not an oil person so please don't flame

I would bet you BP would pay you to take it off their hands!

quote:

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if some clever entrepreneur figured out how to extract the crude from the water, would he/she be able to sell it?

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Lots of things come into play here....

To begin, oil in the ground isn't owned by the mineral owner. The mineral owner only owns the right to explore for the oil and the oil becomes owned when it is captured by the exploring oil company which leased from the mineral owner the exploration rights. Your entrepreneur could argue that in this situation the oil just spewing out into the ocean is uncaptured oil that if scooped up by him would be owned by him. However, BP could argue that it actually captured it by drilling the well - that is the capture - and the spill is a spill of its oil. It could get tricky,but frankly, I don't think this is going to be an issue.

Yeah but the question is how rights of salvage apply to something like oil.

it seems likely that after being treated w/ dispersants, having the light ends evaporate off, and being contaminated w/ seawater for weeks, the oil would be in such bad shape that no refinery would take it; and it would just end up being disposed.

also, oil recovered as part of a spill remediation is considered a hazardous material, envoking strict handling and disposal guidelines (who is responsible for handling it, who is legally allowed to transport it, how it must be transported, who pays for its disposal, what facilities can take it, etc).

Petroleum coke