Current technology used by BP is proving hopelessly inadequate in curbing the tide of oil gushing from beneath the Gulf of Mexico.
Now, novel technologies that remain untested at such an incomprehensible scale will be needed in anticipation of years of remediation to resuscitate a dying ecosystem.
We are so fortunate that this didn’t happen to one of the oil rigs off the beaches in Orange County, CA.
“It is of grave concern,” David Kennedy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), said back in April. “And the efforts that are going to be required to do anything about it, especially if it continues, are just mind-boggling.”
Bio-remediation Inc. is one company that uses natural organic microbes and has approval from Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection, according to their website. Florida’s Governor, Charlie Crist is considering using patented genetically modified bacterial microbes from Osprey Biotechnics, which is awaiting environmental approval.
On the other hand, while encouraging microbe growth with bio-stimulation on contaminated shorelines appears useful, unleashing oil-eating microbes themselves has produced less than stellar results. For example, bio-treatment using a bacterial culture from Alpha Environmental was deployed following a spill that occurred on June 8,
1990, following an explosion on the Norwegian tanker Mega Borg. An estimated 100,000 barrels of crude oil were burned or released into the Gulf of Mexico, 57 miles southeast of Galveston, during the next week.
Bio-remediation tests were conducted on June 15 and 18, 1990. “These were the first tests of a bio-remediation agent on an oil spill in open waters in the United States,” the NOAA incident report noted. “The bioremediation agent used was AE Bio-Sea Process, developed by Alpha Environmental. AE Bio-Sea Process contains oil-metabolizing bacteria and nutrients.”
While the Texas General Land Office said that the bio-remediation was effective, independent observations indicated that treated oil changed in physical appearance and may have emulsified as a result of addition of the Alpha product. Chemical analyses on samples from impacted and reference sites failed to demonstrate that treatment with the Alpha product enhanced rates of petroleum bio-degradation.
Is it possible Bio-remediation INC. has solved the problem by developing “bad bugs?”
Random thoughts while observing the passing charade, I’m J.C.