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Oil Means More Arsenic In Seawater

oxi writes "Besides the oil already spilling into the Gulf of Mexico at the rate of up to 60,000 barrels daily, a group of British scientists says one can expect to see elevated levels of arsenic as well. The research, published in the journal Water Research, showed that oil prevents naturally-occurring arsenic from being filtered out of the water by the sediment on the ocean floor."

6 of 168 comments (clear)

  1. Save the Gulf: Send the Enterprise by nido · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I am of the opinion that the best way to clean up the Gulf of Mexico is to Send the Enterprise (no, not that Enterprise, silly rabbits!). The complete proposal is given at the link.

    Tell everyone you know.

    (kuro5hin.org has two options for voting for a story: "Front Page" and "Section Page". 93% of the people who voted for my story voted FP, so I have reason to believe that my proposal has merit.)

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  2. Re:And yet... by gmuslera · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Maybe you should care how nature took care of other ocean contaminations on the past,

  3. Re:And yet... by Trepidity · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Some have turned out not all that catastrophically, though.

  4. In related news: Not much hope of making it stop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-461896

    "According to Sagalevich’s report, the oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico is not just coming from the 22 inch well bore site being shown on American television, but from at least 18 other sites on the “fractured seafloor” with the largest being nearly 11 kilometers (7 miles) from where the Deepwater Horizon sank and is spewing into these precious waters an estimated 2 million gallons of oil a day."

    "As a prominent oil-industry insider, and one of the World's leading experts on peak oil, Simmons further warns that the US has only two options, “let the well run dry (taking 30 years, and probably ruining the Atlantic ocean) or nuking the well.” "

    "On top of the environmental catastrophe currently unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico the situation may about to get even worse as new reports from the US are confirming the grim predictions of Russian scientists regarding the oil dispersement poisons being used by BP which are being swept up into the clouds and falling as toxic rain destroying every living plant it touches"

  5. Re:OMG! by MrKaos · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How much more arsenic will there be? Will the entire ocean die? Will just a few patches of the Gulf die? Or more likely will it not make the tiniest bit of difference?

    I found these two abstracts that may help. Langmuir adsorption model is used to determine the effects.

    I was trying to put some perspective on the BP oil spill for myself and found it's roughly an Exxon Valdez (E.V) disaster every week (based on approx 50,000 bbls per day), so it's 6 E.V's so far. Considering the amount of damage that was done there, local fisheries are now supported by hatcheries so the overall toxicity of the oil spill has pretty much destroyed the ecosystem. Twenty years later not much seems to have improved and Huffington Post reports not only the human health implications but the same-old same-old response we get from these companies as data collection efforts are simply stopped. Ignorance really is bliss and when it's not possible to do any science and politicians in the future can honestly say "The health implications cannot be determined".

    That arsenic is a carcinogen that bio-accumulates in the environment means that even if this catastrophe was to stop right now the human health implications are something that will continue to unfold well into the next generation. Airborne pollutants like Hydrogen Sulfide, which took a week to dissipate from E.V just continue.

    Bottom line: No-one knows (A metric ass load?). EPA says you can't harvest fish from seawater with a greater concentration of 0.0175 micrograms of Arsenic. Seawater is more capable of containing As than fresh water and there are many other factors (temperature, organic/inorganic As) that determine toxicity. Pressure from the depth of water is also a factor. I think what is being said here is that the Gulf of Mexico's days as a fishery are pretty much over and it's time to drill the shit out of that oil reserve and empty it as soon as possible.

    Lets be realistic No-one is going to take the risk of being the "Oh but you made it worse" person that everyone points fingers at so NO-ONE will do ANYTHING. Right now you are seeing the people standing around the dying person bleeding wondering when someone is going to call the ambulance. I blame the greenies, if they'd have protested more none of this would have ever happened and we could have lived our apathetic little lives without an oil spill of this magnitude. As it so happens now we have to live our apathetic little live without the luxury of ignorance going, tsk tsk that oil spill - so bad tsk tsk.

    References; Neff, Bioaccumulation in Marine Organisms: Effect of Contaminants from Oil Well Produced Water

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  6. Re:It's not just BP down there is it? by moonbender · · Score: 3, Interesting

    So who then are the right people?
    If you know why haven't you sent their names to the Government so they can do more than just worry about why it's taking so long?
    Also is it really a "news blackout" is is there really just nothing else to report?
    How on earth would BP enforce a news blackout anyway?

    Are you astroturfing or something?

    The right people would have been the Dutch.

    Sending their names to the government woudn't help; they've already refused the help.

    There is a kind-of blackout, ie here is CNN's take on it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpJBsjKhRTo

    BP doesn't enforce the blackout, the government does.

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