From the University of Rochester , those darned bacteria are ruining the eco photo-ops. Video follows.
At least 200,000 tons of oil and gas from Deepwater Horizon spill consumed by gulf bacteria
Researchers from the University of Rochester and Texas A&M University have found that, over a period of five months following the disastrous 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill, naturally-occurring bacteria that exist in the Gulf of Mexico consumed and within five months removed at least 200,000 tons of oil and natural gas that spewed into the deep Gulf from the ruptured well head.
The researchers analyzed an extensive data set to determine not only how much oil and gas was eaten by bacteria, but also how the characteristics of this feast changed with time.
“A significant amount of the oil and gas that was released was retained within the ocean water more than one-half mile below the sea surface. It appears that the hydrocarbon-eating bacteria did a good job of removing the majority of the material that was retained in these layers,” said co-author John Kessler <http://www.ees.rochester.edu/people/faculty/kessler_john/index.html> of the University of Rochester.
The results published this week in Environmental Science and Technology http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es301363k include the first measurements of how the rate at which the bacteria ate the oil and gas changed as this disaster progressed, information that is fundamental to understanding both this spill and predicting the behavior of future spills.
Kessler noted: “Interestingly, the oil and gas consumption rate was correlated with the addition of dispersants at the wellhead. While there is still much to learn about the appropriateness of using dispersants in a natural ecosystem, our results suggest it made the released hydrocarbons more available to the native Gulf of Mexico microorganisms. ”
Their measurements show that the consumption of the oil and gas by bacteria in the deep Gulf had stopped by September 2010, five months after the Deepwater Horizon explosion. “It is unclear if this indicates that this great feast was over by this time or if the microorganisms were simply taking a break before they start on dessert and coffee” said Kessler. “Our results suggest that some (about 40%) of the released hydrocarbons that once populated these layers still remained in the Gulf post September 2010, so food was available for the feast to continue at some later time. But the location of those substances and whether they were biochemically transformed is unknown.”
Previous studies of the Deepwater Horizon spill had shown that the oil and gas were trapped in underwater layers, or “plumes”, and that the bacteria had begun consuming the oil and gas. By using a more extensive data set, the researchers were able to measure just how many tons of hydrocarbons released from the spill had been removed in the deep Gulf waters. The team’s research suggests that the majority of what once composed these large underwater plumes of oil and gas was eaten by the bacteria.
Professor John Kessler, recently appointed as Associate Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences of the University of Rochester, worked with graduate research assistant Mengran Du at Texas A&M University to analyze over 1300 profiles of oxygen dissolved in the Gulf of Mexico water spanning a period of four months and covering nearly 30,000 square miles.
The researchers calculated how many tons of oil and gas had been consumed and at what rate by first measuring how much oxygen had been removed from the ocean. Mengran Du explained that “when bacteria consume oil and gas, they use up oxygen and release carbon dioxide, just as humans do when we breathe. When bacteria die and decompose, that uses up still more oxygen. Both these processes remove oxygen from the water.” Du added that it is this lower oxygen level that the researchers could measure and use as an indicator of how much oil and gas had been removed by microorganisms and at what rate.
The work was supported by the National Science Foundation with additional contributions from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Sloan Foundation, BP/the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, and the Chinese Scholarship Council.
Hmm. That got me wondering if someone used Biozome to clean up the mess. I live not far from the place that produces it. http://www.obio.com/ (Keep it in mind that Biozome was intended for improving plant growth, getting rid of spilled oil in the garage, etc – http://www.biozome.com/).
Not too surprizing. Petroleum seeps are natural to the gulf, so one would have guessed that some organisms would have adapted to take advantage of them.
we know that this area is prone to oil seepages and that there are “oil-eating bacteria” there. The message was reinforced immediately after the blow-out. But does this really tell us anything new about the extent of the damage?
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/discoblog/2008/05/27/its-in-the-bag-teenager-wins-science-fair-solves-massive-environmental-problem/
Sorry but this is old news. See also California oil steps bacteria. It has been going on for a long time now.
Well, now we know how to clan up oil spills anywhere, right?
Those bacteria become food for other organisms and on up the food chain, increasing bio-productivity.
People look at me as if I am mad, when I tell them oil spills are good for the environment.
I reminded my family on the day this happened, that petroleum is organic in nature, and just mother’s milk to some. I guess it helps to have spent many years as a geology student.
man in a barrel:
At September 11, 2012 at 4:11 pm you say and ask
If such bacteria did not exist then the world would be covered by oil from seepages by now.
The bacteria will convert all the escaped oil given sufficient time.
Therefore, “the extent of the damage” depends on how you define “damage” and over what time.
For example, eventually, all the oil will be gone but the ecology which emerges may differ from that which existed before the incident. If so, then it is a matter of opinion as to whether that change is “damage”.
And local fishermen have been damaged by loss of income. It is a political decision how much time must elapse before they can again catch fish. So, for them, the extent of the damage is determined politically.
And so on.
Richard
The key variable here is the use of dispersants. The bacteria live in the water and feed at the oil water interface, so the smaller the droplets the higher the surface to volume ratio and the faster the bugs can eat. This was all known at the time of the spill, but the environmentalists fought tooth-and-nail to keep dispersants from being used.
What we learn is lots of oil and gas was consumed by naturally occurring bacteria. The truth is not only is this expected it has been demonstrated before in the Gulf and other places. We also see or learn that give the location and other physical characteristics of the place all we have are some reasonable guesstimates. We are also reminded that mathematics is a wonderful tool for use in scientific investigations. Math is just that a tool.
This is why it baffles me that people are concerned about arctic drilling spills.
With seepage, there’d be a bunch if oil just under the icecap if there weren’t bacteria consuming it. Currents wouldnt take all of it away.
Philip Bradley says:
“Those bacteria become food for other organisms and on up the food chain, increasing bio-productivity.
People look at me as if I am mad, when I tell them oil spills are good for the environment.”
This all reminds me of the Econ. Prof. I had at UW Madison in the early 70’s. One day he was bragging in class about having made a trip to DC to testify in a Congressional hearing on the Economic impacts of an oil spill that had occurred in Galveston Bay (I think). He was yuking it up finely because they had successfully mislead Congress with his testimony.
Apparently he testified that the oil spill in question had had “significant economic impacts” but none of the Congressmen in attendance thought to ask about the nature of those impacts and he left them assuming that they were negative. When if fact the economic impacts were positive as the oil apparently acted like a fertilizer and bio productivity increased along with fishing success after an initial short lived period of toxicity.
In my young eyes that man and the movement lost a lot of respect, never to be recovered, on that day.
“Du added that it is this lower oxygen level that the researchers could measure and use as an indicator of how much oil and gas had been removed by microorganisms and at what rate.”
So they’re using a proxy for approximating bacterial activity and hence oil consumed and that proxy tells them 40% of the oil remains but they dont know where it is. I suspect its taken up residence with the missing heat.
Anengineer, given that oil seepages and the bacteria that eat them are natural events/things, I can see the hesitation in throwing a whole bunch of something pretty much brand new and alien (dispersants) into the mix. Theoretically it might produce the result you note and which it seems to … but playing around with theories when dealing with something as big as that oil spill in the Gulf is a bit of an “iffy” thing to do. What if it had turned out that the dispersants were deadly poisonous to the bacteria and/or selectively resulted in survivors that just loved to feast on weird dispersant-type chemicals. Those survivors could have spread around the planet, eating ALL the more natural dispersants, and then the entire ocean could have wound up covered in an oil slick!
Likely? Probably not. But I always tend to be a bit leery of “theories” about things. Theoretically importing rabbits to Australia seemed like a great idea to someone at one point, didn’t it?
– MJM
Oh noes, oil spilt on the ground !!!! ……………where it cam from. snarc/off
came from. ooops
Jimbo says:
September 11, 2012 at 4:16 pm
So why does the media keep acting and reporting like oil spills are the worst thing to happen to anyone, anywhere, at any time?
Not surprising.
Considering what went down in WWII, with no disperants used, yet there was no lasting sign of it ever. Something in the ocean must be eating the oil.
What is the impact and duration of the oxygen depletion? I’m sure it isn’t a good thing, but it may well be less of an issue than the oil itself. Still, if there’s a downside I would expect the greens to highlight that as well.
The availability of dissolved oxygen in the water needs to be considered in the determining the rate of consumption of oil and hydrocarbon gas. There is a notional limit of oxygen concentration below which the bacteria will stop metabolising oil/gas (likely dependent upon the type of hydrocarbon on the “plate”). If metabolism is throttled due to lack of oxygen, then oxygenation can be used to accelerate natural remediation.
Philip Bradley says:
People look at me as if I am mad, when I tell them oil spills are good for the environment.
Well, I wouldn’t quite go that far. It depends on the environment. Certainly, the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico are as good a place as any for an oil spill to be consumed by naturally occurring bacteria and assisted by dispersants. When the spill was occurring the first thing people were asking me about was how it would affect the NC coast, since the alarmists were projecting how long it would take to reach Cape Hatteras. I explained then how the dispersants increased the area that bacteria could feed on the oil thereby accelerating its depletion, but that even without dispersants the oil would never make any appreciable appearance on NC shores thanks to our microscopic friends. I think they thought I was just a little off my rocker too. Perhaps I’ll send them all a link to this post.
An example of the typical alarmist nonsense people were taken in by: “This amount of oil may be enough to kill off or contaminate all marine life within the Gulf of Mexico, to foul the coastline throughout the Gulf and, thanks to the Gulf Stream, through much of the Eastern Seaboard, at least to Cape Hatteras in North Carolina and possibly beyond.” http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2010/05/american-chernobyl.html
I guess this is why the media have been reporting all day today that the tar balls on the beaches are “definitely” from the oil spill. Have to keep up the paranoia!
Of course, when I was a kid in Pensacola during the fifties, we used to find tar balls on the beach all the time — long before there were wells in the Gulf.
Before we get too excited about 200,000 tons that were gobbled up, remember that the spill was 650,000 tons of crude and 500,000 tons of gas. Those guys have a lot of eating left to do.
There are no credible data or analysis pointing to the existence of ‘Anthropogenic Global Warming’!
The IPCC, its writers and reviewers, in sum is the Piltdown Man of the 21st century.
Cheers IPCC