Final Message

So in our previous posts we covered on what is an oil spill, what is fish kill, how it affects our environment holistically and ways to clean an oil spill up. Oil spills are harmful to the environment and as such should be treated as matter of importance. The environment is what we rely on to survive and with it being harmed, it has an effect on us humans. It is an inter- dependent relationship. As such these oil tankers should be regularly inspected and undergo maintenance on a bi-monthly period. Once an oil spill occur the company should be held responsible and be fined for damages as well as clean up. 

In conclusion the onus is on to also play our part and speak up for the environment

Oil Spill Clean up

Oil spill clean up is a very strategic, planned out technique. The first thing that should be done is identifying the source of the spill/leak. Next, do an evaluation on communities in close proximity to the spill to assess the damages. Then clean up can begin. The clean up committee should take into consideration the safest method minimizing the harmful effects on the environment. Here is a video on ways to clean up an oil spill.

Fish Kill

What is a fish kill?

Here is the link to an article written prepared by Dr. Farahnaz Solomon, Fisheries Biologist, Institute of Marine Affairs published in the Trinidad Express Newspapers on November 16th, 2016. The article goes into detail about fish kills and the many causes of fish kill. http://www.trinidadexpress.com/20161116/features/what-is-a-fish-kill

Yes, oil spills affects organisms, but each organism is affected differently from the other. Different species of fish are affected differently. For example shell fish and fin fish are unaffected by oil or briefly affected by it. However when adult fish when exposed may experienced reduced growth, enlarged livers, changes in heart and respiration rates, fin and reproduction impairment. Oil also affects larval and eggs survival. So we can safely say that not all fish kills are results of oil spills but oil spills do negatively affect fishes. 

When speaking about the environment we speak about the biotic(living) and abiotic(non living) factors. Oil spills not only affects the living environment but it also affects the non living environment. Many of us knows the Gulf of Paria is protected by mangroves.These mangroves are homes to a variety of organisms and also play an important role as they prevent erosion, maintain water quality and protect the shorelines from damaging storms, hurricane winds and floods. Now that we have stated the importance of mangroves we are going to look at how oil spills affect the mangroves and the rippling effects of a damaged mangrove. Again the effects are all based n several factors such as the composition of the oil and the length of time the roots were exposed to the oil and the amount of the oil the roots came into contact with. Light or refined oil such as gasoline no 2 oil and jet fuel contain relatively high amounts of the most water soluble and toxic compounds. These oils evaporate rapidly and impacts occur mostly when large oil spills strand on shore. Light fuels are absorbed by tree roots and can cause mortality of red and black mangroves within a time period of 24-48 hours. Crude oil and heavily refined products coat the roots reducing the ability of the tree to exchange gases. Because these are heavily refined oil they will tend to be more persistent which may lead to leave loss and possibly death. This leads to other organisms being affected as well as the shoreline of many beaches. So now that we have a general idea of how oil spills affect mangroves we can now compare it to the oil spills in the Gulf of Paria and how it affected the mangroves. It was reported by Petrotrin that the oil spill was crude oil, which is a heavily refined product. Therefore this oil coated the roots of trees making it difficult to exchange gases which will caused leaf loss and death.  This will have a rippling effect on organisms that use the mangroves as a habitat or feeding zone.

 Photographs showing the roots of mangroves covered in oil.  

When dealing with a catastrophe such as an oil spill, one must look at different ways to minimize the effects. The cleaning up of oil spills can be just as harmful as the oil spill occurring. Many companies look for the cost cutting method i.e the product to get the job done the fastest yet the product is the cheapest on the market. While these products may the best in getting the job done they tend to do more harm than good. Take for example the Corexit 9500 a dispersant used in the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico  was reportedly used by Petrotrin in their efforts to clean up  the oil spill in Gulf of Paria in 2013 has effects on organisms that can cause serious damage or death as worse case scenario. As budding environmentalists we must investigate the situation not only by the physical effects but also how will the product affect organisms and disrupt feeding relationships from one trophic level to another in a food web. According to tests done on microzooplankton retrieved from the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico after its oil spill it was proven that the dispersant combined with the crude oil disrupted the energy flow from higher trophic levels to lower trophic levels and it changed the structure and dynamics of marine planktonic communities. We can compare the results and come up with one conclusion that Corexit 9500 causes harm. However there are many factors that can be taken into consideration. For example, how long were the organisms exposed to the crude oil as well as the dispersant. How much of it was accumulated by said organisms?  The toxicity of both crude oil and corexit 9500 and how the organisms adapt to the changes. Did the organisms get rid of the pollutant through egestion or metabolism? The factors listed above can tell us how organisms were affected and also if the crude oil and dispersant contribute to fish kill. As environmentalists one must come up with more sufficient ways of cleaning up an oil spill without causing further damage to food webs and organisms.