Marine Ecology
Part 3
Oil Pollution
EnvE 301
2023-2024 Spring
Filiz B. Dilek
Causes:
Oil transportation (spills and discharges)
Bilge water: residual liquid that collects within the ship as a result of drainage,
seepage, leakage
Deballasting (discharge of ballast water)
Offshore oil and gas production wells
Oil refineries
Fate of oil in Marine Enve
Loss to the atm (light fraction, short HC,
Wind, temp., light aromatics --- most toxic
Aerosols and sprays
Oil slick
Soluble oil (light HC,
aromatics, most toxic
Wind action
particulate oil (tarballs) or
water-in-oil emulsion (mouse)
İngestion by
animals
Mixing and return to the
surface
detritus
Heavy oil
biodegradation
sediment
Surface water sediment
(weeks) (months) (year, decade)
Fate of oil in marine environment
Stages of spilled oil:
Spreading: oil first physically dilutes itself, then spread by
the current or wind. Interfacial tension and viscosity are
important.
Evaporation: aided by high temp, rough seas (formation of
sprays at wave crests), and wind
Emulsion: wave and wind action disperse the oil throughout
the water in the form of very small droplets.
Breakdown: occurs through weathering, photolysis and
biodegradation and creates clumps of very dense residues
known as “tar balls”.
Light crude or light fuel oil (diesel oil or No 2 fuel oil)
contains major toxic fraction (e.g. short HCs, aromatics) and
soluble fractions.
Heavy number 5 or 6 fuel oil contains much less toxic
compounds. Contain mainly insoluble (heavy-tar) HCs and
damage to enve is far less.
Light oil, if there are no winds, good sunlight, high temp then
as much as 80% may evaporate.
Conversely, if winds are strong, waves high as much as
80% may go particulate oil.
Tanker Accidents
A damaged tanker spilling oil
Near Shore (South Korea, 2007)
From: guardian.co.uk
Oil on rocks
Oil on water
The clean-up drive - but beach clearing in populated areas requires hard labour
Deepwater Horizon disaster - Gulf Mexico-2010
Largest marine oil spill in history, caused by explosion on the Deepwater
Horizon oil platform (Gulf of Mexico) (April 20, 2010), 66 km off the coast
of Louisiana.
Oil slick covering 5200 km2; over 205 million gallons of oil
were released into the Gulf.
Fireboat response crews attempting to extinguish the fire on
the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, April
21, 2010.
Controlled burn of oil spilled in the
Deepwater Horizon disaster, Gulf of
Mexico, May 6, 2010. The burning oil
was contained by a length of boom.
Effects of Oil Pollution on the marine life:
Every slick is a unique one.
Effects may change according to the enve. If the enve is a
spawning ground then the damage may be very high.
If the spill has occurred in the spawning season when there
are lots of larvae and eggs then the damage is high.
If the spill has occurred in winter and offshore then damage
may be low.
Effects of Oil Pollution on the marine life:
Oil covers the surface of gills of fish and cause asphyxiation.
In a few cases substantial kill have been reported.
Particularly sunk oil kill the bottom fish.
DEAD FISH FOUND AT THE BEACH
Effects of Oil Pollution on the marine life:
Biota Affected:
Impact on sea birds is usually
catastrophic.
In cold climates, oil effects
“water proofing of birds causing
them to freeze to death
In warm climates, mortality of sea birds mainly due to
swallowing of oil which then toxify the birds. Birds
ingesting oil stop feeding and starve to death.
Brown pelicans (Pelecanus U.S. Fish and Wildlife workers releasing
occidentalis), captured at Grand Isle, pelicans that were cleaned and
La., on June 3, 2010, waiting to be rehabilitated after being oiled by the
cleaned of oil from the Deepwater Deepwater Horizon oil spill,
Horizon oil spill.
https://www.britannica.com/event/Deepwater-Horizon-oil-spill
Seal pup coated in oil
Turtle Found Dead at the Beach
Effects of Oil Pollution on the marine life:
There is notable effect on phytoplankton. Primary
production reduces drastically. 10-4 – 0.1 mg/l oil stops cell
division.
Soluble aromatics affect negatively the zooplankton. Some
of the zooplanktons seem to take up particulate oil.
Effect on benthos: Oil looses its most toxic fraction by the
time it reaches the bottom sediments. Heavy fraction and
long chain HCs make the sunk oil. They produce long term
effect as they gradually solubilize. They may even affect
further away by constantly dosing solubilization products.
Clean-up of Oil Pollution
➢ Mechanical Method
➢ Use of Dispersants
➢ Biological control
Mechanical Method
Flow of oil is controlled by booms or skimmers. Once the
flow is controlled, next step is to contain the oil.
Spill booms are baulks of timber (buoyant or air filled
material) connected end-to-end and having joints with
flexible material.
Surface curtain: to prevent over splashing
slot to contain the oil
Sub-surface skirt: to prevent escaping under the boom
A Clean-up operations using
boom and skimmer
A Clean-up operations using
boom and skimmer
Mechanical Method
Effective under very limited conditions.
If the wave height > 0.5 m not effective
If the wave height > 1 m does not work at all
Dispersants
to emulsify the slick.
A surfactant is typically a long molecule which has both
hydrophilic and hydrophobic ends.
In oily water: hydrophobic ends will seek non-aqeous
phase and reduce surface energy and favour the
formation of stable droplets. The skin which they form
around these droplets tends to prevent their coalescence.
Add surfactant
Oil slick
Oi
l
Oi
l
Oi
l
Dispersants
Two elements are essential in practice:
➢The surfactant must mix readily with the oily water thus
requiring a solvent , if it is viscous or waxy (as is often the
case)
➢Agitation is necessary to initiate the formation of
droplets.
The emulsion which results has a milky appearance, it
will readily disperse with further dilution.
Dispersants
plane spray Shore spray
heli spray
boat spray
By disseminating a pollutant in the water column,
Spraying dispersants
enhances and accelerates avoids oil beaching on
the natural degradation the shore because it
process prevents the wind from
acting on the slick
Biological Control
Oil degrading bacteria and nutrients are injected to slick.
Very few applications. In the development stage.
Heavy oils are more diffucult for them to attack, partly
because they are more difficult to disperse.
Compounds in the range of C10 – C16 seem to be
broken down most readily. Parafins may be more easily
degraded.
e.g. by Pseudomonads
Biological Control
adequate N or P must be available.
When N is deficient and DO < 0.5 mg/l or pH lies below 6,
fungi are likely to predominate over bacteria.
Penicillium candida are found to degrade parafins and
olefins rapidly.
The use of fungi has the advantage that they are more
resistant than bacteria to external influences such as UV
radiation, fluctuation in osmotic pressure.
It must be realized that there is no universally
“right” method, each spillage must be considered
individually, since local conditions such as water
movement and temp. as well as type of oil,
thickness of slick, degree of weathering, nature
and value of coastline or proximity of offshore
regions will ultimately dictate the choice of
materials or equipment.
