The U.S. Coast Guard on Thursday (7/29) said that it could take 10-12 days to seal the "orphaned" wellhead that has been spewing a mixture of oil and natural gas into Louisiana's Barataria Bay since Tuesday when a barge ran into it.

A company called Wild Well Control Inc. has been designated as the prime contractor to secure the wellhead.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Sunday threatened to cut oil exports to the United States in the event Colombia launches a military attack on Venezuela. During his weekly television show, Chavez also said the U.S. plans to assassinate him.

At issue is Colombia's belief that Chavez harbors members of the Colombian militant groups Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), and the National Liberation Army (ELN) in Venezuela. After Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe publicly made this allegation, Chavez severed diplomatic ties with Bogota last week.

The Houston Chronicle has a good article (link below) about the ongoing debate over whether a pipeline carrying crude oil between Canada and Illinois should be expanded to bring crude to other parts of the country, including Texas, for refinement.

Tuesday night there was an explosion and fire on a mobile offshore drilling unit (MODU) approximately 52 miles Southeast of Venice, Louisiana. At least 11 workers are missing and seven are critically injured, according to the U.S. Coast Guard. A search and rescue operation is still underway for those missing.

The MODU Deepwater Horizon is owned by Transocean and contracted to BP.

Early Friday morning about 12:30 AM local time there was an explosion, and a fire broke out at the Tesoro Corp. oil refinery in Anacortes, Wash. At least one worker is dead, four injured, and three others remain missing.

The Christian Science Monitor reported on Monday about a previously undisclosed cyberattack that targeted at least three U.S. oil companies in 2008. According to the article, Marathon Oil, ExxonMobil, and ConocoPhillips were unaware of the severity of the breach until the FBI became involved in the investigation. There is evidence that the attack originated in China.

The affects on the economy and environment of Saturday's oil spill in the Port of Port Author, Texas are sure to be felt for a long time.

Officials have said that the closure of the Sabine-Neches Waterway will impact the economy to the tune of $200 million a day. It is expected to remain closed for several days. And then there is the environment. Crews are fighting to cleanup what is the state's worst oil spill in more than a decade. According to the Coast Guard, approximately 9 miles of shoreline are affected.

A collision between a petroleum tanker and another vessel on Saturday caused a major oil spill in the Sabine Neches Ship Channel in the Port of Port Arthur in Texas.

According to the Coast Guard, the towing vessel Dixie Vengeance and the two barges it was pushing collided with the 807-foot tank ship Eagle Otome, causing significant damage and the discharge of as much as 450,000 gallons of crude oil into the environment.