Oil Spills

Oil will seep to the surface and form tar pits, or on the ocean form a small oil slick. These events are natural and occur every day. However, we move large quantities of crude oil and nearly as much in various products (gasoline, jet fuel, etc.) Some spillage due to transportation is going to occur. When it does there are different approaches to cleaning the spill. It comes down to three general approaches: Contain and remove, disperse with chemicals, or do nothing (it will eventually disperse). There are also "spills" as a result of war (First Gulf War), and from drilling, notable the Gulf of Mexico drilling disaster associated with BP's Deepwater Horizon operation. Here is a good article (Tuscan Cuitizen) on how the spill was finally stopped. After reading this page know how spills are treated and prevented.

	Here the oil comes close to shore where there is a concentration of wildlife .		Spills can also occur at the drilling location. The oil business remains a dangerous occupation.
	Here man made absorbents are used to collect the oil then it is off to a landfill or to a combustion site. Natural materials such as feathers are also used (fur tends to be hard to obtain!)		Here a boom prevents the oil from spreading. Some of the booms are even fire retardant. The skirt below the surface and the floatation parts act as a physical barrier. Not as useful in very rough seas.
	Birds die for several reasons: drowning (the feathers absorb so much oil the air is de placed resulting in loss of buoyancy), ingesting oil (from preening to remove it), and from hypothermia.		Cleanup tends to be person power intensive and very expensive. The arguments comes down to which is cheaper cleanup or prevention? That debate depends very much on the value you place on environments.
	Here the oil can be seen on the surface with booms being used to contain the spill.		The cleanup on the shores of Prince William Sound. High pressure hoses wash the oil from the beach into the water where it is contained by a boom prior to removal.
	Not only is crude oil stored but so are the products. Containment wall prevent jet fuel, gasoline spills from leaving the storage site should the containment vessel fail.		Double hulled tankers might have helped prevent an oil spill in this case. Some collisions will produce spills even from double hulled tankers. Which is safer, all your eggs in few large baskets or many smaller baskets?
	Shipping lanes are highly congested in many oil exporting areas, collisions are best avoided, as a tanker may require several miles to stop!		Fire at refineries and at storage sites are dangerous to the nearby residents. Containment walls should stop the fire from spreading
	The fire will help reduce the water pollution at this location but it will produce lots of air pollution. In remote locations (out to sea) fire might be the only choice.		Some environments are more sensitive than others. Although there is oil in the North Pole area no country owns the land/ice although many maintain a presence there! (Including us Brits!)