At 01:51 PM 5/22/2010, Dave Mcneely wrote:
>The oil I have been using in my '91 VW Vanagon GL Campmobile with
>stock 2.1 waterboxer engine is Castrol 20W - 50, from British
>Petroleum.  Some may find it foolish, but I no longer want to use
>any BP products, just as I have avoided Exxon since the Exxon-Valdez
>catastrophe.  What non-synthetic alternative do knowledgeable list
>members recommend?  Why?

Dear Dave,

I think you're being simplistic.  By that criterion you'll have to
avoid *every* oil producer and refiner of any size -- it's a very
incestuous industry because oil, roughly speaking, is oil.  It might
make more sense to avoid any products coming from a
Transocean-operated well, but again there's no way of knowing what they are.

Iraq (Arabian Gulf, ~9 million bbl)
Pemex (Mexico, Ixtoc I well blowout, ~3.5 million bbl).  Note that
the BP spill is "only" around one-plus million bbl so far, although
the rate is much faster than Ixtoc, which ran for ~nine months.
Anything coming from the Nowruz oil field in the Persian Gulf (almost
two million bbl)
Amoco (Amoco Cadiz, Brittany, ~1.6 million bbl)
Unknown (Brittany, Torrey Canyon, ~860 thousand bbl)
Unknown (Hawaii, Irene's Challenge, ~237,000 bbl)
Unknown (Greece, Irene's Serenade, factor of two +/- 475,000 bbl)
Unknown (Gulf of Oman, Sea Star, ~937,000 bbl)
Unknown (Oman, Amini, ~380,000 bbl)
Unknown (Galveston Bay, Burmah Agate, ~255,000 bbl)
Unknown (Delaware River, Corinthian,  ~266,000 bbl)
Unknown (Istanbul, Independente, ~690,000 bbl)
Unknown (Portugal, Jakob Maersk, ~640,000 bbl)
Unknown (Canary Islands, Khark V, ~450,000 bbl)
Unknown (Straits of Magellan, Metula, ~400,000 bbl)
Unknown (Colombia, St. Peter, ~280,000 bbl)
Texaco, (Panama, storage tank, ~240,000 bbl of which ~140,000 went
into the water)
Unknown (Spain, Urquiola, ~733,000 bbl)
Unknown (Durban SA, World Glory, ~334,000 bbl)
Exxon/Esso (Alaska, Exxon Valdez, ~240,000 bbl) -- note that Mobil
and Exxon are the same company now.

All of these spills are Valdez-size or larger.  Size doesn't
necessarily correlate with environmental damage -- if you want to
research that,
<http://response.restoration.noaa.gov/book_shelf/26_spilldb.pdf > is
a good place to start.

Comments?

Yours,
David