Environmental Effects of Oil Pollution - Essay Example

?Running Head: Environment and Pollution Environmental Effects of Oil Pollution Submission Executive Summary To assess the environmental effects of oil pollution in the context of planetary environment, examination of current scientific literature emerges as an imperative. However, such an examination remains incomplete if the related researches conducted in the twentieth century are not consulted. Oil pollution has taken a grimly form in the last century. Oil pollution sources involve ship operations and bilge cleaning through the international waterways, road and municipal runoffs, petroleum combustion, natural seeps, and spills and accidents. The coastal vegetations, tidal forest, and marine ecology are worse hit. It is widely known that oil spills are causing wide-ranging destruction to wild animals and marine life. Hence considerable preparation and rigid laws are required to conquer this huge problem. Attempts are being made to predict the oil spills and their devastating effects, which can curb the menace of oil pollution to some extent. Still, the international community is required to remain more alert and agile. Apparently, the best approach to deal with the detrimental impact of oil spills to the environment is to significantly lessen oil spills. To effectively minimize oil spillage demands appropriate training and effectual planning. Environmental Effects of Oil Pollution Introduction Combustion of fossil fuels is a major problem in the context of today’s environment. This major threat to the environmental sustainability is indeed an indirect result of oil pollution. Oil pollution has direct effects too. There are numerous sources of oil pollution. Oil pollution can pollute the oceans, seas, soil, and underground water streams. Moreover, combustion of petroleum, gasoline, and diesel causes large scale air pollution. The pollutants in the air again settle into the water bodies and soil with the lapse of time by means of convection, condensation, and rain. Oil pollution due to the oil spills caused by the accidents of oil tankers and rigs is another major threat to the environment. Since the conveyance of crude oil and petroleum is mainly conducted through the waterways, accidents of oil tankers cause huge amounts of oil to get mixed in the waters of the seas and oceans (Fleming 2010). This is the main feature of oil pollution – even through pollution in the soil; the petroleum agents ultimately reach the underground water streams. In the case of the oil spills, varieties of the sea birds and animals are immensely affected. Oil pollution adversely affects the marine ecology, causing death to thousands of organisms (Baker 1978). It damages the natural treasures like coral reef and harms the aquatic animals like fishes, plankton, reptiles, etc. Humans can be seriously affected by taking polluted sea food. Moreover, pollution caused by the combustion of petroleum is also highly injurious to human health. In this relation, it can be further mentioned that the economic dimensions of losses due to major oil spills are considerably high (Pezeshki et al. 2000). The economic losses hamper both the industries and the financial expenditure in the various environmental reconstruction processes. Sometimes, the estimation of these losses is rather difficult. In a nutshell, effects of oil pollution are multifaceted and need to be discussed in detail. Literature Review Large scale of oil pollution particularly due to the oil spills and tanker accidents damages the oceans and seas considerably. Not only that, the petroleum agents would reach the shores and harm the coastal ecology as well. Hundreds and thousands of aquatic animals, sea birds, and plants are adversely affected. This effect of oil pollution is discernable in the US Gulf coast (Pezeshki et al. 2000). Oil spills have taken place in this region, so the effects of oil spills and clean up have manifested as environmental hazard in this part of the world. Hence, plant response to fouling due to the petroleum agents absorbed through the water streams has been an important subject of study. Physically and chemically induced effects are numerous. Stunted growth, leaf discoloration, malnutrition, and even death of the plants have been noted in this context. When the natural vegetation is hit, the animals, birds, insects, etc. dependent on it would also be affected (Lanfranconi et al. 2010). Hence inter-specific and intra-specific sensitivity becomes major concern. Pezeshki and his associates (2000) have reviewed the effects of petroleum hydrocarbons on marsh macrophytes in the US Gulf coast region. The objective is certainly to enhance the spill response efficiency. Petroleum hydrocarbons cause physical and chemical damage to the plants (Peressutti et al. 2003). Plants may survive fouling by the production of new leaves. But even the relatively non-toxic agents can damage or kill the plants when oil prevents plant gas-exchange physically. According to Pezeshki and colleagues (2000), compaction of soil and vegetation coupled with the physical disturbances associated with the clean up operations following an oil spill has damaged the US Gulf coast marshes. Both acute and chronic effects have been noted in relation to the wastes associated with the offshore oil and gas production. These detrimental effects damage the tropical and temperate marine ecologies. Drilling fluids (muds) and produced formation water (PFW) are the major agents of harmful pollution (Baker 1978). Drilling fluids (muds) include crude oils, chemical additives, ester based cutting muds, water based cutting muds, and oil based cutting muds, which drain into the water and affect the marine life by impairing respiratory processes, gas exchange, temperature control, etc. (Baker 1978). The potential long term effects of offshore oil and gas production industries have been found to be numerous and serious. Acute and chronic toxicity makes sea food harmful to human health. According to Holdway (2002), the toxic effects further impair the functionality of the ecosystem, which eventually cause death to hundreds and thousands of organisms. Oil pollution has discernable effects even to the microbiological extent. Changes caused by diesel oil pollution in the metabolically active bacterioplankton from an oligotrophic coastal location have recently been studied and analyzed (Fleming 2010). Hydrocarbon pollution events in the coastal area exploited for the seasonal touristic activities have triggered a series of modifications at the molecular level in the bacterioplankton assemblage in the region (Peressutti et al. 2003). Differences in the diversity in pristine and polluted sites in this coastal area have been found in direct relationship with the alterations of prokaryotic numbers, which have been again in direct consequence to the patterns and extent of oil pollution (Lanfranconi et al. 2010). Another example of the microbiological impact of oil pollution can be found in the results of a recent research on the dynamics of hydrocarbon degrading bacteriocenosis in relation to oil pollution in Patagonian soil (Peressutti et al. 2003). To understand the current researches conducted through the last decade, it is crucial to assess the environmental impact of oil pollution that was being studied in the late twentieth century too. Oil pollution and its effects were already manifesting near the major oil port of Milford Haven in Wales (Fleming 2010). The inter-tidal and sub-tidal areas can be regarded as examples of active and passive oil pollution. The researches conducted through the late twentieth century show that the refinery effluents, cleaning treatments, and spills have long term effects on the marsh vegetation and aquatic life. Oil pollution has already been noted and analyzed in the North Sea and Celtic Sea regions (Fleming 2010). Shore communities like the salt marshes, rocky shores, and mud flats were worse hit. The chronic nature of oil pollution due to the physical and chemical activities related to the drilling and transportation of petroleum hydrocarbons has been established. This is rather like environmental slow poisoning (Peressutti et al. 2003). Therefore, field experiments were embarked on to detect the biological effects of the various types of cleaning treatments on the different types of coastal environments. These experiments are very contextual with respect to the recent scientific activities too. As stated by Baker (1978), elucidation of the effects of the refinery effluent toxicity is also critical and field studies are crucial for the purpose. Further, oil pollution is also caused by the drainage of gross industrial wastes in the water bodies. In this context, point sources include municipal sewerage systems, storm water runoff, industrial wastes, burnt or unused engine oils, etc. On the other hand, non point sources include sediment, agricultural chemicals, acid mine drainage, spills of oil and other hazardous elements (Whipple et al. 1974). Major oil pollution of the underground water streams has been found to be caused by automobile and industrial lubricants, much of which is disposed off after use by dumping on the ground or the sewers. In the view of the potential oil spill and pollution patterns, certain parts of the world are being consistently monitored where pollution levels are already high. Northern European waters, Southern European waters, South American waters, and the offshore industry of Brazil have been the primary areas of focus (Fleming 2010). Scientists are setting up observatories and research facilities for the purpose of computer modeling of the potential threats of possible oil spills. According to Pezeshki and colleagues (2000), this is targeted to financial estimation in relation to both losses due to drainage of oil and hectic clean up and recovery processes. Here, it should be further mentioned that the ability to monitor and predict marine oil spills depends on access to high-quality information on ocean circulation. Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment (GODAE) systems provide data, with global coverage, for currents, temperature, and salinity in the open ocean, and are now being used in oil spill fate forecasting systems (Fleming 2010). GODAE ocean forcing data can be implemented in various oil spill modeling systems, including both through direct application and through nesting of local hydrodynamic models (Hackett et al. 2009). As explained by Hackett and colleagues (2009), benefits of using GODAE data sets for oil spill modeling are improved prediction accuracy, global coverage, and the provision of alternative predictions for a given area. Figure 1. Overview of Statfjord A oil spill forecasts as rendered in Google Earth. Two Meteo-France (MF) MOTHY and four Norwegian Meteorological Institute (met.no) OD3D forecasts are shown, labeled with the ocean data used to force the oil spill models: Bio4 = met.no model nested in GODAE/FOAM data. Merc15th = Mercator/GODAE N.Atl. Merc4th = Mercator/GODAE Global. Nordic4 = met.no standard model. The red clusters represent the predicted slicks on December 17, 2007, at 00 UTC (4.5 days after the spill). Grey lines indicate the trajectory over the forecast duration (Nordic4 extends to December 19, 2007, 12 UTC). *taken from Hackett, B., E. Comerma, and P. Daniel. 2009. Marine oil pollution prediction. Oceanography 22: 168-175 Analysis of the Effects of Oil Pollution The certain key findings like the damage to marsh vegetation, coastal vegetation and ecology, aquatic life, etc., which have been discussed through the evidence based literature review, have influenced the very trends of current understanding. Damage to the marsh macrophytes in the US Gulf coast region (Pezeshki et al. 2000) explains how the vital process of photosynthesis would be impaired at a large scale, thus increasing the proportion of greenhouse gases in the environment. Chronic and acute toxicity caused by the produced formation water (PFW) and drilling fluids (muds) discharged by the offshore oil and gas production processes (Holdway 2002) would poison the sea food and eventually harm human health. Alterations caused to the microbial life cycle, assemblage patterns, and related biochemical processes (Lanfranconi et al. 2010) would impair the natural processes of biodegradation of hydrocarbons and carbon assimilation. The analysis of the findings in the scientific literature examined so far clearly shows that certain parts of the world, where the oil conveyance or production processes are intense, are prone to accidents and oil spills. Hence, severe environmental hazards can take place. Therefore, monitoring and forecasting the fate of marine oil spills is one of the most important applications for operational oceanography. Prediction services, whether national or commercial, according to Hackett and colleagues (2009), play an important role both in decision making during incidents and in designing emergency response services. The synthesis in this context shows that damage to the marine ecology and the related microbiological processes would adversely affect carbon assimilation and hydrocarbon degradation. This would increase the proportion of greenhouse gases in the environment. Moreover, by damaging plant gas exchange through physical compaction, oil pollution can impair plant metabolism and photosynthetic processes in large areas of marsh, mangrove, and other sorts of natural vegetation. Hence, availability of oxygen in the atmosphere will be reduced (Peressutti et al. 2003). Combustion of fossil fuels, particularly the petroleum products add harmful greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. This can be regarded as an indirect environmental effect of oil pollution. This is, however, in direct relation to global warming (Fleming 2010). The natural events and cycles that influence the climate are bringing about global climatic changes due to the direct and indirect effects of oil pollution. The pattern and amount of warming can be explained on the on the basis of petroleum combustion, oil spills, dumping of lubricants, etc. The greenhouse gases emitted due to the human activities related to the consumption of oil are detrimental to the climate of our planet (Fleming 2010). Deforestation is making the situation worse, since the scope of storage of carbon dioxide is increasingly becoming narrower. However, there are other heat trapping agents like methane and nitrous oxide. Moreover, emission of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) causes depletion to the ozone layer, which is again responsible for global warming (Peressutti et al. 2003). But due to the very large amount of petroleum combustion every year throughout the world, according to Houghton (2009), carbon dioxide remains at the prime focus of the greenhouse effect and global warming. Oil spilled at sea is one of the most studied forms of marine pollution, due to the catastrophic and highly visible character of accidents, as well as oil’s devastating effects on marine life. Because quick action can reduce the effects of spilled oil, the ability to forecast its drift and fate is needed by coastal societies, and many national services have been developed over the last few decades (Fleming 2010). Oil spill forecasting is typically carried out using a numerical model of the weathering and motion of the oil in the sea. Weathering, which includes evaporation, emulsification, natural dispersion, and other oil-specific processes, is determined by the chemical properties of the particular oil type under the influence of ambient environmental conditions (Holdway 2002). The most common numerical formulation for oil represents the oil mass as a cloud of discrete particles (or superparticles), as stated by Hackett and colleagues (2009), each of which represents a volume of oil that is subject to weathering and motion induced by geophysical forces. Although the formulations of particles and weathering processes may vary considerably among oil models, all are critically dependent on geophysical forcing to determine the fate of the oil spill, especially its motion (Hackett et al. 2009). In this way, it can be easily understood that how intricately we need to institute the struggle against the environmental hazards caused by oil pollution. Moreover, the economic implication of oil pollution is also a serious consideration. For example, on April 20, 2010, an explosion at the mobile offshore drilling unit Deepwater Horizon resulted in a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The economic effects of this disaster are still a matter of debate and investigation. The economic losses not only involve the loss of the petroleum resource drained, but also the cost of the subsequent clean up process and the environmental damage caused. United States Government Accountability Office is taking concrete steps in this direction. In this context, S.A. Fleming, the Director of Physical Infrastructure, has testified that the economic damage due to such oil spills depends on the location of the accident spot, time of year of the accident, and the type of oil that was spilled. The Oil Pollution Act, according to Fleming (2010), has also been instrumental in determining the effects of such accidents. Oil pollution thus has a wide spectrum of hazardous environmental effects. Discharge of produced water formation (PWF) and drilling fluids (muds) due to offshore oil and gas production affects the marine ecology profoundly (Fleming 2010). These effects are discernable in the regions like Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea. Damage to coastal vegetation like the marsh macrophytes and mangrove forests is also a serious threat (Pezeshki et al. 2000). Deletion of bacterioplankton at a large scale due to oil spills damage the food resources for the marine life systems. Huge amounts of discharge of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere due to petroleum combustion are another grimly environmental effect of oil pollution. The combined effect is irreparable damage to marine ecology consisting of fishes, sea birds, plankton, amphibians, etc. coupled with coupled with deforestation of the coastal regions. Global warming and health hazards should also be mentioned in this context. Conclusion The current scientific literature comprehended properly without the understanding of the scientific researches and processes that began in the twentieth century when oil pollution, particularly that due to the spills, began to take a major form. The evidence based analysis in relation to water pollution control conducted in the late twentieth century clearly warned us of the potential damages of oil pollution. Unfortunately, the international community did not take sufficient measures to curb the menace. Today, the danger of oil tankers and rig accidents, large scale oil spills, and harmful drilling fluids has increased manifold. So, it is necessary that the international community takes effective measures to control the effects of oil pollution; otherwise it will be too late. Moreover, the specter of global warming is also related to oil pollution since it is being principally caused by the effects of petroleum combustion. Global warming would eventually trigger off melting of the polar ice caps. This will raise the sea level worldwide. Also, glaciers will melt and formation of these glaciers will be hindered. As a result, there will be finally water shortage in the snow fed rivers of the world. There will be threatening shortage of potable water. Floods will become frequent and the very existence of the island countries in the world would be threatened. Hopefully, recent researches in the field of microbiology show that there is still scope for biodegradation of the discharged hydrocarbons in both soil and water. In the same context, it should be mentioned that carbon assimilating bacteria are also there, which can trap the carbon dioxide in the air and convert them into non volatile covalent compounds. Thus, according to Peressutti (2003), utilization of certain bacteria in this field can neutralize the hazardous effects of oil pollution at large scale. So, it can be concluded that there is both hope and peril as far as the environmental effects of oil pollution are concerned. Of late, the international community is also attempting to develop prediction models in relation to the probability of oil spills and similar accidents in the major waterways and drilling regions in the world. If such a model can be made to function effectively, threat of oil pollution can be minimized to considerable extent. References Baker, J.M. 1978. Marine ecology and oil pollution. Water Pollution Control Federation 50: 442-449 Fleming, S.A. 2010. Oil Spills: Costs of Major Spills May Impact the Viability of Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, DIANE Publishing, Darby. Hackett, B., E. Comerma, and P. Daniel. 2009. Marine oil pollution prediction. Oceanography 22: 168-175. Houghton, S.J. 2009. Global Warming, in A Companion to the Philosophy of Technology (eds J.K.B Olsen, S.A. Pedersen, and V.F. Hendricks), Wiley Blackwell, Oxford. Holdway, D.A. 2002. The acute and chronic effects of wastes associated with offshore oil and gas production on temperate and tropical marine ecological processes. Marine Pollution Bulletin 44: 155-203. Lanfranconi, M.P., R. Bosch, and B. Nogales. 2010. Short-term changes in the composition of active marine bacterial assemblages in response to diesel oil pollution. Microbial Biotechnology 3: 607-621. Peressutti, S.R., H.M. Alvarez, and O.H. Pucci. 2003. Dynamics of hydrocarbon-degrading bacteriocenosis of an experimental oil pollution in Patagonian soil. International Biodeterioration and Biodegradation 52: 21-30. Pezeshki, S.R., M.W.Hester, Q Lin, and J.A. Nyman. 2000. The effects of oil spill and clean-up on dominant US Gulf coast marsh macrophytes: A review. Environmental Pollution 108: 129-139. Whipple, W., J.V. Hunter, and S.L. Yu. 1974. Unrecorded pollution from urban runoff. Water Pollution Control Federation 46: 873-885. Read More