We all know about the Gulf of Mexico disaster. The Deep-Water Horizon exploded on the 20th April 2010, sadly with the loss of eleven workers from Transocean, the operators of the semi-submersible drilling rig. Subsequent events have been difficult to follow despite the massive publicity surrounding the blowout and oil spill. For example, it is difficult to get an estimate of the quantities of oil that have been released. Official estimates are that approximately 35,000-60,000 barrels of oil a day were being released (some estimates are as much as 100,000 barrels a day). This means that over the 83 days prior to the well being capped on the 12th July somewhere between 461,895,000 and 791,820,000 litres of oil were lost from the well (a US barrel being equivalent to 159 litres). Although it is estimated that some 131,461,200 litres have so far been captured and burned that still means hundreds of thousands of tonnes of oil have been spilled into the Gulf of Mexico. 8.35 million litres of dispersant have also been released onto the ocean surface or injected into the well head. This is a concern because of the toxicity of the these chemicals. The dispersant used was a medium-toxicity dispersant, not the least toxic or most effective modern dispersant available.
The effects on the ecosystem are devastating. Over two thousand seabirds have been found dead, along with more than 470 turtles and over 60 marine mammals. Many more will have died at sea and not been found or even burned in efforts to get rid of the oil. The oil is washing up onto the shores of the US Gulf states which harbour more than half of the coastal wetlands of the lower 48 states of the USA. 97% of the fish and shellfish commercially landed in the region depend on these wetlands and estuaries to some extent. This coastline is already suffering from rapid erosion in some areas and the destruction of plant life within wetland areas may accelerate this process and threaten many dependent species. Less visible will be the effects in the deep ocean. The Deep-Water Horizon well, also known as the Macondo prospect, lies at between 1500 – 1600m depth on the flanks of the Mississippi Canyon. This is the most important conduit of organic matter from the Mississippi River to the deep ocean. Several plumes of oil or oil / dispersant have been reported in deep water reaching many miles from the well head, although this has been disputed by BP and sampling has only detected small quantities of oil. The effects of the oil and dispersant on deep-seabed life, and on life in the water column is unknown. However, it has been shown that deep-sea animals in this area can accumulate some of the toxic fractions of oil (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons) so affects on the ecosystem may be expected.
All this is occurring on top of many other human impacts, the Gulf of Mexico is undoubtedly an ecosystem that is under severe stress. For example, a seasonal dead zone has developed in the northern Gulf of Mexico since the 1970s. The cause has been the massive quantities of runoff of agricultural fertilisers from the catchment of the Mississippi River. Nitrates and phosphates fertilise the ocean stimulating blooms of marine algae which then die. As these cells sink they are broken down by bacteria which use the oxygen in the water column suffocating other marine life. Overfishing has also caused large-scale changes in the ecosystems of the Gulf of Mexico, removing large predators such as sharks, often as by-catch and causing knock-on effects in the ecosystem. The coral reefs of the wider Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean are in a state of severe degradation, affected by overfishing, pollution, coastal development, disease and climate change impacts which cause mass bleaching. The Deep Water Horizon disaster represents just one further wound to a system that in many respects is collapsing. Judging from the impacts of other oil spills, it will take at least tens of years for the system to “recover” from the effects of this massive spill.
This could not be said for another part of the world where another blow-out occurred last year. This blow out occurred in the Montara Oil Field, to the north of Australia in the the Timor Sea on the 21st August, 2009 and lasted for 74 days. You could be forgiven for not hearing about the blow out in the northern hemisphere, it hardly registered in the news, although it was mentioned in some broadsheet newspapers in the UK. As with the Deep-Water Horizon, the Montara oil spill appears to have occurred through technical failure of the drilling / well equipment. The rig, the West-Atlas was owned by a Norwegian-Bermudan company, Seadrill and operated by PTTEP, a company that ultimately belongs to PTT, the state oil company of Thailand. In this case, though, the spill occurred in a region that is poorly explored and understood but one which a recent study (Halpern et al 2008, Science 319: 948-952) classified as one of the least impacted regions of the world’s oceans. This region, which lies within the “coral triangle” could be regarded as one of nature’s remaining treasures yet has now seen a large oil disaster.
With the Montara blow out it is even more difficult to ascertain just how severe the spill was and how it has affected marine life. The Australian Government have so far not released the official report of the inquiry into the accident, raising suspicions that weak regulation could be a contributory factor to the accident. However, it is suspected that the spill of light oil and gas condensate may have covered an area of up to 90,000km2, compared to figures of 6500km2 estimated for the Deep Water Horizon. It is suspected that the spill may have affected sea birds, sea snakes, turtles and dolphins, but there is little available information. What has been claimed is that there have been major declines in fisheries on the coasts of the Indonesian islands of Timor, Sumba and Pasir, particularly for red snapper. This has affected up to 7000 fishers in this area, who have lost there livelihoods with reports that many have had to move away from the area completely. The Australian Government are reported to be investigating the truth of these claims. This affect is reminiscent of the Exxon Valdez in 1989, where local fish stocks crashed following the oil spill and some, including the important herring fishery in the area, have never returned.
I find it rather ironic that this spill should have occurred in Australian waters, almost un-noticed, in the shadow of the publicity surrounding the grounding of the Chinese coal carrying ship the Shen Neng I on the Great Barrier Reef, a situation which the Australian Prime Minister of the time described as “outrageous”. He also reportedly stated that there was “no greater natural asset for Australia than the Great Barrier Reef”. The vessel was reported to have crushed two miles of reef as it took a “short cut” on its way to an Australian port and to have contaminated half a mile of the coast with oil. The Montara blow out was far more serious, who is responsible for this outrageous accident in one of the most pristine areas of the world’s oceans? Even more serious for the Great Barrier Reef and other coral reefs around the world are the large quantities of fossil fuels, including oil, gas and coal, that are being burned, releasing CO2 into the atmosphere. This is causing mass coral bleaching and ocean acidification, both of which are already impacting the growth of these reefs and which will, by the end of century, have sealed their fates if we continue on the current trajectory of carbon emissions. These facts, for the degradation of coral reefs through mass bleaching and acidification are indisputable, they are happening and can be observed, seemed to have escaped the attention of governments such as Australia, who are digging coal and pumping oil out of the ground as fast as they can to use domestically or to sell as exports.
Lack of joined-up thinking on environmental issues is just one area which we all need to pay attention to. It is apparent that we simply do not value marine ecosystems for the services and products they provide for humanity. The oceans are part of the Earth’s life-support system. Everything from food, the production of oxygen, nutrient recycling, coastal protection, temperature regulation and so on are worth billions upon billions (for coral reefs figures up to $375 billion per annum for goods and services to mankind) to humankind, especially when that value is considered over future years and for future generations. These figures are not considered when a new oil or gas development is planned and the risks from it assessed. The Environmental impact assessment for the Macondo prospect was particularly unimaginative in considering the scale of a catastrophic accident that could arise at the site. With respect to beaches and wetlands in the area BPs Exploration Plan, dated March, 2009, BP stated:
“An accidental oil spill from the proposed activities could cause impacts to [beaches, wetlands, shore birds and coastal nesting birds]. However, due to the distance to shore (48 miles), and the response capabilities that would be implemented, no significant adverse impacts are expected.”
This was despite BP estimating, in the same document, that a catastrophic blow out could release 162,000 barrels of oil a day.
It is clear that the Environmental Impact Assessment, Drilling Plans and other requirements for oil exploration by the US government are wholly inadequate in terms of assessment of the real risk and potential cost of serious accidents. Whilst the finger of blame has been firmly pointed at BP, they are a commercial company operating according to the rules and according to the logic of the market-based economy where they answer to their shareholders. Here, poor regulation of the industry is at least partly to blame for the sub-optimal and inadequate response following the accident.
We are all shareholders in the planet and all depend on the environmental services provided by ecosystems, particularly the oceans. It is critical that governments pay much closer attention to how extractive industries operate.
· We should ask the question as to whether or not an operation should be allowed to take place, are the risks it poses outweighed by the benefits over the medium to long term. This must be done with full knowledge of the ecosystems in which the operation is proposed. One of the problems of the Montara blow out, in the Timor Sea, is that much basic scientific information on the region is simply missing. The baseline scientific work on documented what is present in the region and how the ecosystems are structured has not been done.
· Is the operation being carried out according to best modern practices and are the right procedures in place for the worst case of catastrophic failure that we can imagine.
· Using “fisheries speak” the right monitoring, control and surveillance protocols must be in place to ensure industrial compliance to rules and regulations. In the event of an accident, it is critical that lessons are learnt.
· Follow-up investigations and monitoring of environmental impacts are critical in reducing the possibility of future accidents and in refining responses to catastrophic events so that environmental harm is minimised. It is notable that this has not been done adequately for many oil accidents, for example, the previous Gulf of Mexico Ixtoc I explosion and oil spill.
· Finally, industry should pay substantial bonds that are released back to them following the operation on the basis of environmental performance. Such bonds should be in place to pay for the management and clean-up of a catastrophic accident should it happen.
Important in all this is good communication between industry, the responsible government (or authority on the high seas), and other stakeholders in the marine environment.
