The Environmental Impact of Oil Spill: Why We Must Do Better?

Posted on Dec 20, 2022 at 10:12 PM

As we all know, An oil spill causes significant and long-term negative environmental, social and commercial impacts on life. 

In this article, we will learn about everything related to the oil spill and its effects on the environment, the economy, and the biological system of organisms. Read on.

What is an oil spill, and how does it happen?

An oil spill is a crisis or an accident that results in the loss of various amounts of oil due to a malfunction. This can happen anywhere oil is extracted, transported, or used. Therefore, an oil spill is very common and occurs in many different ways.

An oil spill can be small, for example, when an oil spill while refuelling a ship or its cargo is unloaded. But although small, this oil spill can cause damage, especially in sensitive environments, such as wetlands, beaches, and mangrove areas.

On the other hand, the results are severe, and the damage is enormous in some cases of a massive spill, such as a break in the structure of the pipelines, an explosion or sinking of tankers or offshore oil stations, or any malfunction in drilling operations. As a result, we see damage affecting the ecosystem for decades.

What is crude oil?

The term petroleum or crude oil refers to a group of petroleum hydrocarbon compounds. Petroleum hydrocarbon compounds were formed over thousands of years due to the decomposition of a group of remains of plants and animals buried under the layers of the earth and oceans. However, it is a type of fossil fuel.

Oil is found underground or under the waters of the seas and oceans, in deep reservoirs and wells. There, oil droplets reside in the "pores" and holes of natural rocks.

After discovering the presence of an oil well, the drilling and exploration process begins to extract resources from their reservoirs. In the next phase, the oil is transported by pipelines, ships, trucks, or trains to plants or stations called refineries for refining. After refining, it can be converted into petroleum products, including gasoline, diesel, and kerosene, and petroleum products, such as asphalt and oils.

What are the environmental damages of the oil spill?

An Oil spill poses a significant threat to the environment. The amount of damage from an oil spill depends on the animal and plant species, habitats near the spill area, and the type of oil spilt.

Once oil spreads on the surface of the water, it stops sufficient amounts of sunlight from reaching underwater organisms and reduces the amount of oxygen dissolved in the water. And this may cause the death of these organisms.

Furthermore, there are traces of oil spread on seawater on waterfowl. Oil slicks can contaminate their wings, making them difficult to fly, or strip away the insulating properties of a waterfowl's fur and feathers. This may cause their death as a result of hypothermia.

Oil consists of many different toxic chemicals. If living organisms swallow poisonous chemicals, they may cause serious problems, for example, immune system effects, heart damage, stunted growth, and even death.

An Oil spill also affects plants, especially mangroves and salt marshes, as ecosystems. Which is one of the prominent coastal trees that suffer permanently from leaks.

The direct environmental impacts of an oil spill are often easy to determine after they occur. However, it isn't easy to accurately assess their impact on the ecosystem in the long term.

Does the oil spill affect the economy?

In short, the answer is yes. Not only does the clean-up have to be paid for, and in the cases of big spills, this can run into billions of dollars, but the long-term impact of a spill also has an economic consequence.

For example, when an oil spill occurs in a tourist country that depends on tourism for its economic growth, the number of tourists coming to it will decrease, affecting its economy. Another example is that if the area relies on fishing, this often must be halted while the place where the spill occurred returns to normal, directly affecting its economy.

In most cases, Legal action to obtain compensation for economic and environmental damage from the subsidiaries of the tankers is often a long and burdensome affair, especially for countries with limited experience and lacking the legislative framework to deal with such incidents.

How is the process of cleaning up an oil spill?

The speed and performance of the clean-up process are related to several factors: the response speed of the clean-up team, the time it takes to get to the site of the spill, the weather conditions, the type of oil spilt, the shoreline type and environmental sensitivity.

If the cleaning team reaches the polluted spot within a few hours, they can aim to contain and skim the oil before they get to the shoreline, thus protecting the area.

The team uses mechanical tools and means in the Containment and skimming process. These include skimmers and modified boats that skim the oil off the top of the water. The use of Booms, which are floating physical barriers that stop the oil from spreading. In the best-case scenario, only 40 % of oil from a spill can be cleaned up by these methods.

Once the spill increases and oil reach the shoreline, it becomes harder to clean up. When oil gets close to the coastline, manual clean-up campaigns are typically deployed to get wildlife away from the impacted area using floating dummies and balloons as a deterrent.

How can we prepare for a future oil spill?

Governments and companies operating in the oil and gas industry must work hard to put systematic plans for immediate implementation in case of disruption. Governments and companies must understand what must be done quickly in the event of an oil spill of any size to prevent the matter from escalating.

At the same time, periodic training should be conducted on responding quickly when a potential oil spill occurs within a few hours. The faster the response, the better, and the less environmental impact.

Oil spill response can be tiered so that small spills are handled at a local level, larger spills are handled on a national level, and significant falls call on an international response.

Therefore, we advise you to attend the International Petroleum Management course offered by the London Premier Centre Training if you want to learn more details.

The Biggest Oil Spill in History 

One of the largest oil spills of the last century was the spill of the British tanker Torrey Canyon off the English coast of Cornwall. This incident occurred in 1967 AD when more than 119,000 metric tons of oil were spilt.

We also mention, among similar incidents, the oil spill from the Amoco Cadiz tanker off the coast of Brittany, France, spilling over 223,000 metric tons of oil and ship fuel spilt. This incident occurred in 1978 AD.

Let's head to North America, specifically in 1989, when oil spilt from an oil tanker belonging to the Exxon Valdez Company within Prince William Strait, causing significant environmental and economic damage. Although the amount leaked is much less than the oil spills that occurred throughout history, the amount revealed did not exceed 37 thousand metric tons.

In recent years, the Deepwater Horizon exploration platform is still at the top of the list. This oil spill occurred on the 20th of April 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico. Within the details of this incident, the fall led to the sinking of the platform and the death of 11 workers. The oil spill continued for 87 days, in huge quantities from the Macondo well, estimated at 4 million barrels.

In Conclusion,

An oil spill is a serious disaster that not only affects the country concerned but also develops to affect other regions. In light of this, and to avoid the occurrence of disasters, everyone must be responsible for the prevention of these disasters. It is necessary to combine local and international efforts when they occur to save can be considered a public issue.