Nobody cares about the oil in the middle of the ocean, it will break down. Oil naturally breaks down in the ocean from microbes and the sun, not to mention it is flammable and they can burn large sections of it.
The problem comes near the shore - and thats where absorbents and booms come in. Oil absorbent are not naive ideas, they are standard operating procedure. Any place that sells gas on the water in this country has a box full of booms and absorbent mats by law. This is just a much larger version of that so the availability of mats becomes an issue and so hair, mattress padding etc become options.
Yes, but from what I understand reading elsewhere they've done a lot of work to keep the oil underwater, so it will come ashore with the water itself rather than just on the surface, right ?
As for the hair being naive, I figured the sheer quantities involved would make it rather impractical, the hay was a nice little setup in two bins of water on a benchtop but to execute that principle on a several hundred by several hundred kilometer area (at the moment) is a little bit harder.
I might be a little cynical, but I personally believe that keeping the oil underwater is worse and is simply a BP PR move. If it is underwater you can't burn it, you can't skim it, you can't absorb it, and the sun won't break it down.
Sure it might not get into marshes as quickly, but instead microbes eat it and create total deoxygenation of the water. I have dealt with the cleanup of minor sewage spill that caused total deoxygenation of a sound, I know how horrific that is. Basically all of the fish suffocate, die, and float to the surface to rot. Expect to see bumper to bumper fish carcases for miles. It was the most disgusting thing I've ever seen in my life.
I think the goal with absorbing is that you will put out booms to protect sensative areas, and then when oil collects near them you can absorb it where it is more concentrated. The oil does not cover the surface completely, it is in patches, so collecting it into a solid slick makes the economics a little better (note: the idea that collecting it could be profitable is ridiculous, but you can optimize the dollar per barrel cleaned up ratio)
The problem comes near the shore - and thats where absorbents and booms come in. Oil absorbent are not naive ideas, they are standard operating procedure. Any place that sells gas on the water in this country has a box full of booms and absorbent mats by law. This is just a much larger version of that so the availability of mats becomes an issue and so hair, mattress padding etc become options.