Paul Gordon (who seems to be a nice person) posted an article on the current oil crises at the following thread on EZboard. The implication seems to be that there is a clear shortage of oil production relative to demand that is due to a higher than usual series of breakdowns and problems with the oil refineries. Although it is no longer "politically correct" to speculate on the possible connection with rollover failures, she seems to thing that the level of embedded chips failures is significantly higher than has been reported or recognized while admitting that it has been much less than was predicted by some.

Any opinions other than the usual manaical ravings of cpr? Are we begining to see the slowing effect of software and embedded chips failures dragging (however minutely) on the economy? Am I kicking a dead horse here? Just curious.

-- JoseMiami (josenmiami@yahoo.com), September 25, 2000

Answers

Jose:

It is good to see you around these parts lately. I do not know you that well(pastor in miami?), but I am sure you are a good guy at heart.

The person you speak of is "Paula" Gordon. She has been debunked here many times. She has been exposed as not being knowledgable with embedded systems.

Unfortunately, I am sure you will get responses from those you do not like, per se. Do the research yourself-If I remember, you were a "doomer" last year(hate that word)-try to learn from it and take an objective look at Paula Gordon. She is not one of the winners in this "game".

-- FutureShock (gray@matter.think), September 26, 2000.

Jose, you don't need to read CPR's rants and spamming to get the scoop on the oil. There's been a lot about it on the news lately (unless you're paranoid that the media is into a conspiracy to keep the truth from us, as many "doomers" thought last year.) And FS is right about Paula Gordon. She's definitely beating a dead horse (and I can't believe she's still at it.)

The scoop on the oil as I understand it, seems to be that OPEC has slowed down production (countries playing the oil game), and the market is responding accordingly. The White House has passed a measure to release 30m barrels over a time period, (in effect releasing this year what they bought at low price in the oil glut market last year), to offset the high cost of heating oil this winter, especially in the northeast.

-- (smarty@wannabe.one), September 26, 2000.

Here's an example of a news article in today's news [snip] "Both the IMF and the Group of Seven have called on oil producers to raise output to cut oil prices from their recent decade-high. The United States has said it will tap its strategic petroleum reserve and this helped push the oil price down somewhat, although it remains at over $30 a barrel."

-- (smarty@wannabe.one), September 26, 2000.

Tag off. Sorry about that.

-- (smarty@wannabe.one), September 26, 2000.

"Are we begining to see the slowing effect of software and embedded chips failures dragging (however minutely) on the economy?"

Not a chance. Paula Gordon needs to find a new avocation.

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), September 26, 2000.

Hello, Jose.

Assuming there is a, "... slowing effect of software and embedded chips failures dragging (however minutely) on the economy?" ... and the "fix' can stay ahead of the 'failure', we are okay; however, if the failure rate [made public or otherwise] out distances the operational or fix rate, the respective economy can, will and does suffer - a cascading, snowballing effect as it were.

Is there a connection between poorly maintained production flow lines and a refinery where produced output slows and stops and then the refinery won't come back on line. Or, for what ever reason, just explodes.

Are events like this related? Is there a causal relationship? How does one tie the events together? Global thinking vs I don't know what level of thinking?

If I had the time and staff, I believe modeling would indicate a worsening scenario, but who am I.

Sometimes Jose, despite education, training, experience, news hype and differing points of view, you just have to follow you gut instinct.

Good luck.

-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

"gut" instinct led to al ot of money spent on unnecessary preps. Using gut instinct without spending the time required to develope that instinct is dangerous. There are a bunch of people over on SLEZ whose gut instinct is that the world is going to end real soon now. I dount they are right.

So much for gut instinct.

-- FutureShock (gray@matter.think), September 26, 2000.

You beat me to it FS. I was going to say that if one's instinct happens to be paranoid, fearful and gullible, then one is out of luck most of the time following that instinct.

There's no shortcut for doing our research and thinking hard, when it comes to the future. Gut instincts for the most part are good for immediate reflex responses, when one has no time to research the immediate situation and a response is required.

IMHO, ofcourse.

-- (smarty@wannabe.one), September 26, 2000.

cryptobyte, "refinery where produced output slows and stops and then the refinery won't come back on line. Or, for what ever reason, just explodes" First comment, new refineries haven't been build in the last ten years. Second comment, refineries do just explode. That last statement reminds me of the reporters during the space shuttle explosion. Like it was a big surprise rockets were made of fuel. So it should be no surprise that gas is volatile.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 26, 2000.

Some of Paula's latest...

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=003qc7

Oil Industry Publication: Recent spate of oil industry accidents "traceable to instrument repair or malfunction"

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Grassroots Information Coordination Center (GICC) : One Thread

Consider fieldbus for retrofits Oil Industry Publication: Recent spate of oil industry accidents "traceable to instrument repair or malfunction"

Benefits result from reduced maintenance, greater safety and increased performance

R. Dunlap, Fisher-Rosemount, Austin, Texas

Eonomic benefits of the digital fieldbus instrument communication standard have been developed and studied for new construction cases. Versus a traditional analog installation, fieldbus achieves cost reduction through reduced footprint, shortened configuration and commissioning times, and reduced wiring and labor costs. These are easily tracked, tangible savings. Fieldbus implementation can also be economically beneficial in the case of retrofits and revamps of existing hydrocarbon processing plants. When calculating the life cycle cost and benefit of a plant, stages beyond construction must be considered.

Although the economic discussion applies to all industries, it is especially important in hydrocarbon processing. Hydrocarbon processing is unique in terms of public scrutiny, industry scale, financial pressures, safety risk and constant revamp activity.

For the purposes of this article, benefits of fieldbus in retrofits will be split into the following categories: maintenance, safety, performance and profitability. We will consider a hypothetical refinery with 200,000 bpsd crude capacity and 100,000 bpsd FCC capacity.

Maintenance. Maintenance is necessary and expensive. Predictive maintenance is much more effective than planned or reactive maintenance. Maintenance is one of the largest controlled expenditures in any industrial concern and can soak up over 10% of the cost of goods sold.

Traditional 4  20 mA transmitters only report process variables. In contrast, much more than just process variable information flows over the fieldbus network. Fieldbus instruments create networked intelligence.

Now information such as time since last calibration and total valve stem travel can move over the network. Maintenance data can then be collected and stored for each instrument.

Fieldbus-compliant instruments can also warn when they are approaching failure. Experienced personnel will be more able to accurately predict how different field devices behave in different services and adjust the repair schedule for devices in particular services. They can also identify device-to-device idiosyncrasies.

Present technology allows a fieldbus-enabled control system to transfer instrument information to plant LANs, maintenance programs and engineers workstations. Data can then be used for vendor selection and purchasing decisions, evaluating metallurgy and enhancing scheduling considerations.

Regulatory and internal corporate regulations depend on instrument performance. A fieldbus-compliant system can keep its own audit trail.

As an example, during a refinery turnaround, many valves will be removed, checked, inspected and have new parts installed.

Assume the 200,000 bpsd refinery has 10 process units with 40 control valves each. Further assume that half of these will be repaired, inspected or have some effort spent on them. Under present methods this repair process would cost approximately $175,000 once labor of operators, pipefitters, machinists and technicians is included. Transportation, packing and gaskets would also be required.

Process industry studies show that only a fraction of the valves typically pulled for repair actually need to be repaired. The rate of unnecessary repair can be 50% to 70% or more. Fieldbus allows tracking the condition of each valve and determining when it needs repair. If the example refinery cut its valve repair rate to 30%, this would save $122,500 in labor and material costs. Determining the optimum interval for preventive maintenance will only occur with accurate and complete instrument data. Fieldbus-enabled devices take the trial-and-error out of determining the optimum PM interval.

Safety. Although as a whole the hydrocarbon industry is very safe, it has suffered a recent spate of accidents. Accidents may be occurring more frequently because fewer dollars can be allocated to staff, training and maintenance. Commodity price shifts eat at profits, resulting in capital and operating spending cuts. These shifts have put unprecedented strains on operators and machinery. Equipment and personnel run closer to physical and safety limits than ever before. Concomitant with throughput increases, accident size and severity have risen.

Thus, importance of safety and shutdown equipment is growing rapidly. Protection system complexity is rising with the complexity and throughput increases of the processes being protected. Safety system integrity depends on the integrity of its constituent field devices.

A large portion of these accidents are traceable to instrument repair or malfunction. For example, every time a manifold is opened to check a transmitter or a valve is removed to the shop for repacking, there are several points of contact between atmosphere and chemical, and between human and chemical.

Each contact point is a possible fire, explosion, exposure or illness.

Minimizing single points of failure has traditionally extended from the marshalling rack upward. In contrast, fieldbus can maximize safety by making an entire plant self-monitoring.

In a typical facility, 20% of the loops can be considered critical. Let us consider the definition of failure. If a transmitter or field device in a critical loop goes out of calibration, this can be a more severe problem than if the device becomes totally unavailable. A totally failed transmitter will make itself known by causing a shutdown or showing an out-of-range value. A transmitter in a critical loop with traditional field wiring architecture can prevent a necessary shutdown or cause one with no indication of an impending problem. Let us assume that a transmitter experiences a calibration failure every five years. Taking the reciprocal, every transmitter has 0.2 failures per year. Referring to our hypothetical plant, it will have on the order of 10,000 I/O points, 25% of which are transmitters and 20% of those are considered critical. Simple multiplication reveals that there will be 100 failures per year of critical transmitters. None of these failures will be reported over a 4  20 mA wiring scheme.

Total transmitter failures are much less frequent. At an assumed MTBF of 100 years the number of failures is still significant. Using the same calculation method as before and the same estimation for the number of critical loops means there will be five total failures per year of critical transmitters. This probably understates the actual case: as a plant ages, the probability of device failure rises and the number of failures will not be constant or predictable.

Considering the need to ensure both safety and plant uptime, the frequency of both of these types of failures is not acceptable. The safety, insurance and avoided shutdowns pay off the fieldbus implementation instantaneously. Only fieldbus-compliant devices can report their calibration status and warn of impending failures.

Performance. In many services, valve variability cost has not been well determined. However, research indicates that a small amount of variability results in large hidden costs. For every 0.5% reduction in valve variability, a 1% production benefit can be achieved. At this rate, an increase of just a few percent of variability in a critical service results in an enormous production cost.

It is not unheard of to find valves with 5% variability. This has a significant impact on refinery profitability. For example, cost of a single hour of 5% variability in an FCC unit feed valve is over $200 at present margins. This is equivalent to $1,600,000 per year. This variability cannot be determined by an outside operator and cannot be detected over traditional analog signal lines. However, a fieldbus-equipped valve could report its stem friction, position anomalies, time since last calibration and even give insight into wear on the internals.

Blending is another area in which every instrument is critical. Depending on which components are used to make up octane, 0.1 RON giveaway costs $3,000,000/yr/100,000 bpsd crude capacity. Rvp giveaway is also significant.

Tied in with the maintenance cost, instrument performance directly affects equipment reliability upstream and downstream of it. Cycling valves cause extra wear on pumps; wandering transmitters can cause fired heater damage. Detuned controllers, frustrated or apathetic operations staff, operating in a wider tolerance from setpoint, crowding the specifications, inability to engage APC and accidental trips decrease profitability. Fieldbus can cure many of these problems at the source.

Profitability. The information gathering devices in a plant form a pyramid: ? Enterprise resource planning (ERP) links a site to a business strategy ? Optimization schemes run over advanced process control (APC) ? APC feeds new setpoints to the DCS ? DCS systems process and display field data ? Field devices collect data and provide control.

Profits are frequently increased through sophisticated software at the ERP level. However, this scheme cannot function without a solid base. Effectiveness of each successive layer depends on the integrity of the layer beneath.

Many of the benefits accrued to higher-level implementations are due to careful study of the layer beneath. For example, benefits of implementing APC largely result from tuning controllers internal to the DCS and repair of field devices below that. Before an APC project can be executed, a study of field devices and controller tuning commences. A study is required because the devices connected to 4  20 mA systems cannot inform engineers or staff of their health.

Let us assume a 5% benefit from APC, a 5% benefit from optimization and a 5% benefit from ERP. If the hypothetical refinery has profits of $4,300,000/day, then $4,300,000 x 1.05 x 1.05 x 1.05 is $4,900,000/day. The difference is $600,000/day. Let us also assume that the on-stream factor for APC is 90%. Raising the on-stream factor to 95% will increase profits by over $1,000,000/year. At this rate, payout for a fieldbus retrofit project is less than one year from APC alone.

The author Rob Dunlap is a business development specialist. His areas of expertise are in hydrocarbon processing, petrochemicals and refining. Rob provides applications knowledge as well as sales and customer support to the Performance Solutions group. He has over eight years of experience in the hydrocarbon processing industries. His experience includes: catalytic reforming, alkylation, simulated moving-bed separation, isomerization, hydrotreating, distillation, catalytic polymerization, phenol and other process units. Rob was employed by UOP, a process licensing company, prior to joining Fisher-Rosemount. He was responsible for inspecting, commissioning and troubleshooting instrumentation, distributed control systems and electrical systems. Rob also served as a technical advisor for process matters and plant startups. Rob also holds a BS in chemical engineering from Cornell University, New York, and is a member of the Instrument Society of America.

http://www.hydrocarbonprocessing.com/archive/archive_00-09/00-09_consi der-dunlap.htm

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), September 22, 2000

Answers

An excellent article Mr. Jenkins

"As for me...I shall finish the Game"!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Shakey~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

-- Shakey (in_a_bunker@forty.feet), September 23, 2000.

I crossposted this interesting item on EZBoard and added the following comments of my own: ....After much sleuthing at the Department of Energy in March of 2000, including talking with a group of the team that oversaw DOE's Y2K efforts, I discovered that no one there had the embedded systems expertise necessary to identify, let alone track and assess oil sector-related embedded systems and complex integrated systems problems. Sad, but true. (That is why the connection between refinery disruptions and embedded systems has not been made by DOE.) No one on John Koskinen's staff had that expertise. That will help explain why the Information Coordination Center failed to track refinery disruptions and pipeline explosions, and other high hazard sector problems that have occurred and that are occurring at record levels since the first of the year. Y2K has been and remains an incredible example of flawed policymaking and implementation. An unexpected set of factors converged to bring us to this point in time with no high impact, high visibility catastrophes or disasters involving the chemical industry, nuclear power industry, the oil and gas sector, etc. For the most part, only fragments of the story concerning how we got this far so relatively unscathed are known and so far as I can determine, they are known by only a very few people. They tend to be individuals who feel themselves to be free from political, professional, or organizational constraints and who have sufficient time and interest to continue to track these concerns. Y2K is an issue area that involved and continues to involve technological complexities. With only occasional exceptions that I know of, Federal efforts, not to mention United Nations-sponsored efforts, failed to include individuals who possessed the requisite technological expertise in the most complex aspects of Y2K: embedded systems and complex integrated systems. By one software engineer's estimate, there are only around 104 firms and 2000 people in the world possessing such expertise. I am aware of only a few individuals with such expertise who have thus far indicated a willingness to come forward to share what they know or to alert policymakers and others in roles of responsibility concerning problems that are continuing to occur. This is for a variety of reasons, many of which are quite understandable. These reasons include liability concerns, fear of reprisals, threats of being fired, or fear of jeopardizing their ability to earn a living, etc. The failure to pay adequate attention to the most complex aspects of Y2K can be found in the fact that John Koskinen had no technical experts on his small staff of 11. In fact, he said in March in response to a question that I posed to him concerning the omission of technical experts from his staff, that he would not include a technical expert on his staff if he had it to do over. (You can link to that exchange at http://www.gwu.edu/~y2k/keypeople/gordon) As with other parts of the Federal Government's efforts, including those of Congress, the more complex and daunting aspects of the problem were not understood and there is certainly no evidence that there is any greater understanding of them now. In fact, to my knowledge, the more daunting problems that have continued to occur are not even being acknowledged, tracked or assessed, let alone acted upon. (This includes the many different types of malfunctions and failures that were predicted.) Other less daunting IT system-related problems are, in some quarters, not even being referred to as being "Y2K-related" and are simply being dealt with as any technical problem would be. In parts of the public sector that I am aware of, it is even politically incorrect to mention the fact that Y2K-related problems are occurring and are having to be addressed. Strange, but true. I think that there is some chance that the full story may come out one day. That day may well be years away; then again it could be months away. Right now, most people have little interest in the matter. They have no reason to believe that the government's January "declaration of total victory" was indeed premature. Of course, to many, the sole concern was always about worst case scenarios. While worst case scenarios of converging disruptions and disasters have been averted, low and mid-range impact scenarios are still within the realm of possibility. If we end up with a full scale energy crisis by the winter, the impact scale by the first quarter of next year could be a level 3 or more. (See Part 1 of my White Paper on my website regarding what such impacts could entail.) In some ways, it may well be a moot point whether or not Y2K played any role whatsoever even as regards the energy sector. In the following two ways, however, the role of Y2K is not a moot point: ~ It is impossible to develop sound policy if you do not understand the causes and the nature and scope of the problems being addressed. Repairing something that has malfunctioned or failed requires an understanding of what caused the malfunction or failure. Preventing a problem also requires understanding what might go wrong. ~ It does not bode well for the future if policymakers and those in roles of responsibility fail to understand what has happened and what is happening regarding Y2K and embedded systems. It does not bode well for the future if they approach other complex technological challenges, now and in the future, with equal disregard for technological expertise and understanding. It does not bode well if they fail to apply the lessons that should have been learned and that have yet to be learned from the Y2K and embedded systems problems that have occurred and that are continuing to occur.

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

The crossposting on EZ Board can be found at http://pub5.ezboard.com/fyourdontimebomb2000.showMessage? topicID=11603.topic&index=1

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

By the way, Carl, thanks for much for this find.

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

Paula, it would seem to me that IEEE should be continuing to monitor the situation, given that they were first and most in-depth in their analyses of embedded sytems and their potential problems. Haven't been at their site for a while; think I'll toodle on over there....

-- Rachel Gibson (rgibson@hotmail.com), September 23, 2000.

I'm back. First, I should have said IEE (British). This particular page has a great deal of information that will take me a while to sift through. Any help would be appreciated.

-- Rachel Gibson (rgibson@hotmail.com), September 23, 2000.

Here's a link to the EZBoard Article A recent spate of oil industry accidents

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), September 23, 2000.

Rachel,

What a good idea! Perhaps a way to begin would be to post a half dozen or so of the most interesting pages or items that you have found at the IEE site. A number of people will doubtlessly want to explore them further. You could put out a "plate of appetizers"....

Sorry, I am not able to pitch in at the moment.

Regards,

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

Thanks, Spider, for the EZ Board link.

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

Thanks for the link, spider.

Paula, this ap petizer appears to be most appropriate presently:

"L2.3 SLOW DRAG: Just as problems with the year 2000 appeared years before, in this scenario, problems will appear over time after 2000. As daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, yearly programs encounter the problem, there is a constant but only slowly realised drag on all activities. In this scenario, everything done for the first time after 2000 will be problematic, and delays, errors and decreased productivity will diffuse through the economy, not always attributable to the year 2000 problem. The drag could be as significant as an increase in tax rates or energy prices. The year 2K could result in a recession, but the connection might not be obvious."

The above was written in 1998.

-- Rachel Gibson (rgibson@hotmail.com), September 23, 2000.

Extraordinary quote...

Thanks for the insurance link as well.

-- Paula Gordon (pgordon@erols.com), September 23, 2000.

The title of this thread is taken totally out of context. If you are still looking for Y2K evidence, there isn't any in this article. The author indicates that he thinks the recent spate of accidents is due to inadequate staffing, training, and maintenance exacerbated by the recent price increases which are causing "Equipment and personnel run closer to physical and safety limits than ever before. Concomitant with throughput increases, accident size and severity have risen." So, he is saying that accidents have increased because production demands have increased. Nowhere does he allude to digital equipment causing accidents directly, due to Y2K or otherwise.

Get your facts straight.

By the way, I'd say the author of this article would be a good one to contact to discuss the minute possiblility of Y2K errors causing any of these accidents. I'd bet he could set you straight in 5 minutes of conversation.

"Safety. Although as a whole the hydrocarbon industry is very safe, it has suffered a recent spate of accidents. Accidents may be occurring more frequently because fewer dollars can be allocated to staff, training and maintenance. Commodity price shifts eat at profits, resulting in capital and operating spending cuts. These shifts have put unprecedented strains on operators and machinery. Equipment and personnel run closer to physical and safety limits than ever before. Concomitant with throughput increases, accident size and severity have risen.

Thus, importance of safety and shutdown equipment is growing rapidly. Protection system complexity is rising with the complexity and throughput increases of the processes being protected. Safety system integrity depends on the integrity of its constituent field devices.

A large portion of these accidents are traceable to instrument repair or malfunction. For example, every time a manifold is opened to check a transmitter or a valve is removed to the shop for repacking, there are several points of contact between atmosphere and chemical, and between human and chemical.

Each contact point is a possible fire, explosion, exposure or illness. "

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), September 26, 2000.

-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), September 26, 2000.

Smarty & Future you must suffer from selecting comprehension symdrome [or you were so busy jumping to react you weren't listening], I believe I said, "Sometimes Jose, despite education, training, experience, news hype and differing points of view, you just have to follow you gut instinct."

Maria thank you for making my point. You said, "First comment, new refineries haven't been build in the last ten years. Second comment, refineries do just explode. That last statement reminds me of the reporters during the space shuttle explosion. Like it was a big surprise rockets were made of fuel. So it should be no surprise that gas is volatile."

The existing refineries are built with old technology and when the price of crude went down so did the $ put back into maintaining or expanding operations. For that matter, exploratory drilling all but ceased ... yahda3x

Regarding "volitile", generally things are designed to operate [besides planned obsolesence] and perform a service of some kind (e.g., produce a profit, etc.)

Just because some thing has fuel in it doesn't mean it will blow-up. The shuttle had bad or poorly designed o-rings - remember. I find it disturbing you believe because some thing has fuel it will blow up. Does that mean you trade cars daily because you fear your car is going to randomly blow up?

Since cars, trucks and planes have tires Maria, I wonder what master plan picked, ordained, directed [or voice told] Firestone to mfg. tires that would start failing after x amount of use.

Selective comprehension and voices sure make for strange bed fellows?

-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

cryptobyte, if one looks hard enough for a conspiracy, one is probably going to find one. Whether said conspiracy is real or imagined is a-whole-nother story.

As to the cross-posting by Buddy, I find it absolutely hilarious that Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) claims that "...I discovered that no one [at the DOE] had the embedded systems expertise necessary to identify, let alone track and assess oil sector-related embedded systems and complex integrated systems problems...".

I'd like to know how Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) is qualified to decide who is qualified. Further, are we supposed to believe that Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) has "carte blanche" into the DOE? Or the United Nations? Or, for that matter, into any segment of the U.S. Government? What is her security clearance? What are her credentials? She worked for FEMA at one time, did she not? Does this automagically qualify her for the "insider's view" of the DOE or the U.N. or (gasp!) "complex integrated systems problems"?

(And did you all notice she STILL hasn't revealed any "sources"?)

Can someone out there PLEASE give this woman an actual job? I believe her "expertise" is in Public Administration.

-- Patricia (PatriciaS@lasvegas.com), September 26, 2000.

crypto, You're welcome, glad I could help.

I find it disturbing you believe because some thing has fuel it will blow up. Does that mean you trade cars daily because you fear your car is going to randomly blow up? Sorry, crypto but I never wrote it will blow up. I implied that the possibility of it blowing up is greater with fuel because of its volatility. Also I don't trade my cars in daily but I do, however, turn off my engine when I refuel it. This is because (so there's no misunderstanding) fuel can explode with the slightest spark; it is volatile. Thanks for your concern over my vehicle habits.

BTW take a look at the thread I posted. Oil costs at $11 per barrel didn't justify new refineries.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 26, 2000.

oops

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 26, 2000.

FACT

Is "The Paula" suggesting that the Chips have the ability to selectively break down..........Only in the petroleum industry? **IF** there ever was a problem vis a vis the CDC re: embedded systems, SURELY after 9 months OTHER INDUSTRIES would SHOW AT LEAST THE SAME EFFECTS AS THE OIL INDUSTRY. .......THAT.....is only "common sense". BUT.....we do not see that. Therefore, for "The Paula" to be correct, the CHIPS THEMSELVES ........MUST BE ELECTING TO BREAK DOWN ***ONLY** in the OIL BUSINESS.

As Dieter would say........."IST THIS NOT SO??".

FACT :

THERE NO PRICE RISE OR SHORTAGES IN ..........ANY OTHER CHEMICAL PRODUCTS DUE TO "THE PAULA'S" THEORY ABOUT "EMBEDDED CHIPS".

The same "embedded systems" use in Cracking crude are used in MANY OTHER CHEMICAL PROCESSES for the derivatives and finished products ranging from molecules to polymers to compounds used to clean the panties that "The Paula" probably soils every time she thinks about the Terror of Y2k.

To use the number that the IDIOTIC WASTE OF TAX MONEY (the Chem Safety Board) used: there are supposed to be some 65,000 chemical faciilities in the US. (Overstated numbers but others claim 100,000.) And many use the VERY SAME CONTROLLERS (uCs) and MicroProcessors (uPs) that the CRACKING PLANTS FOR CRUDE USE.

WHY? BECAUSE THE VENDORS OF THE SYSTEMS CAN READILY ADAPT THEM TO OTHER PROCESSES. (THE DETAILS OF THIS REQUIRE A MIN. OF MY BACKGROUND IN CHEMISTRY (ONE OF MY MAJORS) AND MY 3 YRS. WORK EXPERIENCE FOR A CHEM. MANUFACTURER plus ONLY 10 years with a distributor of uPs and uCs.

It should be OBVIOUS that if there were "embedded problems" the systems would be effected across the board. It was even argued by such "serious intellectuals" as BeachBall Brucie that the "secondary clocks" would strike ALL INDUSTRIES and by another "leading light of brain power" Lord DUMBO (a speaker at "The Paula's" GWU's Y2k soirees) that SAID EFFECTS would go on and on and on until 2010 min. (He no doubt was counting on this to spur sales for his newsletter but somehow he has vaporized from even that pit of mud: Hyatt-ski's web site).

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 26, 2000.

Maria. I think your argument(s) lack premise and conclusion. Defining something in terms of itself doesn't hold up well!

"I implied that the possibility of it blowing up is greater with fuel because of its volatility." If you are alive, the possibility of dying is higher, too. What is your point?

"BTW take a look at the thread I posted. Oil costs at $11 per barrel didn't justify new refineries." When existing refineries were built, was oil at $11 per barrel?

ttfn

-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

crypto, you ... ah it's not worth it.

Paula is a twit, she may be a nice person but a twit none the less. Patricia and CPR hit it accurately. Paula knows not what she says.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 26, 2000.

Maria:

You brought in Dr. Gordon. I didn't. Regardless, you never answered my previous two questions? Isn't that hedging on your own position?

-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

Chemical/Radiation Threads

in the Grassroots Information Coordination Center (GICC) question and answer forum

Columbia, SC: Company Officials Shutdown Plant After State Orders Closing Due to Suspected Leak of Organic Tin Into River NY:Eleven Overcome By Dimethoate Fumes at Lawn and Garden Treatment Product Company

CA: Emergency phone calls delayed after toxic-chemical release

Sulfuric Acid Compound Spills at Plastics Coating Plant, Sends at Least 40 For Treatment

Hundreds evacuated in central Mexico after malathion pesticide leak

Mercury scare in Chicago

Oregon - Employees sue to shut down Umatilla Chemical Depot; allege nerve gas leaks

SC - Valve Malfunction Knocks Out Worker; Chem Tank

CHICAGO--Dozens of people evacuated because of a leak of nitric acid

EUROPE - Chlorine Leak at Chemical Factory

NJ: Exxon Mobil's Baytown Olefins Plant Shut

CANADA: 3,000 EVACUATED NEAR ACID PLANT FIRE

Japan: Plant blowup kills 4, injures 22 in Gunma

Japan: Chemical Plant Explosion

PA, Ammonia leak forces evacuation at plant

WA: Hanford 'take-cover' alarm sounds after workers smell sulfur

NJ - Printer Glitch Causes More Airport Delays

IOWA - Elevated Reading Found at IAAAP

Death ruling raises issue of Gulf War ills

Safety Concerns Stop Work at Los Alamos Neutron Lab

U.S. to Pay Thousands for Radiation Exposure - Post

Alabama Town Residents Evacuated

Newport, TN: EPA Orders Chemical Plant Shut Down, Citing

Potential Well Contamination, Releases, or Explosion

US Monitoring Reports of Elevated Radiation Levels in Kazakhstan

Two Rivers, WI: Cause of Chlorine Leak at Water Plant Undetermined: Nearby Buildings Evacuated

Idaho Radioactive-Waste Converter Exceeds Emissions Limit

N. CAROLINA - More Than 6,000 Gal. Hydrochloric Acid Leaks From Malfunctioning

Pressure Valve

TEXAS - Update...Thousands Flee Acid Tank Danger Near Houston...

UKRAINE - Update...Zaporozhye Nuclear Plant

THAILAND - Workers Rushed to Hospital From Inhaling Ammonia Gas, Governor Refuses To Shut Down Factory

UK - Suspected Dangerous Chemicals Discovered at Beach Area

CHICAGO - Chemical Leak Sickens at Least 9 People

ILLINOIS - Ammonia Leak Causes Injuries, Forces Evacuation

TEXAS - 2 Chemical Plant Workers Found Dead

ZAMBIA - Acid Shortage Hits Copper Tailing Plant (Technical Problems Cited)

New Mexico: 1,000 Geese Die Near Roswell

NEW MEXICO --Workers Exposed to Plutonium at US Lab

ST. LOUIS - Low-Level Uranium Escaped into Plant, U.S. Inspectors Say

FLORIDA - Tests Show Area Tainted

PA--Chemical Linked to 2 Allentown Fires

PA--Chemical Worker Badly Hurt When Door Blew Off Overpressurized Kiln at Allentown

Mercury Reclamation

TEXAS--State Faults US on Solvent Leak, Officials Probe Delay in Reporting Levels Near

Nuclear Arms Plant

THAILAND--Spate of Accidents Sparks Factory Inspection Drive, 2,200 Plants Will Be Covered

OHIO--Update, Spll Treated as Water Reaches Tiffin (Sandusky River)

Romania - 6 wks ago it was Cyanide; Now it's a mine spill - 20,000 tons of metal pollutants headed for rivers

Thailand--Follow Up to Poison Gas Leak at Petrochemical Company

Finland--Strike Warning Issued For Plastic and Chemical Products Sector

Plastics Plant Worker Dies From Exposure to toxin

UK: Major Gas Leak at Chemical Works in Cheshire

Entire Ohio Town of 500 Evacuated After Tank Collapse and Chemical Spill

Number of Reported Chemical Incidents Up Ever-so-slightly

New York - Alert; Radioactivity released; Indian Point 2 Plant

Federal Chemical Safety Board comments on Y2k & accidents

Hospital malfunction

No significant increase in reported chemical incidents.

1100 State Workers Sent Home Following Chemical Spill Albany, NY,

Emergency Response and Notification Systems unplugged, non-Y2k compliant

Columbus Ohio, Hundreds Evacuate VA Medical Clinic, Seven Taken to Hospital Due to

Carbon Monoxide Leak

Chemical Warning System/ failed several times in last 15 months..Thurs and Saturdays

-- think (you@oughta.know), September 26, 2000.

This post is quite accurate but the real bottom line on "The Paula" is simple:

HOW WOULD ........PAULA GORDON ("generalist)....... EVEN KNOW WHAT AN "EMBEDDED SYSTEM EXPERT" WAS EVEN IF SHE OWNED A DOG WHO WAS TRAINED TO SNIFF THEM OUT?

She bills herself as a "generalist" and gives NO TECHNICAL CREDENTIALS. This is "typical" of Liberal Arts majors in "Government". ITS ALSO THE REASON THAT HARD WORK GSA types tend to ignore "The Paulas" of the Earth.

For "The Paula" to select "embedded systems experts" (after allowing a Jim Lord to pose as one at one of her Paula Y2k Trembling Sessions at GWU)......

would be the equivalent of allowing Hillary Clinton to buy and sell members of the New York Yankees because she .......had attended a game or two.

Get it straight: PAULA GORDON IS A Y2k "GROUPIE" trying to be elevated to the "stage". NOT GONNA HAPPEN. WOULDN'T BE PRUDENT.

cryptobyte, if one looks hard enough for a conspiracy, one is probably going to find one. Whether said conspiracy is real or imagined is a- whole-nother story.

As to the cross-posting by Buddy, I find it absolutely hilarious that Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) claims that "...I discovered that no one [at the DOE] had the embedded systems expertise necessary to identify, let alone track and assess oil sector-related embedded systems and complex integrated systems problems...".

I'd like to know how Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) is qualified to decide who is qualified. Further, are we supposed to believe that Paula Gordon (of No Embedded Systems Expertise) has "carte blanche" into the DOE? Or the United Nations? Or, for that matter, into any segment of the U.S. Government? What is her security clearance? What are her credentials? She worked for FEMA at one time, did she not? Does this automagically qualify her for the "insider's view" of the DOE or the U.N. or (gasp!) "complex integrated systems problems"?

(And did you all notice she STILL hasn't revealed any "sources"?)

Can someone out there PLEASE give this woman an actual job? I believe her "expertise" is in Public Administration.

-- Patricia (PatriciaS@lasvegas.com), September 26, 2000.

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 26, 2000.

HINT.........for those who don't know: "THE PAULA" once ran for Congress from a district in S.F. No details are given on her web page. SHE LOST. Such people tend to get "infected" with their own PR.

Let me "posit" this: "THE PAULA" is on her way to being the HAROLD STASSEN OF Y2k. Always in the running but NEVER LISTENED TO BY ANYONE EXCEPT FOR............................amusement.

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 26, 2000.

cpr part of your last post reminded me of a line from your autobiography, "... NEVER LISTENED TO BY ANYONE EXCEPT FOR............................amusement."

Twitch once for 'YES' or twice for 'NO', but are you so down on Dr. Gordon because she makes you feel so helplessly inadequate? If you need help from your Roadies to respond, they and you please feel free.

PPS

A high percentage of sane people sing in the shower. Do you now the name of the song they sing? [This assumes, of course, [that] you shower; however, if not the case, you might of over heard some one while peeking through the door.]

-- cryptobyte (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

Think:

Your point? This is one of those old hat debates-I have yet to see ANYONE post data to prove that problems are occuring at a statistically significant rate in our infrastructure to posit "y2K" or any other kind of mass failure.

This is the same reason I deferred to the pollies: no on coudl show me EXACTLY how a date related problem(s) would bring about the end of the world.

Crypto-

How did I get in there with maria? All i said is that people need to make a gut check before relying on their gut.

-- FutureShock (gray@matter.think), September 26, 2000.

crypto:

I worked at a refinery between 1984 and 1991. There were regular explosions. I also lived in that little town called Blue Island that Deb M. mentioned, with the Clark Refinery [in the early 70's.] It had regular explosions.

Sometimes the explosions were caused by malfunctions, and sometimes the explosions were caused by human error. [okay...another malfunction], but we're not talking about a place that's risk-free.

Your point is unclear in my mind.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

Hello, FutureShock:

You provided part of my reply in your reply to Think.

"... yet to see ANYONE post data to prove that problems are occuring at a statistically significant rate in our infrastructure to posit "y2K" or any other kind of mass failure. This is the same reason I deferred to the pollies: no on coudl show me EXACTLY how a date related problem(s) would bring about the end of the world."

How does one person, group, agency, ... coordinate all the data - that they are aware of - into a usable model. Given a serious effort and exhaustion of every means of research possible, I propose the failure scenario is so large, so big [that] we can only begin to fathom the complexity, enormity and spill-over of it's effects.

A large sample is thirty (30) of some thing. How complex is a population in the billions that is spewing real time data from each and every one of the respective individual chips.

Perhaps the following reference is useful to you. Perhaps not.

[Pay close attention to two clock section: operational vs shelf life] Mark A. Frautschi, "Embedded Systems and the Year 2000 Problem (The OTHER Year 2000 Problem)" (Draft), JULY 1, 1998. http://www.tmn.com/~frautsch/y2k2.html

Given this failure scenario, the more I have learned - the less I seem to know. Given your respective knowledge, education, experience and belief system, some times all that is left is gut instinct - pro or con. That is my point.

While I am glad Y2K roll-over wasn't worse, I also know we aren't out of the woods yet. And, the wolf pulling people from the sleigh is this undefined, untrackable, undocumented failure thing.

Thanks.

-- crypto ... (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

Hello, Anita:

"I worked at a refinery between 1984 and 1991. There were regular explosions. ... It had regular explosions. Sometimes the explosions were caused by malfunctions, and sometimes the explosions were caused by human error. [okay...another malfunction], but we're not talking about a place that's risk-free. Your point is unclear in my mind."

In a production mode refinery, an explosion is irregular. They aren't designed or underwritten by how many explosions they are capable of with standing before production stops.

Due to poor maintenance, chips, people, ..., there are more and more unscheduled maintenances taking place and they are spanning longer than normal time frames - as down time increases, production decreases.

Dropping two rocks in different parts of the same ocean will eventually result in the concentric rings intersecting; likewise, at some point, even in a global economy, the effects of accumulating down time, lost production and revenue will eventually start to take a toll.

Another way of looking at it is, the difference between Operational and Strategic mind sets.

Regardless, have a good day.

crypto

-- crypto... (cryptobyte@hotmail.com), September 26, 2000.

Unless one buys into multiple conspiracy theories, in this case that malfunctions are being covered up, there are ways to gauge wether or not we are experiencing failures at an unprecedented rate. Accidents in places like chemical plants and nuclear power plants must be reported to various agencies. If there were a story, the press would be all over it-I remember many statistics being posted here at the beginning of the year. I also remember all the initial FUD over the number of incidents taking place at nuclear plants. Where are these statisticians now?

Again, one has to buy into an enormous conspiracy theory to believe anything related to date is taking down plants with alarming regularity. This is another reason why I did not believe the doomsayers-hey, I do not trust easily, especially govt. and corporations, but I could not fathom-it defied logic-that a conspiracy of such epic proportions could have developed to hide the "real" deal from the people.

We have an enormously complex world, utterly beautiful in the way it turns chaos into order, and order into chaos. It astonishes me how it all works, for the most part, considering the nearly incalculable number of transactions that take place every day between machines and people, people and people, machine and machine...It really is a miracle that anything works at all.

Y2K is over.

-- FutureShock (gray@matter.think), September 26, 2000.

I've never seen any explanation from Paula, Shakey, or anyone like them as to how a date function is involved in the refining of oil. Oh yeah, I almost forgot -- overflowing buffers in non-compliant chips. (derisive snort) No, I mean a real explanation.

The fact that Paula suspects it inclines me to disbelieve it.

-- Mikey2k (mikey2k@he.wont.eat.it), September 26, 2000.

Someone tell me this TWIT is not a "conspiracy theory" prone AIRHEAD.

I can't believe she would expose herself in public as follows on what is obviously a "venue" that like GICC she must think is "appropriate". But then......she did "run for Congress" and given the riff raff that was allowed under the Dome over 200 years, who the Fukk really would take her seriously:

Its all a coverup I tell ye. They have to be lying.

Biggest Fruitcake is also a "conspiracy" freak-out.

http://pub5.ezboard.com/fyourdony2kglitches.showMessage? topicID=107.topic

8/15/00

Paula Gordon Re: THE EMBEDDED SPIKE .......

---

Interesting exchange...

The following is a relevant excerpt of something I posted on GICC a few weeks ago:

"The most recent in the series of briefing/brainstorming sessions at George Washington University on Y2K was held on Tuesday, July 11....

A primary focus of that session was some newly shared information concerning what is going on behind the scenes. It turns out that according to a number of persons with hands-on expertise in the field, Y2K/embedded systems problems involving integrated systems are very much with us and are becoming more evident with the passage of time. Owing to liability, absence of focus, threats of dismissal, bottomline and market concerns, the political incorrectness of mentioning Y2K problems, and other factors, it appears that information concerning such problems is not getting out. Y2K/embedded systems problems seem to be unfolding in slow motion and only a very few people appear to be inclined or able to identify them and fewer still seem interested in openly tracking, assessing, or addressign them. Few seem willing to talk about what is happening. No one that I have been able to identify in the Federal government has responsibility for tracking, assessing, and addressing such ongoing problems.

Given present circumstances, including high levels of disinterest, absence of expertise, absence of resources, and failure to assign responsibility, potential long term scenarios that could evolve are cause for some concern. For instance, it would be possible for a scenario of mid-range impact on the impact scale to evolve. In such a scenario more and more problems could become evident while little in the way of expertise and resources were directed to tracking, assessing, and addressing the underlying causes of the problems. One possible consequence of such failures is the detrimental impact that they can have on public health and safety or the environment. Two other possible consequences that can follow from a failure to acknowledge or address the underlying causes of problems include the following:

~ only the most obvious symptoms might be addressed when a failure occurs or a malfunction becomes apparent, meaning that the problem may recur again and again until the underlying cause is finally addressed OR

~ costly equipment and systems might have to be replaced in its entirety, obviously a very costly proposition.

Such possible consequences could have been avoided had remediation efforts been completed or had repairs been done that were based on an understanding of the actual or possible causes of the problems.

At the June 12 meeting at GW, communications with engineers familiar with Y2K-related integrated systems problems were reported on and discussed along with suggestions for initiatives. As the developments that were discussed are sensitive in nature (jobs and careers can be at stake), particular care must be taken in publicly reporting them. I hope to be posting some general information about these developments in the next few months.

Meanwhile, I continue to communicate with officials behind the scenes, even though, in most cases, the level of interest is very low. The low level of interest can be attributed in part to the absence of technical expertise within most all government offices and/or the failure of such expertise to inform government policies and priorities. Such technical expertise is needed to understand Y2K-related complex integrated systems problems involving IT systems and embedded systems.

There is a commonly held perception among Members of Congress, the Administration, the media, and the public that the Administration was correct in declaring victory in early January. Efforts to track and assess Y2K problems, such as they were, ceased early in the year. As one contractor to government put it at a public meeting in March, "we (the public) are on our own."

I am aware of only a very individuals who have continued to express continuing concern about Y2K-related matters. Aside from GICC, I know of very few other efforts that continue to include a focus on such concerns and none of these has the visibility that GICC has. It is curious that public institutions have abrograted their responsibilities to continue event to track and assess, let alone address, this stage of the first greatest global challenge in the information age. It makes me wonder if this is an indication that at least for the time being, as a society, we have collectively allowed technology to "snooker" us: Technology may have gotten the upperhand. Very few of those with the technical training that enables them to understand Y2K-related complex integrated systems problems are openly acknowledging their concerns. In recent months, far too few seem to be helping shed light on and address current and continuing Y2K-related challenges. It also seems that when the insights of those with such training and expertise is brought to the attention of those in roles of public responsibility, it can fall on deaf ears. Such individuals too often lack a basic grasp of the complexities of technical subjects and cannot see the relevance of such concerns to policy and action. In our overly specialized society, we have failed to create a sufficient role for generalists and cross-disciplinary experts. We have failed to create roles for persons who understand enough about the complexities of technology and policy to act as catalysts and interpreters between the experts and those in policy roles. This could well prove to be one of the gravest failings of schools that train and prepare professionals in scientific and technical fields as well as the fields of public administration and business administration....

I am interested in communicating directly with those who have technical expertise bearing on Y2K-related complex integrated systems problems who might be willing to share their insights into what is going on behind the scenes, on the record or off the record."

Paula Gordon
<pgordon@erols.com>
=============================================================== http://pub5.ezboard.com/fyourdony2kglitches.showMessage? topicID=74.topic
Re: Paula Gordon's questions to John Koskinen re Y2K outcomes

---

Snooze,

The analogy fits. I am personally aware of several unreported Y2K failures. While not "show stoppers" they illustrate that failures have ocurred and will continue to occur for some time. If they occur in low-profile programs, some may also occur in high- profile ones, especially as infrustructures get closer to their maximum capacities.

All the best,
Mountain Mike

Paula Gordon
Registered User
(8/29/00 3:01:03 am)
You have been banned
in this ezboard


My questions to John Koskinen: A belated posting

---

Very belated thanks, Ed, for posting this note concerning the John Koskinen Q&A! Until very recently, I had technical problems that had kept me from visiting ezboard. Those problems solved, I have only recently found this thread.

Also belated thanks to everyone for your comments.

John Koskinen's response to my question concerning the small size of his staff (11) and the absence of even one technical expert on his staff helps explain why so little information has gotten to the public concerning embedded systems and complex integrated systems problems. It also helps explain why the most serious problems that have occurred and that are continuing to occur (and that could potentially occur) are either not being tracked, monitored, or assessed, or they are simply not being identified or reported out by the public or private sector as being even possibly Y2K-related. The reports of the Chem Safety Board contain no information concerning whether or not a problem is Y2K-related or whether there is evidence to suggest that it might possibly be Y2K-related. There is no one at the National Institute for Standards and Technology who has any continuing responsibilities regarding Y2K-related embedded systems concerns. To the best of my knowledge, no official with embedded systems expertise at the Department of Energy is looking into Y2K-related problems as they may be related to refinery disruptions. There is no one at the National Transportation Safety Board who is investigating possible connections between the abnormally high number of problems falling within NTSB's areas of responsibility and Y2K-related IT and embedded system malfunctions. I would be glad to receive information to the contrary on any and all of these statements. I would be happy to stand corrected.

Surely someone in the Federal government should have responsibility for evaluating what has happened. A sound approach to the policy process would seem to require it. Surely there should be someone charged with tracking, assessing, and monitoring current problems. Surely, someone in a role of public responsibility should be charged with taking steps, regulatory or otherwise, to prevent future problems or address the problems that are continuing to occur.

So far as I have been able to discern, there are no individuals in roles of public responsibility in the Executive Branch of the Federal government who have any official ongoing involvement in even tracking the effectiveness of past Y2K-related efforts. There seems to be little or no recognition in Washington of the desirability of even assessing the completeness of remediation efforts and of making sure that all stop gap measures have been replaced with fixes that will last.

"Victory" was viewed perhaps by most, as escaping any worst case scenarios. Having escaped worst case scenarios or their likelihood, all efforts to identify, track, assess, and address continuing problems simply ceased, at least as far as the media and the public is concerned.

Complicating matters has been the fact that very few individuals with the requisite specialized technical expertise in complex integrated systems seem to have an interest in stepping forward to make the case that any unfinished efforts need to be completed and that there are problems that need to be acknowledged and addressed.

According to the best information I have been able to gather, problems involving the malfunctioning or failure of embedded systems and complex integrated systems can be expected to continue in those high hazard sectors that took a fix on failure approach or that did not remediate successfully or completely. Two clear choices for those in roles of public responsibility and for those concerned about the public interest seem to be:

~ continue as we are or

~ do what can be done to investigate, acknowledge, assess, minimize, and address the problems. ----------------------------------------

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 26, 2000.

offffffffff

-- cpr (buytexas@swbell.net), September 26, 2000.

Think,

You may want to consider doing that. You're list is stupid and has nothing to do with Y2K. The mercury scare in Chicago? That is from old meters in houses built many, many years ago. Another concern is that the meters have been improperly disposed.

You're very ignorant.

-- CJS (john@saporitoplating.com), September 26, 2000.

cool, I had no idea my question would generate such an interesting discussion. Acutally I agree with you, Futureshock, "y2k is over." FOr some perverse reason, I could not resist the temptation to stir things up and see what people had to see about Paula's latest post. I'm pretty amazed and impressed by her persistance in the face of reality.

Thanks for all the thoughtful and courtious comments (CPR excluded).

-- JoseMiami (josenmiami@yahoo.com), September 27, 2000.

Mikey2K-

You're still around? Hello.

Jose:

Kicking anthills?

-- FutureShock (gray@matter.think), September 27, 2000.

FS,

By jove, I think you've unwittingly hit on a new crusade for cpr {and one which I'm sure would garner 'Nita's full support.}

{Long cut & paste intended - everyone else but cpr *avert your eyes*}:

August 1, 2000

Invading Ants Press United Front in California By JON CHRISTENSEN Dr. David Holway, top, and Neil Tsutsui are among researchers at the University of California at San Diego using a colony of ants that stretches from San Diego to beyond San Francisco to study the genetics and evolution of the insects. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- SAN DIEGO -- In a quirk of evolution and genetics, Argentine ants are overwhelming native California ants while forming what scientists believe may be the biggest ant colony in the world, stretching more than 600 miles from San Diego to north of San Francisco.

The ants in this so-called supercolony are so similar to each other genetically that different colonies do not fight with one another the way they do in their homeland. As a result, they are using a united family front to win territory from native ants.

In Argentina, where they are known as sugar ants, different nests of the fiercely territorial ants fight with one another, competing for food and space. An ant that wanders into the territory of another colony just 50 yards away will quickly be torn apart by workers who recognize the peculiar odor of a rival. But in California, scientists found that they could take a worker from San Diego and put it in a colony from San Francisco and it would be welcomed like a kissing cousin.

Using the same DNA fingerprinting techniques used in paternity cases, scientists at the University of California at San Diego looked at the genetic differences between ants in Argentina and California. They discovered more than twice as much genetic diversity among Argentine ants in their native range compared with those in California.

Published reports and museum samples showed that Argentine ants first came to the United States aboard ships carrying coffee and sugar from South America during the 1890's. The scientists concluded that the relatively small immigrant populations created a "genetic bottleneck," choking off genetic diversity.

The small founding populations represented less than half the genetic diversity of the species.

That has made almost all Argentine ants in California similar enough that they can no longer distinguish between close kin and ants from other nests, a critical mechanism in the evolution of social insects. So instead of defending separate territories, the ants behave like a single fluid colony in their new territory.

And though the Argentine ants appear to have mellowed out among themselves in California and are mostly just a nuisance to humans, they ruthlessly kill and displace native ants, some of which are 20 times as large as the Argentines. The effects of the invasion ripple through the ecosystem. Some plants, like tree poppies, depend on native ants for seed dispersal. And large native harvester ants make up more than 90 percent of the diet of coastal horned lizards, commonly known as horny toads and a candidate for the endangered species list.

Dr. Ted J. Case, a biologist at the University of California at San Diego, has spent much of his career studying population changes among reptiles on islands and in isolated patches of natural habitat like parks in suburban California.

When a statewide survey of reptiles and amphibians found a precipitous decline in the population of coastal horned lizards, Dr. Case thought that changes in the lizard's food base might be involved. So he pulled together a team of scientists and students to study the tiny Argentine ants, which are about a fifth of an inch long.

The DNA detective work capped a five-year investigation of the ecology, behavior and genetics of the ants. By comparing Argentine ants in their native and invaded ranges, the scientists solved an intriguing puzzle in the increasingly important field of invasion biology, which is the study of invasive species. Most invasive species move into a territory that has been opened up by changes in habitat and local extinction of native species, Dr. Case said. But in the case of Argentine ants, a genetic change triggered changes in behavior and colony structure that enabled the invader to conquer new territory by eliminating native species.

At the same time, the huge supercolony of Argentine ants in California continues to pose an unsolved riddle about the evolution of so-called unicolonial insects, which act as single colonies over large areas. And it raises the creepy possibility of an insect world dominated by invasive unicolonial species.

Scientists play down that possibility. The loss of genetic diversity is generally considered to be detrimental to the survival of a species, said Neil Tsutsui, a graduate student who did the genetics research in Dr. Case's lab. The loss of kinship recognition is an even bigger problem for social insects, he said. The only way female workers, who make up the bulk of the colony, can ensure that their genes get passed on to future generations is by protecting closely related queens. So it is assumed that workers work only for queens who share their genes. But if workers cannot distinguish between their kin and any other ants, they end up working for the whole supercolony. And then there is no way for natural selection to favor any one queen and her workers over any other in the colony.

If unicolonial insects were successful in the grand sweep of evolutionary time, Dr. Case said, they would probably appear more often. Unicoloniality may be useful in the short term, as it is for Argentine ants and some other invasive ants, he said, but in the long run it appears to be an evolutionary dead end because social behavior could not evolve.

That is little consolation for residents of Southern California, where the small, dark brown and black Argentine ants are the No. 1 pest that extermination companies are called upon to eliminate.

In contrast, it took a week for researchers to even find the ants in Argentina. "It was eye-opening to see how inconspicuous they were in Argentina," Dr. Case said. "Even in areas where they're relatively common, they're not dominant. They're not a pest. So then the question was, what has enabled them to be so successful here?"

In California, the researchers have no trouble finding ants to study. There are Argentine ants invading the chaparral-covered ocean bluffs around the University of California at San Diego. There are Argentine ants scurrying along cracks in sidewalks on campus. And there are Argentine ants swarming by the elevator on the ground floor of the biology building.

Although colleagues have joked that the researchers have aided and abetted the invasion, Dr. Case's lab keeps its ants under strict control, in plastic tubs coated with a slippery Teflon-like substance that ants cannot climb. The lips of tubs are coated with a sticky substance that traps any ants that might find a trail to the top. In the lab, different colonies of Argentine ants are connected by plastic tubing to common foraging areas -- tubs with water and food.

By not fighting among themselves, Argentine ants in the supercolony gain a competitive advantage over other ants, said Dr. David Holway, a postdoctoral researcher who designed experiments to test the supercolony's advantage over colonies that fight with one another. The experiments showed that Argentine ants that cooperated with one another produced more than three times the brood and more than twice as many workers as colonies that fought with one another.

The experiments also showed the advantage the supercolony ants had over native ants. The Argentine ants get to food faster, overwhelm rivals with sheer numbers of workers, and defend their turf with chemical weapons they spray on opponents. "The Argentine ants win in a few days," Andrew Suarez, a graduate student, said with grim admiration. Mr. Suarez's family came from Argentina, and his grandmother put up the research team members when they studied the ants there.

Mr. Suarez said the experimental results helped explain why some parts of California that once were home to as many as 20 different species of ants now contained as few as two: Argentine ants and a native species that is active in the winter, when the Argentine ants are less active.

"Some people say, 'Big deal; you're just replacing some ants with others,' " Mr. Suarez said. "But the thing is, you're displacing 20 species. And all the roles they play are wiped out: dispersing seeds, pollinating plants, providing food for other animals. All the functions are totally lost when Argentine ants move in."

Friends and neighbors often ask the researchers how to deal with Argentine ants in their homes. Because their research indicates that lack of moisture is the only factor that seems to limit the spread of Argentine ants, they suggest a simple solution: replacing lush lawns with desert landscaping. "You wouldn't have them if there were native plants and cactus and San Diego looked like it should," Mr. Suarez said.

In their research papers, the scientists have also suggested that more Argentine ants could be introduced to California to increase their genetic diversity so that the ants would again fight with one another and contain their own populations. But they conceded that it was an academic idea unlikely to be practical. Any introduced populations would probably be quickly wiped out by the supercolony, Mr. Tsutsui said.

Dr. Case's lab is now collaborating with scientists at Clorox who are studying the chemicals that ants smell to identify nest mates. If they could create a chemical that identifies ants as enemies of the supercolony, then they might be able to spray the chemical on half of the colony and let the Argentine ants fight to the death.

Another more grim possibility is that another invasive species could offer some competition for the Argentine ants. In the Southeastern United States, imported red fire ants seem to have limited the spread of Argentine ants. The fire ants come from the same South American habitat as the Argentine ants. And they are also an invasive unicolonial species. But unlike Argentine ants, which spread slowly without help from humans and took a century to spread throughout most of coastal California, fire ant queens and winged males take nuptial flights and establish new far-flung colonies. They have invaded California just in the last few years. And they are even meaner than Argentine ants.

Dr. Case is chagrined to see another invasive species come to California. Especially one that bites, he said. But he and his colleagues are also students of invasions and species change. And the coming showdown between Argentine and fire ants will offer another opportunity to study an invasion as it happens.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company

-- flora (***@__._), September 27, 2000.

Jose, I'm kind of curious as to why you would be "...amazed and impressed by her persistance in the face of reality...".

"Amazed" I can understand; though "astounded" and/or "stunned" would have been my choice of words. But, IMO, there's absolutely nothing there that would result in someone being "impressed".

-- Patricia (PatriciaS@lasvegas.com), September 27, 2000.

Oops...I almost forgot.....

HI CJS!!!!!

-- Patricia (PatriciaS@lasvegas.com), September 27, 2000.

Flora:

You knew this would get my interest. Do you have the link around? We're studying founder-effects and bottlenecks right now, and these fellers fit right in.

It appears as though I could wipe out my fire-ants with these Argentinian ants, and wipe out some other species of wildlife. Then again, why are fire-ants so rampant if they still have other predators?

A woman from school came over to study a week or so ago. We decided to study on the patio because it was a nice day. I warned her that I attracted ants. It was funny as I killed them nipping my feet while they never approached her. She might have even thought I was imagining them until she said, "Um...there's an ant crawling across your page 171." Think I could get hired as sortof a pied piper?

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), September 27, 2000.

'Nita -

"Think I could get hired as sort of a pied piper?"

I smell at least one grant in there somewhere!

I pasted it the article from where I'd saved it on my desktop. The NY Times archive search just said you could buy the same article for $2.50.

If you like, I'll e-mail mine to you {it's the same thing as above}.

Pretty interesting, huh? There was a great article in Nature several years back about sea anenomes. They reproduce by cloning, & wage fascinating battles with neighboring anenome communities for territory.

-- flora (***@__._), September 27, 2000.

I sympathize with you Anita. The fire ants in Texas are the worst I've ever seen. One time I fell on an ant hill and was covered within seconds, drove me nuts.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), September 27, 2000.

You know, all this talk of ants got me to thinking (which can be a highly dangerous pastime around these parts).

Anyway, I realized that when SO and I are in the backyard, the ants (teeny-tiny little guys) will crawl over whatever shoes I have on, and wind up crawling up my leg. It's pure comedy watching me trying to swat them away. SO, OTOH, will be standing there in bare feet and/or shoes and not one will go near him.

Wonder if it's a "hormone" thing?

I agree with flora, I smell grant money ;-)

-- Patricia (PatriciaS@lasvegas.com), September 27, 2000.

Hmmm, grant $$$...

Patricia,

Maybe Paula & cpr could join forces!

{don't know 'bout y'all - but I think I just scared myself.}

'Nita - I tried to zap the article to your mailbox.

-- flora (***@__._), September 27, 2000.

Jose:

Ok, I have waited for an explanation. Who is Paul Gordon? If this refers to Paula Gordon, what is the inference? Just waiting to hear. This is not related to the total discussion. I am just amazed that this error [if it is one] was not discussed earlier.

Q

-- Q (Question@what.xxx), September 27, 2000.

Watching Paula Gordon pretend to talk "technical" aint a pretty sight....a bit like a ballerena farting, it's downright embarrassing.

Paula, how about those Rosemount 1151 transmitters? LOL, you wouldn't know an embedded system if it whacked ya upside that dense head...

-- FactFinder (FactFinder@bzn.com), September 28, 2000.