Broughtons Oil Spill

A little oil looks like a lot but the locals with oars in the water say it is more than what's being reported.

What do think Hawgwash, oyster or salmon farm related? What ever is in those pens may be gone for health reasons.

sunchaser said:

What do think Hawgwash, oyster or salmon farm related? What ever is in those pens may be gone for health reasons.

Click to expand...

Salmon farm. Not going to say much because there are clearly two commentaries coming out.

I don't care about the pen fish as much as the wild.
Herring spawn right now and that effects everything.

That is in the Burdwood Group, right across from Echo Bay. The bright lights at the fish farm left a diesel pump on overnight.

Emergency crews responding to diesel spill near northern Vancouver Island - British Columbia - CBC News

Yet another negative consequence of fish farming.

Your will find those fish in your local market soon, since the fish farmer reports they are exhibiting "normal behavior".

Diesel spill detected at fish farm off coast of northern Vancouver Island | Globalnews.ca

It was released by a fish farm. 1000 liters (264USG) of biodiesel. I'm sure the low flying red Dash 8 that checks for oil pollution with refractometers has already made a special trip.

I would have guessed even less based on the pix.....but I can't see farther down wind/current.


A pint of oil covers acres and acres......

Fish in the pens should be unaffected. That amount of diesel will evaporate and leave little impact on environment. Seems like this small spill is really just fodder for the enviros and anti-fish farm proponents.

Nightsky said:

Fish in the pens should be unaffected. That amount of diesel will evaporate and leave little impact on environment. Seems like this small spill is really just fodder for the enviros and anti-fish farm proponents.

Click to expand...

And your professional background on this matter is...what?

Jim

You are an industry professional in this area, are there procedures or protocols to deal with harvesting farmed salmon from diesel spill polluted waters?

Not my area of expertise, but I suspect the Canadian Food Inspection Agency will be involved. They routinely test for chemical residues and they would probably be involved in this investigation. If they find something they don't like, the product will be seized and that will be the end of it.

http://www.inspection.gc.ca/food/ch...s/terminology/eng/1332109097754/1332109200002

The bigger issue in my view to me are the effects on clams and other intertidal organisms. While 1,000-1,500 litres may not seem a lot it's too easy to just hand wave off these as one offs and that they don't matter. Smoking guns are difficult to find and all too easy these areas suffer deaths by a thousand cuts.

Jim

JDCAVE said:

The bigger issue in my view to me are the effects on clams and other intertidal organisms. While 1,000-1,500 litres may not seem a lot it's too easy to just hand wave off these as one offs and that they don't matter. Smoking guns are difficult to find and all too easy these areas suffer deaths by a thousand cuts.

Jim

Click to expand...

I agree that the cumulative effect of spills like this can be rough on the ecosystem. However, as much as I dislike spills like these, this amount of diesel fuel should break down relatively quickly as long as the water is reasonably clear. The fuel will evaporate and much will be consumed by the microbes that can plague our fuel tanks. The diesel is light enough that it will predominantly reside on the surface of water until it is dispersed, consumed, and absorbed. This should reduce any harmful effects on shell fish.

I think spills are bad and shouldn't be taken lightly. However, from what little I can tell about this particular spill, it shouldn't have much long tern negative affect on the water column.

I imagine that the operator will be paying a hefty fine, and rightly so.

dhays said:

I agree that the cumulative effect of spills like this can be rough on the ecosystem. However, as much as I dislike spills like these, this amount of diesel fuel should break down relatively quickly as long as the water is reasonably clear. The fuel will evaporate and much will be consumed by the microbes that can plague our fuel tanks. The diesel is light enough that it will predominantly reside on the surface of water until it is dispersed, consumed, and absorbed. This should reduce any harmful effects on shell fish.

I think spills are bad and shouldn't be taken lightly. However, from what little I can tell about this particular spill, it shouldn't have much long tern negative affect on the water column.

I imagine that the operator will be paying a hefty fine, and rightly so.

Click to expand...

Ok. So let's take that 1,000 litres of diesel and move it around a bit. Let's say I have a fuel truck and spilled that 1,000 litres on your front lawn. Will you still say it's ok, the microbes will break it down soon enough? Or if you were buying my house with a below ground fuel tank that leaked 1,000 litres into the soil, would you still say it's ok it happens all the time to all kinds of properties and the bacteria will break it down. On land there are all kinds of environmental standards in place for removal of contaminated soils and who is responsible. What is different here? Some of the locals are frosted by this spill and I don't think we should just be blowing them off. How much is acceptable? I'm telling you not sure. And I am certainly not an expert on habitat issues such as this.

Returning to my previous point of "death by a thousand cuts", there are thousands of environmental issues where single events are considered low risk, but event after event eventually causes collapse of populations. After a 40 year career in fisheries, I have witnessed case after case of population collapse and still scientists really only have theories as to why those occurred. I think we need to rethink what is and is not acceptable.

JDCAVE; said:

Returning to my previous point of "death by a thousand cuts", there are thousands of environmental issues where single events are considered low risk, but event after event eventually causes collapse of populations. After a 40 year career in fisheries, I have witnessed case after case of population collapse and still scientists really only have theories as to why those occurred. I think we need to rethink what is and is not acceptable.

Click to expand...

Nightsky;
I know she was from Rupert but sometimes it’s a small coast so, I hope you had no relationship with Miss Cory.

Jim;
Thanks for the dispassionate voice of experience.
Smarter people than us don’t have all the answers and in a (hypothetical) higher, high tide, that fuel could resemble the land spill you mentioned above.

From the start, when amounts were reported as anywhere from 600 to 3,000 litres, emotional experts jumped in and spoke from agendas and paycheques.

Another casualty in this scenario is relationships as the touchy source pits neighbour against neighbour. An identical, overnight leak from an old Taiwan “trawler” at anchor, would not excite the loins as much.

JDCAVE said:

Ok. So let's take that 1,000 litres of diesel and move it around a bit. Let's say I have a fuel truck and spilled that 1,000 litres on your front lawn. Will you still say it's ok, the microbes will break it down soon enough? Or if you were buying my house with a below ground fuel tank that leaked 1,000 litres into the soil, would you still say it's ok it happens all the time to all kinds of properties and the bacteria will break it down. On land there are all kinds of environmental standards in place for removal of contaminated soils and who is responsible. What is different here? Some of the locals are frosted by this spill and I don't think we should just be blowing them off. How much is acceptable? I'm telling you not sure. And I am certainly not an expert on habitat issues such as this.

Returning to my previous point of "death by a thousand cuts", there are thousands of environmental issues where single events are considered low risk, but event after event eventually causes collapse of populations. After a 40 year career in fisheries, I have witnessed case after case of population collapse and still scientists really only have theories as to why those occurred. I think we need to rethink what is and is not acceptable.

Click to expand...

Jim, I was either not clear or you misread my intent. I did not mean to imply that the spill is "ok". I also didn't intend to imply that those who are upset by the spill should be "blown off" or their concerns discounted.

I was simply trying to say that the effects of this particular spill will likely be very minor and not have any significant environmental impacts. Your comment about "death by a thousand cuts" was terribly important in my opinion. The effects of a minor spill such as this are very minor, but the accumulative effect of countless spills such as this, as well as the other stresses on the ecosystem likely are creating large effects.

As I mentioned in my post, the operator should be paying a fine. Why? Because punitive actions like a fine can be effective is ensuring that other operators are more careful in the future.

dhays; said:

As I mentioned in my post, the operator should be paying a fine. Why? Because punitive actions like a fine can be effective is ensuring that other operators are more careful in the future.

Click to expand...

Just a wee wild guess...Mitsubishi probably has fine money in their "operating" budget. You can bet the 10 buck an hour kid had a can tied to his arse though.

JDCAVE said:

And your professional background on this matter is...what?

Click to expand...

I have no professional qualification as regards oil spills, only a long held belief that diesel, being a very light oil, will spread widely, very thinly and evaporate relatively quickly. To back up my belief, I decided to do a little google search and found this website, Global Marine Oil Pollution Information Gateway • Facts • What happens to oil in sea water?.
I quote from this site "Evaporation: Lighter components of the oil will evaporate to the atmosphere. The amount of evaporation and the speed at which it occurs depend upon the volatility of the oil. An oil with a large percentage of light and volatile compounds will evaporate more than one with a larger amount of heavier compounds. For example, petrol, kerosene and diesel oils, all light products, tend to evaporate almost completely in a few days whilst little evaporation will occur from a heavy fuel oil. In general, in temperate conditions, those components of the oil with a boiling point under 200�C tend to evaporate within the first 24 hours. Evaporation can increase as the oil spreads, due to the increased surface area of the slick. Rougher seas, high wind speeds and high temperatures also tend to increase the rate of evaporation and the proportion of an oil lost by this process." While I tend not to believe everything I read on the internet, this website seems reputable to me and leaves me no reason to doubt its conclusions.

As to the fish in the pens, as long as the fuel stays on the surface, I believe very little impact will occur to fish, however, if fish feed is spread while the sheen is in the pen, then those pellets could absorb fuel while passing through the spill and affect the fish in the pen(s). Again, this is just my belief.

Nightsky; said:

To back up my belief, I decided to do a little google search...

Click to expand...

Goo Gal, gotta love it.

The following just shows to go ya, for every individual who can back up this, another can back up that. No winners.

Peter Ross, an ocean pollution expert with the Vancouver Aquarium, said parts of it will evaporate and other parts will remain as droplets in suspension or on the shore.

"The diesel is not going to disappear magically. It's going to continue to weather, get older as a product and end up in different parts of the environment in different forms.''

He said a sheen is a mixture of some diesel components that remain behind after the evaporation of toxic components. Therefore, a sheen is less harmful than other fuel components, but it still shouldn't be taken up by shellfish that are eaten by humans, he said.

Ross, who previously worked for the federal government, said the spill was modest and in sheltered waters. "If we can't clean that up, then how does that speak to our capacity to deal with large ocean-going tankers with heavy fuel products?'' he asked.

Hawgwash said:

Goo Gal, gotta love it.

The following just shows to go ya, for every individual who can back up this, another can back up that. No winners.

Peter Ross, an ocean pollution expert with the Vancouver Aquarium, said parts of it will evaporate and other parts will remain as droplets in suspension or on the shore.

"The diesel is not going to disappear magically. It's going to continue to weather, get older as a product and end up in different parts of the environment in different forms.''

He said a sheen is a mixture of some diesel components that remain behind after the evaporation of toxic components. Therefore, a sheen is less harmful than other fuel components, but it still shouldn't be taken up by shellfish that are eaten by humans, he said.

Ross, who previously worked for the federal government, said the spill was modest and in sheltered waters. "If we can't clean that up, then how does that speak to our capacity to deal with large ocean-going tankers with heavy fuel products?'' he asked.

Click to expand...

He makes some good points and some are a bit difficult to quantify, like the last point....there are all sorts of petroleum spills with different abilities for clean up crews to be able to.

I am no scientist but have responded to numerous spills and work part time for the second largest subcontractor on the Deepwater Horizon spill after the NRC.

A couple hundred gallons of diesel that has had a couple hours to spread is all but impossible to clean up. Sure where it collects...but even on the surface, getting absorbent material over every square inch is a pretty tall order. With great assets able to boom it off quickly...different story...but that is rarely the case.

But I do agree that a percentage of all but extreme volitiles do make their way into the water column.

Just as an update on the Burdwood spill, CCG has reported the final spill volume to be 660 L (160 USgal). Most of the sheen visible in the photos are rainbow-colored (~0.0003 mm thick) or silver (0.00007 mm thick). Sheens that are thin are very difficult to recover - usually a sorbent pad will not pick up a sheen that thin.

During the Queen of the North spill (2006) of 220,000 L was spilled. Butter clams were the most severely affected organism and contained high levels of hydrocarbons. But the levels were not lethal and returned to background levels within 2 months after the spill. So that is likely the the primary impact from this spill.

Cermaq, the fish farm owner and spiller, will be required to pay for third-party monitoring and possible restoration.

It is easy to demonize the fish farms (popular sport in BC) but we all carry around that much fuel and contribute to the risk. I hope it never happens to me . . . but it could.

Just a case on point: In my little closed basin in NC, a knucklehead spilled maybe ten gal of diesel in his bilge, it mixed with some lube oil in there, and he waited til dark and just pumped it out. That night I smelled it and went walking the docks. Sure enough he was still on the boat running the pump and that crap was visible coming out the through hull.

I knocked on the boat and pointed it out to him. He was shocked and embarrassed and said he had no idea what was going on. I look in the boat and engine hatch is up and a bunch of five gal buckets and oily rags clearly visible.

I told him he had a choice. Clean it up or I'm calling the coasties. He said he would clean it up. By now the stuff had dispersed all over the basin. I had a bale of oil zorb sheets in the shop and gave it to him. He spent the night in a dink throwing sheets, swiping them, collecting them, whatever.

Next morning there was a sheen and a stink remaining.

By that afternoon, sheen only in a few spots, stink barely detectable.

Next morning, no trace evident. It either evaporated, was bio-consumed, or dissolved.

No dead fish visible on the bottom. No injured birds. Apparently it was not an environmental big deal.

I had a talk with the marina where the guy slipped. Promptly evicted.

Some of the comments here say, if I could paraphrase, that most of the fuel will evaporate so all is good. I've often wondered where this fuel evaporates to that is good.
Could someone fill me in on just what happens to the fuel after it evaporates.

No expert here, but have read up on the topic. Apparently hydrocarbons in the atmosphere are broken down by solar UV radiation, and consumed in reactions with other compounds such as NOx. Basically end up oxidized at some rate. My take after reading was the chemistry was complicated.

leeman said:

Some of the comments here say, if I could paraphrase, that most of the fuel will evaporate so all is good. I've often wondered where this fuel evaporates to that is good.
Could someone fill me in on just what happens to the fuel after it evaporates.

Click to expand...

It's no problem. You just breath it. But it's in small breaths, so you don't notice.