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Just days after increasing the flow-rate estimate to 20,000-40,000 barrels of oil per day, a government panel on Tuesday released a considerably larger new estimate: 35,000-60,000 barrels per day.

As the NYT explains, the high estimate indicates that "an amount equal to the Exxon Valdez spill could be gushing from the well about every four days."

Here is a timeline of how the estimates have increased in recent weeks:

Here is what these ever-changing estimates look like graphically:

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To give some perspective:

  • The low estimate of 35,000 barrels per day would mean that as much as 83,790,000 gallons have leaked in the past 57 days.
  • The high estimate of 60,000 barrels per day would mean that as much as 143,640,000 gallons have leaked in the past 57 days.
  • 143,640,000 gallons = 542,959,200 liters / 309,516,000 Americans = 1.75 liters per man, woman and child living in the United States.

Imagine every single American dumping nearly a two-liter of oil into the ocean. According to the high end of the latest estimate, that is your share of this disaster so far: 1.75 liters.

Update — It is not clear whether the new 35,000-60,000 figure applies retroactively. After reading this piece from Reuters, I assumed that it does:

Even at the minimum estimated rate of 35,000 bpd, the ruptured well has dumped nearly 2 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded on April 20 — nearly eight times the amount that the Exxon Valdez spilled into Prince William Sound in Alaska in 1989.

But the New York Times implies otherwise:

The latest estimate reflects a possible increase in the flow rate that occurred after BP cut an underwater pipe called a riser on June 3 to install a new device to capture part of the oil.

The press release from Unified Command is not clear on this.

Update 2 — Business Week notes the lack of clarity on this issue as well:

Yesterday’s statement didn’t elaborate on whether the team concluded that removing the pipe, which enabled BP to begin recovering oil on the drillship, increased the amount escaping from the leak.

Update 3 — This doesn’t settle the question definitively, but according to the Washington Post the administration isn’t attributing the increased flow-rate to the riser pipe being cut:

An administration official said via e-mail on Tuesday that the larger figure was the result of better data on the flow, not necessarily a reflection of the flow increasing when the riser pipe was cut.

If anyone can answer this definitively, please let me know in the comments. Either way, this is an obscene amount of oil we’re talking about.