Ben, if I may offer up some thought.....I really do not think that there is anything beyond better prevention. There is no easy way to drill an offset well to kill the leaking well. That is going to take months, even if there was a rig on standby right next to the problem well. If the leaks are coming from multiple places, each may need a different kind of solution. Some of this stuff is just not easy to contain once it gets out of control. The concept of the operation from the start is one drills a hole using bits and pipes for the mechanical part, and using drilling mud of proper weight and consistency to keep the pressures of the oil and gas from blowing out the hole as you drill. Once you hit your target, you cement the entire cap of the hole area you just drilled, and have a blowout preventer in place over the hole that is cemented in place and is designed to shut off any flow from the well. One of the problems with this well in this deep water area is the accumulation of methane hydrates (frozen gas-water) in the sea bed that extended beyond the area where the hole was drilled. Once those hydrates are exposed to any heat, they expand quickly and essentially blow up and out from the sea bed. Again, only way around that problem is prevention. Do not drill into hydrates, or if you do, make sure things are controllable.
So now we have a failure of the well, a failure of the blowout preventer which is supposed to stop oil from flowing out, maybe a failure of the cement that was containing the blowout preventer to the wellhead, and multiple leaks from broken pipe and plumbing things built for future production. Lots of serious-sized problems, and in an environment that is really hard to access and work in without very limited and very specialized equipment (deepwater submersible robots). If one had all of that gear on a tender ship nearby, plus the crews to work things, and knew exactly where the problems were, things may have been able to be slowed down or shut off a bit sooner. Not easy to anticipate, so that is why prevention is so important in the planning and execution, because recovery after the fact gets really hard and complicated.
In some other countries, Norway for example, they require multiple blowout preventers be installed. They require independent assessors to monitor and inspect installations, cementing and testing, and lots of other operations. Being a major source of Norway's income, they apply the resources, have the skilled people and equipment on hand, etc. Working conditions there are more harsh in many respects, but damages impact a lot of things they care a lot about....fisheries, etc.
That is why it is not an easy problem to solve once things get out of control like they are with this particular well. All of the thing BP is trying to do, both conventional and unconventional, are difficult to do, and take time. If, for example, they had that containment dome thingie already built and nearby, they may have been able to utilize it sooner or more effectively, but only if they knew for sure the location of the leaks.
At this point, finding and containing the leaks as quickly as possible is the priority. cleaning things up becomes the second, but most visible problem to tackle. Had they been able to string out the miles and miles of oil booms around the accumulating slick sooner, it would also have helped, but they were not readily available, and the seas were also too rough to have the containment booms contain the growing oil slick. Nobody has yet devised another effective way to keep the slick contained, that is why shutting off the source is so important first, and not even letting the leak happen in the first place is the most important. Recovery is going to take time and it is going to be very messy and damaging for sure. I live in Texas, and our shores were at first not threatened by the spill, but we were sending everything and everybody into the fray to help. Now the winds have shifted and the spill is threatening our coastal waters too, plus the extremely fertile and delicate Galveston Bay area, which is a major source for seafood for the entire world. They are already trying to build oil containment booms across the major opening to the bay at this point. If we get one bad storm, and hurricane season is just around the corner, this is going to be really ugly. Tar on the beaches is more a tourist issue. Oil and tar in the marshes is a food source and livelihood issue that takes years and years to recover.
LJ