What the Blogathon has been missing thus far:
I'm still a __ing believer; and why wouldn't I be since the information readily available from the beginning of this incident has been so clear and above board. A free and open flow of accurate information was at our fingertips everyday, shame the information the next day disagreed completely with that of the day before, heh, what could be more open than that?
Color me skeptical if you will. ,
Let us get this into perspective
"Down the drain oil" pollution is defined as slow chronic oil leaks from land based industrial processes. Because this source of pollution is so diverse, the best estimate of its contribution to marine oil pollution is in the region of 40 million gallons of oil a year, or just under 11% of the world total.
Petroleum consumption by all types of industry and automobiles releases volatile organic compounds into the atmosphere, which are then deposited into the marine environment. This type of pollution is responsible for approximately 15 million gallons of oil a year (just under 5%) and is being fueled by the continuing use of 2 stroke engines in recreational vehicles.
Petroleum transportation, including spills from oil tankers, leaks from aging pipelines and coastal facility spills, at 44 million gallons, make up 11.5% of the yearly total
Non accidental discharges from sea going vessels and jettisoned aircraft fuel are responsible for nearly 80 million gallons of marine oil pollution or nearly 22% of the annual global total.
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Spillage from oil extraction, such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, make up just under 4% of yearly totals, at just over 11 million gallons of oil pollution.
Natural Seeps is around 175 million gallons of oil per year and makes up 45% of the total.
However if you do more than just scan these figures and say oil extraction is not such a big deal and incidently nature does a whole lot more damage, I suggest you take into consideration
The blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico gushed 12 times faster than the government and BP estimated in the early weeks of the crisis and has spilled a whopping 4.9 million barrels, or 205.8 million gallons
Oh shit, in one three month period we added 205.8 million gallons; that's a 53% increase over and above what happens every year. Take that natural seepage! Just because it is a natural occurrence does not mean it is by definition benign. We do not know what nature can handle we just might be tipping the scales too far.
These figures so often used also forget the most insidious spill of all time the Niger Delta which has been spilling around 11 million gallons a year for the last 40 to 50 years, nobody really knows the flow rate it could be substantially higher. So that is 4% of the average yearly total on its own.
So this year alone we have polluted our oceans to a tune of nearly 400 million gallons of oil, nature adds a further 175 million gallons.
Now life in around seepage sites has had time to adapt or die in its oily habitat, the rest of the marine environment has not had these luxuries.
There is another type of oil pollution, a byproduct we take for granted in our everyday lives and it enters our oceans in colossal quantities every year; plastics.
Marine trash, mainly plastic, is killing more than a million seabirds and 100,000 mammals and sea turtles each year, said U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in a statement.
'We found six times more plastic than plankton, and this was just colossal,'
Nobody really knows the long term effects of so much non-biodegradable filth in our oceans, but choking on it is probably the least of our worries.
OK so we have created a rubbish tipsof our oceans with our need for oil and its byproducts, the sorry saga of oil does not end here:
Global wheat markets reeling from Russian droughts, thousands of cattle killed by heat in Kansas, and countless crop acres wiped out by floods in Pakistan are glimpses of what can be expected as the world struggles to battle climate change.
But as concerns mount over extreme weather hitting global food systems this year, governments are no closer to forging a pact to fight climate change.
Then good news like this hits us in the back of the head
Scientists have discovered that the phytoplankton of the oceans has declined by about 40 per cent over the past century, with much of the loss occurring since the 1950s. They believe the change is linked with rising sea temperatures and global warming.
When someone turns around a tells me that nature will take care of this all, I just want to slap them silly.
We have no idea of the effect of oil in the oceans deep but we are sure as hell going to find out now, oil has been found in crab larvae [zooplankton] that are the foundations of the food web.
The research has just begunand the full results will not be fully known for a generation, from past experiences of oil spills of lesser proportions the omens are not good.
In this diary I have looked at the metaphorical forest and to have a healthy forest one must tend the trees, applying good management practices as it were.
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Action
A lone voice often does not suffice, all our actions resulting in pollution and the destruction of our habitat are interrelated.
Greenpeace
There is a wide choice
Call and write to your representatives
Senate
House
Ensure that your representatives know your stance as to BP's responsibility in all of this, have them pressure the EPA to do their job, we the tax payer should not be paying for the clean up and it is far from over.
Never forget your own responsibility in all this
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(Tayo Fatunla, Freelance Cartoonist for Cagle Cartoons (West Africa), Buy this cartoon)
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