Oil Spills

Oil spills include releases of crude oil from tankers, offshore platforms, drilling rigs and wells, as well as spills of refined petroleum products such as gasoline, and diesel. Oil also enters the marine environment from natural oil seeps. However, public attention and regulation tends to focus mostly on seagoing oil tankers and spills. Oil spreads fast and is hard to contain once a spill has occurred and stopping the spill, as we saw in the Gulf of Mexico BP spill, can be a long process with millions of litres of oil pumped into he ocean while a solution is researched. Another concern with oil spills is the clean up once oil reaches the nearby shore lines.

Many animals are affected by oil spills. In particular sea birds have their feathers coated by the oil with limits their buoyancy and temperature regulation and thus die of hypothermia. Also many birds while preening their feathers ingest the oil and poison themselves. Seals and sea otters have similar problems when an oil spill occurs. The dark colour of the oil also prevents sunlight from penetrating plant life in the ocean and many plants die as a result. This loss of plant and animal life drastically effects the food chain and as most oil spills take on average 2 months to contain many other species are also effected. Without human intervention to contain the spill and cleanup animals that have been covered in oil most end up dying.

There are many different methods to cleaning up and oil spill yet, it is important to remember that not one method has been proven to erase the mess 100%. Depending on the landscape of the shore line, the temperature of the water and many other factors the best method of clean up can be decided.There are certain kinds of bacteria that can be used to get rid of oil on sand and rocky coastlines. Controlled burning can be effective for a large scale spill however it releases air pollution which adds to the pollution from the actual spill. Also, skimming can be done for hydrophobic oils that float on top of the water. Research shows that 14 of the 20 most prominent animals that live in a sea side habitat are still recovering from the effects of an oil spill 10 years later. 

With the high demand for oil many companies and governments are disregarding scientific research and studies and are digging deeper into the ground for oil. That was the case in the spring of 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico when oil drilling company, BP began deep sea drilling. Literally, in uncharted waters as they ventured deeper and deeper, the drill began to leak and what resulted was the 3rd largest oil spill in history. It is valuable to note that as our world becomes more populated and the demand for oil increases companies will have more desire to push the boundaries and dig deeper into the earth's surface. However, with this type of drilling comes much more risks and the pros and cons of potential oil vs the after math of an oil spill have to weighed very carefully. Also, the need and development of safer, and more environmentally friendly energy will increase.