The effects of an oil spill and freeze event on intertidal community structure in Washington : final report /

Mode of access: Internet.

Immediate ecotoxicological effects of short-lived oil spills on marine biota.

Marine environments are frequently exposed to oil spills as a result of transportation, oil drilling or fuel usage. Whereas large oil spills and their effects have been widely documented, more common and recurrent small spills typically escape attention. To fill this important gap in the assessment of oil-spill effects, we performed two independent supervised full sea releases of 5 m(3) of crude oil, complemented by on-board mesocosm studies and sampling of accidentally encountered slicks. Using rapid on-board biological assays, we detect high bioavailability and toxicity of dissolved and dispersed oil within 24 h after the spills, occurring fairly deep (8 m) below the slicks. Selective decline of marine plankton is observed, equally relevant for early stages of larger spills. Our results demonstrate that, contrary to common thinking, even small spills have immediate adverse biological effects and their recurrent nature is likely to affect marine ecosystem functioning.

Invitation to submit restoration proposals for federal fiscal year 2001 /

Mode of access: Internet.

Invitation to submit restoration proposals for federal fiscal year 2002 /

Mode of access: Internet.

Chemical shoreline cleaning agents for oil spills : update state-of-the-art on mechanisms of action and factors influencing performance /

"EPA contract no. 68-C8-0062, Work assignment no. 3-48, SAIC project no. 01-0895-03-1000."

Prince William Sound after Exxon Valdez oil spill [microform] : hearing before the Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, House of Representatives, One Hundred Third Congress, first session, on the ecological changes in Prince William Sound after the Exxon Valdez oil spill and the use of fines imposed, March 24, 1993.

"Serial no. 103-10."

Weathering of hydrocarbons in mangrove sediments: testing the effects of using dispersants to treat oil spills

This field study was a combined chemical and biological investigation of the relative effects of using dispersants to treat oil spills impacting mangrove habitats. The aim of the chemistry was to determine whether dispersant affected the short- or long-term composition of a medium range crude oil (Gippsland) stranded in a tropical mangrove environment in Queensland, Australia. Sediment cores from three replicate plots of each treatment (oil only and oil plus dispersant) were analyzed for total hydrocarbons and for individual molecular markers (alkanes, aromatics, triterpanes, and steranes). Sediments were collected at 2 days, then 1, 7, 13 and 22 months post-spill. Over this time, oil in the six treated plots decreased exponentially from 36.6 +/- 16.5 to 1.2 +/- 0.8 mg/g dry wt. There was no statistical difference in initial oil concentrations, penetration of oil to depth, or in the rates of oil dissipation between oiled or dispersed oil plots. At 13 months, alkanes were >50% degraded, aromatics were similar to 30% degraded based upon ratios of labile to resistant markers. However, there was no change in the triterpane or sterane biomarker signatures of the retained oil. This is of general forensic interest for pollution events. The predominant removal processes were evaporation (less than or equal to 27%) and dissolution (greater than or equal to 56%), with a lag-phase of 1 month before the start of significant microbial degradation (less than or equal to 7%). The most resistant fraction of the oil that remained after 7 months (the higher molecular weight hydrocarbons) correlated with the initial total organic carbon content of the soil. Removal rate in the Queensland mangroves was significantly faster than that observed in the Caribbean and was related to tidal flushing. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

Survival and movements of Magellanic penguins rehabilitated from oil fouling along the coast of South America, 2000-2010

Oil pollution is a significant conservation concern. We examined data from six institutions along the coast of South America: Emergency Relief Team of the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Fundacion Mundo Marino, Centro de Recuperacao de Animais Marinhos, Natura Patagonia, Associacao R3 Animal, and Mar del Plata Aquarium and data from resightings in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Falkland/Malvinas Islands. From 2000 to 2010, 2183 oiled Magellanic penguins were rehabilitated as part of the routine activities of these institutions or during emergency responses to eight oil spills in which they were involved; all rehabilitated penguins were flipper banded and released. Since their release, 41 penguins were resighted until 31 December 2011. The results demonstrate that, when combined with other prevention strategies, the rehabilitation of Magellanic penguins is a strategy that contributes to the mitigation of adverse effects of oil spills and chronic pollution to the species. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Bioremediation of oil spills

Due to the increasing demand of petroleum everywhere, and the great amount of spills, accidents and disasters, there is an urgent need to find an effective, non-cost and harmless method to clean up the affected areas. There are microorganisms in nature (bacteria and fungi, mainly) that feed on hydrocarbons and transform them into others harmless chemical substances. These bacteria produce enzymes that degrade oil very effectively. This natural process can be accelerated by adding more bacteria or providing nutrients and oxygen to facilitate their growth, which is called ―bioaugmentation and biostimulation. Through this project we discover that these processes can be affected by different factors making difficult the biodegradation execution and opening a gap between the laboratory experiments and the real cases. Therefore, there is much remain to be done and a lot of study ahead to make this technique available in a great scale.

Hazardous material spills and responses for municipalities /

Mode of access: Internet.

Non-structural bulkheads to control tanker oil spills : final report : prepared for U. S. Dept. of Transportation /

Cover title.

Identifying the major spilled oil constituents and fate in harsh offshore environments

The behaviour and fate of spilled oil in harsh marine environments, such as the North Atlantic and the Arctic Ocean are complex due to environmental factors and the composition of the crude. In order to develop appropriate oil spill prevention and management methods, we must first understand how the oil behaves in these harsh environmental conditions. This study focuses on determining the fate of oil in harsh marine environments by first identifying target compounds in the oil that can be used to determine the fate of a spill. This thesis presents the partitioning behaviour of six polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which represent different groups, and phenols in cold conditions. The smallest PAH, naphthalene, dominated in terms of concentration in water accommodated fraction (WAF) of oil, while the larger ringed PAHs presented at lower concentrations. The smallest oil-water partition coefficient was recorded by phenol which partitioned into the seawater more quickly than PAHs. The partitioning of larger PAHs was slower and they indicated high partition coefficients. The oil partitioning increased slightly as temperature increased from 4ᴼC to 15ᴼC. The oil loading (0.1 g/L to 10 g/L) also contributed in deciding the concentrations in water. The use of chemical dispersants is a common response to spills. This study identified that chemical dispersants can change the fate of an oil spill by increasing the availability of oil in seawater. The concentration of larger PAHs such as pyrene and chrysene increased significantly with the application of dispersants. The information obtained are used in developing a molecular imprinted polymer (MIP) sensor to identify oil spills in the North Atlantic Ocean.

Advanced Aerogel Composites for Oil Remediation and Recovery

Oil spills in marine environments often damage marine and coastal life if not remediated rapidly and efficiently. In spite of the strict enforcement of environmental legislations (i.e., Oil Pollution Act 1990) following the Exxon Valdez oil spill (June 1989; the second biggest oil spill in U.S. history), the Macondo well blowout disaster (April 2010) released 18 times more oil. Strikingly, the response methods used to contain and capture spilled oil after both accidents were nearly identical, note that more than two decades separate Exxon Valdez (1989) and Macondo well (2010) accidents.

The goal of this dissertation was to investigate new advanced materials (mechanically strong aerogel composite blankets-Cabot® Thermal Wrap™ (TW) and Aspen Aerogels® Spaceloft® (SL)), and their applications for oil capture and recovery to overcome the current material limitations in oil spill response methods. First, uptake of different solvents and oils were studied to answer the following question: do these blanket aerogel composites have competitive oil uptake compared to state-of-the-art oil sorbents (i.e., polyurethane foam-PUF)? In addition to their competitive mechanical strength (766, 380, 92 kPa for Spaceloft, Thermal Wrap, and PUF, respectively), our results showed that aerogel composites have three critical advantages over PUF: rapid (3-5 min.) and high (more than two times of PUF’s uptake) oil uptake, reusability (over 10 cycles), and oil recoverability (up to 60%) via mechanical extraction. Chemical-specific sorption experiments showed that the dominant uptake mechanism of aerogels is adsorption to the internal surface, with some contribution of absorption into the pore space.

Second, we investigated the potential environmental impacts (energy and chemical burdens) associated with manufacturing, use, and disposal of SL aerogel and PUF to remove the oil (i.e., 1 m3 oil) from a location (i.e., Macondo well). Different use (single and multiple use) and end of life (landfill, incinerator, and waste-to-energy) scenarios were assessed, and our results demonstrated that multiple use, and waste-to-energy choices minimize the energy and material use of SL aerogel. Nevertheless, using SL once and disposing via landfill still offers environmental and cost savings benefits relative to PUF, and so these benefits are preserved irrespective of the oil-spill-response operator choices.

To inform future aerogel manufacture, we investigated the different laboratory-scale aerogel fabrication technologies (rapid supercritical extraction (RSCE), CO2 supercritical extraction (CSCE), alcohol supercritical extraction (ASCE)). Our results from anticipatory LCA for laboratory-scaled aerogel fabrication demonstrated that RSCE method offers lower cumulative energy and ecotoxicity impacts compared to conventional aerogel fabrication methods (CSCE and ASCE).

The final objective of this study was to investigate different surface coating techniques to enhance oil recovery by modifying the existing aerogel surface chemistries to develop chemically responsive materials (switchable hydrophobicity in response to a CO2 stimulus). Our results showed that studied surface coating methods (drop casting, dip coating, and physical vapor deposition) were partially successful to modify surface with CO2 switchable chemical (tributylpentanamidine), likely because of the heterogeneous fiber structure of the aerogel blankets. A possible solution to these non-uniform coatings would be to include switchable chemical as a precursor during the gel preparation to chemically attach the switchable chemical to the pores of the aerogel.

Taken as a whole, the implications of this work are that mechanical deployment and recovery of aerogel composite blankets is a viable oil spill response strategy that can be deployed today. This will ultimately enable better oil uptake without the uptake of water, potential reuse of the collected oil, reduced material and energy burdens compared to competitive sorbents (e.g., PUF), and reduced occupational exposure to oiled sorbents. In addition, sorbent blankets and booms could be deployed in coastal and open-ocean settings, respectively, which was previously impossible.