Oil Spill Dispersants Like Corexit Toxic To Workers & Sea Life - And They Usually Don't Work

[hatrack]

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The first documented use of a chemical mixture, an earlier version of Corexit, was after the 1967 Torrey Canyon spill off England’s coast. Even then, scientists had concerns about the toxicity in the marine environment, prompting governments to develop new guidelines for use and push for less harmful formulations. Yet, over the years, dispersants crept into the toolkit of most spill response organizations around the world. Within days of the Deepwater Horizon spill, crews sprayed dispersants on the growing slick from boats, helicopters, and airplanes. But because the oil was spewing out of the seafloor, BP asked for permission to apply Corexit at the wellhead. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the US Coast Guard approved the idea, and in an experimental effort, cleanup crews injected the dispersant 1,600 meters under the water surface in an effort to disperse the oil before it hit the surface.

Over the duration of the spill, an estimated 7,000 cubic meters of dispersants went into the Gulf, about a third of this volume at the wellhead, according to a report on the spill and cleanup. Barisich and other Gulf Coast residents say dispersants were also sprayed close to shore and near boats. (BP denies the allegations.) “They kept saying they weren’t,” Barisich says, but he fished immediately after the spill, and when the fishery closed, he worked the cleanup effort and was on the water every day.

Barisich isn’t the only one with health issues in the aftermath, says Wilma Subra, a technical adviser to the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, a nonprofit that advocated for affected communities during the Deepwater Horizon cleanup. Subra documented dozens of illnesses tied to the oil spill and Corexit. The most common were respiratory problems, confusion, kidney and liver damage, and skin and muscle issues, but there were also reports of seizures, paralysis, and rare cancers. “Many families living in coastal areas are sick and a lot of the cleanup workers are, too,” says Subra. “They can’t work. [Some have] lost their cars and houses. It has destroyed hundreds of families.”

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Of more than 200 studies, Fingas found 78 percent showed that chemically dispersed oil was more toxic to marine life than oil left to break down naturally. Of those that examined biodegradation, 67 percent showed that the addition of dispersants actually decreased the ability of microbes to eat oil. Just 22 percent of the studies showed positive results; according to Fingas’s report, the petroleum industry funded all of those. Only in rare situations are dispersants helpful, says Jeffrey Short, a consultant who worked for litigants fighting BP after the Deepwater Horizon event. “They have a role to play,” he says. “The right dispersant, with the right oil, with the right wind conditions, in the right place—it works pretty well.” But dispersants only work on oil that’s fairly fresh. Just getting the dispersants to a spill within the first couple of days is often impossible. And the weather window for effective application is small. Most of the time, Short says, their use is “response theater,” something overwhelmed cleanup crews can do to prove they’re trying everything.

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https://hakaimagazine.com/features/a-key-tool-for-cleaning-up-oil-spills-is-more-hazardous-than-helpful/

[Dustlawyer]

1. They sprayed Corexit everywhere! I worked the whole Gulf Coast during the spill and

for three years after. Corexit killed all of the oysters in Apalachicola Bay putting almost all in Eastpoint Florida on welfare. I have seen eyeless shrimp by the ton and fish stocks plummeted.