Health And Safety Effects From Large Oil Spills And Their...

Health and safety effects from large oil spills and their clean-up Introduction: Oil spills have been a treat to man and its environment since the discovery of oil as a source of energy. In history, there have been several massive oil spill disasters have occurred within the last century. (1) It is obvious crude oil is an important source of energy to man and that there are dangers associated with but unfortunately despite the outstanding technological advancements, man has been unable to prevent the occurrence that affected her which is due to her operations. In the past, oil spills from oil tanker accident dominated the scene with an average of 314,000 tons of oil entering the ocean as a result of these. However, this has reduced†¦show more content†¦(3) The oil spill clean-up operations affect the health statuses of those involved either directly through the toxic effects of the oil itself and/or through injuries such as back pain sustained during the clean-up operation. (3) Furthermore the remediation process involved in the cleaning of the oil spill has its own effect on the clean-up workers most of which are volunteers. Several methods have been used in history to respond to oil spills but none of these methods is extremely effective to reduce the impact of oil spills on man and his environment. There are several methods used in the cleanup of large oil spills. According to Yang et al, bioremediation is the microbiological acceleration of the process of biodegradation of oil products. Also, the mechanical method of cleaning up of oil spill which involves the use of sorbents or direct skimming of oil from water surface. (4) This method is however said to be effective only on water surface and not on land. Other methods used includes burning of the oil and use of substance that solidify the oil to make it easy to be separated from the water surface as well as use of substances called dispersants. (5) All these processes in themselves have negative impact on the environment as well as human