. But this would only be possible if Petrobras wasn’t riddled with corruption, thus preventing them from achieving any sort of advancement, final or otherwise. Petrobras’ corruption and desire for personal wealth has caused them to drag their feet on the chance to drill when they had the chance, and in the end, they ended up cutting off their nose to spite their face.
Now if we disregard the financial effects of this oil, and focus purely on the environmental effects, we realize that there are 2 main types of environmental effects caused by offshore drilling, ‘Operational Discharges’ and, as previously mentioned, ‘Oil Spills’. Operational Discharges are the waste products (solid, liquid, and gas) that are produced by the platform, while many of them are allowed to be dumped (some harmful, others not) it is impossible to regulate all of it. Operational Discharges can be further subdivided into ‘Drilling Discharges’ and ‘Produced Water’. Drilling Discharges are the waste products that are associated with the drilling process, including lubrication, cooling agents, fragments, etc… and as with the Operational waste, some of it is allowed, but not all of it can be regulated,some of the things that can’t always be caught can be very deadly. Produced Water is the water that is produced and extracted during the drilling. Much of this water has been in the rock for so long that it is imbued with toxic chemicals and properties, and thus is just as bad as releasing the toxins themselves.
Favelas and Urban Planning:
Favelas have a notoriously dangerous reputation, and are commonly associated with danger, violence, and gangs. But this isn’t necessarily true, Favelas have gotten a reputation as such because, as the BBC article says, “99% of the visitors are foreigners as Brazilians "don't have the slightest curiosity to get to know the favela, at least once in their lives" ”. This attitude, especially from foreigners, has arisen because Favelas are domestic, inner-city, housing, generally lived in by the destitute, and where there’s poverty, there’s crime, especially due to the human desire to get rich.
The police forces create things like the ‘Pacifying Police Unit’ (UPP) which became corrupt due to gang intervention, but, as seen later in the BBC article, not all of the police are corrupt, in fact many of them desire to make the Favelas a peaceful place for people to live, by removing the local gangs from power. Gangs rise to control in a vacuum, they can only be as powerful as the people let them be, but when the people give up on Governmental protection, this gives rise to the gangs. When this happens, it becomes incredibly difficult for the government, especially the police forces, to regain the trust and the power of the mass.
But not all is bad in the Favelas, there are people like Wellington Pereira, who is a self-proclaimed mailman, and a barber in a district of the Favela. Wellington has a stable job, and as he says “he has a good life thanks to his job. He managed to buy "a cosy house that has everything" - Internet, cable TV, bathroom, running water and electricity.” Life is always in perspective, people in places like the US are never happy unless they have the newest greatest thing, the best iPhone, the newest BMW, or the fanciest watch; yet when you see someone in a place like Rocinha, and they’re happy with their live, in a small house, with basic things like Internet and a TV, it really puts life into perspective.
Generally speaking, the less you have, the more you learn to appreciate it, and I feel that this is very much the case in these Favelas. These people have developed a strong identity with their ‘city in a city’. Even though life may be tough inside the Favelas compared to the soft lifes that many Americans have, and are perceived to have, with these strong community ties, it allows for them to have things that many people in the US don’t have, myself included, and that is a strong sense of community and belonging in the community.
As time has moved on, and the rough life of the Favelas has come to light, the Brazilian government has began to try and clean them up, and treat them like less of second class citizens. This is especially the case recently, with the 2014 World Cup, and the upcoming 2016 Summer Olympics, both taking place in Rio de Janeiro; these global events have caused the military to invade these Favelas and exterminate the drugs and gangs in favor of government taskforces and police regiments used to protect the people.
Water Quality (pollution) Management in Rio:
Life is tough in the slums and favelas of Rio, as I previously explained, and because of the lack of government infrastructure in these places, trash is allowed to pile up and be dumped in unsuitable places. When this many people live in such a confined area without the infrastructure necessary to function properly, the citizens living there must do what they can in order to survive. This includes dumping trash into their water supply, which is primarily the Guanabara Bay. When this much trash is dumped into a bay it becomes contaminated, and can no longer be used for what is used to be, which included bathing, and drinking.
With this water becoming so contaminated, it has become a major health hazard for, not only the visitors, but also the inhabitants, who rely on it for basic necessities. The water had become so toxic, that if you drank any of it, even a small amount, it can cause some pretty serious health problems, nothing extremely lethal, but if it is left untreated, it wouldn’t be a pretty picture.
This bay is what the Brazilian Olympic Sailing Team has been using to practice for the 2016 Summer Olympics, which is going to be held in Rio as well. It is not just the toxic waters they need to worry about either, the trash that caused this problem, is a problem within itself for these Olympic hopefuls. An Olympic sailing team shouldn’t need to worry about avoiding rubbish when navigating through their winds. As specified in this article, this is a sport of speed, and dodging the trash slows you down, dramatically; and this isn’t to mention how much of a setback it would be if they damaged the boat if they didn’t avoid a large enough chunk of garbage.
In order to hopefully use this bay in the upcoming Olympics, the Brazilian government claims to have initiated 10 ‘eco-boats’ whose job is to essentially remove the garbage, and clean the waters. As this article says “Fifteen cities surround Guanabara Bay. That means over eight million residents, producing over 18,000 litres of sewage per second.” This 18,000 l/s of sewage is a staggering 66% of the sewage produced, this means that only 34% is actually treated, and not just dumped into this bay, alongside the rest of the trash.