Oil Spill Blog

The Clean Water Act (CWA) is a federal law that was developed in 1972 to govern water pollution. The purpose of this law was to protect the navigable waterways and shorelines from being polluted and to maintain the quality of water.

According to CWA the common sources of pollution are from oil spills. The oil could be in any form, including petroleum, fuel oil, oil refuse, sludge, and oil mixed with wastes in addition to dredged spoil. Even though discharges, include spilling, leaking, pumping, pouring, emitting, emptying, or dumping, it excludes discharges that have got the permit under section 1342. An individual, corporation, partnership, association, state, municipality, commission, or political subdivision of a state, or any interstate body discharging a pollutant into the waters of the U.S.A is required to comply with the Clean Water Act.

From identifying the causes of pollution to the cleanup of polluted areas, the Clean water Act provides guidelines and financial assistance for all. Initially, only the traditional point sources of pollution, such as municipal sewage plants and industrial facilities were focused. Only later were the nonpoint sources of pollution, such as oil runoff from land, studied and researched.

Oil runoff from land is one of the major sources of water pollution. Hence, it is essential for every individual to make sure that small leaks from cars or oil spills at home or garden, does not end in polluting the waterways. Use of eco-friendly oil spill cleaner, such as Oil Gone Easy Home & Driveway S-200 for removing oil from driveway and cleaning motor oil stains can prevent the oil from reaching the waterways.

Boating is another major cause of water pollution. Bilge disposal, sewage disposal, and fuel leakage are the common causes of water pollution from boating. Oil Gone Easy Marine S-200 will help you clean your bilge and protect the local marine environment.
In case of oil spills you can contact Oil Gone Easy S-200, which is on the approved list of federal onsite coordinators, authorized by Environmental Protection Agency in USA for oil spill cleanup.

Popularity: 44% [?]

You never know when you will come across an oil spill in your day to day life. Oil spills can happen just about anywhere in your home or office. Oil stains on the carpet in your office or on the kitchen slab are enough to get you worried. You could end up using ordinary oil stain removers, paper towels, or other such methods. Unfortunately, these methods don’t work well and your expensive rugs are just spoilt.

Most of us dread the tedious process of cleaning up oil spills in our garages and driveways. The labour involved in driveway oil spill cleanup with unsuitable cleaners is worse than anything. More than that, it just leaves you at the risk of being exposed to hazardous chemicals from the oil spills as well as the toxic oil stain removers. Even the children and pets at home run the risk of getting affected by the chemicals of these oil spill cleaners.

The size of an oil spill does matter. Small oil stains or oil spills are easy to manage, but unfortunately if a spill is huge paper towels or other such methods just won’t do the trick. Hence, oil spill kits are a must to protect yourself and others from the potential risk of an oil spill occurrence.

Oil spill kits may include a variety of tools, such as absorbent booms, absorbent mats, appropriate hand protection, and of course oil spill cleaners. Though, use of adsorbent booms and absorbent mats may seem like a good idea at the time, later disposing off these oil laden materials without any further harm can prove to be a problem. Hence, for cleaning up oil spills consider a handy, effective, safe, and eco friendly oil spill cleaner, such as Oil Gone Easy Home & Driveway S-200. This oil stain remover is designed to meet even the emergency needs. What’s more, it is safe on the environment as it makes use of environmentally friendly bioremediation technology. So, make this product a prime component of your oil spill kit!

Popularity: 49% [?]

Oil spills are one of the most well-known sources of contamination. They are very hazardous to the environment and to the living organisms, such as plants and animals. Oil spilled or dumped in junkyards is a very serious issue. A Junkyard is a place that is used to store junk, wrecked and abandoned automobiles, trucks, and buses. Motor oils, automobile fluids, and other solid wastes from these junks are dumped into the yard. These oil spills can carry heavy metals and other toxic wastes that are considered to have deleterious effect on nature.

During heavy rain or by surface drains, the toxic chemicals and heavy metals from junkyards seep into the soil making cleaning difficult. Oil spill cleanup procedures are not only tedious but also quite expensive. There are several oil spill cleanup procedures followed by ecologists. They include bioremediation, booms, skimmers, sorbents, chemical dispersants, biological agents, and more.

Of the lot, the most effective and greener way to cleanup the oil spill is bioremediation. A product that makes use of this technology is Oil Gone Easy S-200. It is an eco-friendly oil stain remover that can be used to not only cleanup oil spills on a large scale but also to remove tough oil stains from driveways, garages, and more. Oil Gone Easy Home & Driveway S-200 oil stain remover can be used on different surfaces, such as concrete, flag stone, asphalt, brick, pavers, cobblestone, and soil. This oil stain remover is not only easy to use but also cost effective.

Some Tips in Oil Spill Management:

• In order to prevent oil spills, outdoor storage facilities should have a permanent roof. It prevents precipitation and restricts sunlight entering the storage area.

• Always store degreasers and solvents in a tightly covered container.

• Rags contaminated with paint, solvents, grease, or oil must be sent to a recycling facility.

Popularity: 61% [?]

Ground water is the natural elixir. In the absence of rain water, ground is the only eternal source of water. Due to massive industrialization and other human activities, the ground water resources are under threat. Oil storage systems, chemical tanks, septic tanks, landfills, and crude oil spills are the potential contaminants of ground water. Both the chemical and biological pollutants percolate the ground and mix with the ground water.

Ground water contamination due to crude oil spills have been a persistent problem and less attended to. Over the past years, gallons of fuel oils and motor oil have been spilled on the land and water sources without check. Since ground water is used as potable water in many regions, contamination of it would cause serious health hazards to human beings drinking it. There is less awareness about such contamination among government and non-government agencies.

Bemidji in Minnesota is one well studied crude oil spill site with contaminated ground water. The intensity of ground water poisoning depends greatly on the rate at which the hydrocarbon components disseminate. Natural biodegradation of oil leachates is more complex at the subsurface level due to the absence of oxygen. Crude oil spills should be controlled and the oil contaminated sites should be immediately subject to remedy.

Treatment of contaminated ground water can be done. But oil spill recovery is a tedious process. Purification can be done by pumping the underground water and filtered through the several stages for removal of contaminants. Augmentation of the hydrocarbon degrading microorganisms effectively into the underground water can help in speedy recovery of oil spills.

Oil Gone Easy 200 is an eco-friendly oil spill remover that is used to clean up the oil spills from land and marine waters. This oil spill remover can be sprayed on to the oil spilled site, which provides increased access to bacterial community thus bringing biodegradation of oil spills. Oil Gone Easy is a very good product in dealing home oil spills and drive away oil spills.

Popularity: 62% [?]

Oil spills occur due to leakage from improper oil tanks, offshore drilling, or faulty pipelines. Disorganized transportation of oil is another important factor that leads to oil spills. It is important to act fast to clean up an oil spill and prevent the oil from spreading to a bigger area. When it comes to oil spill cleanup, crude oil and their derivatives are the worst. Traditional oil spill cleanup methods such as incineration, used especially for crude oil spill cleanup, are expensive and are also considered extremely harmful to the environment. So, natural methods of oil spill cleanup are always sought after.

A group of scientists from the Department of Industrial Microbiology at University College, Dublin, conducted a research on the action of certain microbes in tackling with the pollutants in an oil spill. Their research showed the exceptionally diverse nature of these microbes. While some of the constituents of oil proved to be toxic to some of the bacteria, other bacteria were capable of using the oil compounds as food ultimately breaking them down.

According to researchers, simply adding microbes to the spilled oil or the oil stain will not work. Only specific bacteria work upon the oil components to break them down into harmless compounds. Choosing the most applicable bacteria will only help in cleaning up an oil spill. Manipulation and usage of natural microbial populations is necessary to break down the contaminants and bring back the environment to its original form.

Bioremediation has proven to be natural and effective process to gradually destroy the harmful pollutants in oil spills and remove oil stains. It only calls for the use of a specific set of bacteria that will work on any contaminated site. Oil Gone Easy S-200 is one such oil spill cleaner that makes use of the bioremediation technology effectively and cleans not just soil and marine oil spills, but also oil stains from any surface at home.

Popularity: 88% [?]

Water pollution is the contamination or adulteration of the water bodies, such as rivers, lakes, seas, oceans, and ground water by number of human activities. Since water is essential for all our basic needs, water pollution is a threat to us. Many communicable diseases spread through unclean water, which even results in death.

Although there are different factors that contribute to water pollution, listed below are the most dangerous causes of water pollution.

• Factories and nuclear plants play a major role in polluting the water. Wastes from factories include toxins, such as lead, mercury, and other contaminants. These chemicals are very harmful and can lead to serious health hazards.

• Nonpoint sources are one of the major causes of water pollution. Oil spills from cars, trucks, and other vehicles on land get mixed with rainwater and runoff into streams and lakes polluting them. These nonpoint sources are very difficult to monitor and control, so it falls on each individual to make sure that their vehicles used does not in any way contribute to further pollution. Proper maintenance of vehicles and oil spill cleanup using eco-friendly products, such as Oil Gone Easy S-200 will help to a great extent.

• Fertilizers and pesticides used in agricultural farms, homeowners lawns, and roadsides are a threat to the natural water source. When runoff into local streams or rivers or when drained down into groundwater, they contaminate the water completely.

• Mining is another major reason for water pollution. Heavy metals and sulfur components which are buried in the earth are exposed during mining and during rainfall these toxic chemicals are exposed, which ultimately result in “acid rain drainage”

• Surprising though it may seem, air pollution is also a cause of water pollution. Pollutants, such as sulfur dioxide, nitric acid, and mercury, when deposited out of air results in nutrient pollution and acidification of lakes.

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The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has certain rules regarding oil spill cleanup. EPA had published the rules of the Facility Response Plan (FRP) on July 1, 1994. It listed persons who should prepare and submit the FRP and the points that must be included in the plan. Several revisions to the FRP rule were made including the requirements for animal fats and vegetable oils, which was finalized in 2000.

According to the Clean Water Act amended by the Oil Pollution Act, the EPA requires facilities that store and use oil to prepare and submit the Facility Response Plans. Facilities that may cause substantial harm should respond to the Facility Response Plans. All facility owners are also required to maintain a certification form for future EPA inspections.

The Regional EPA Administrator visits facilities to checkout factors like age of tanks, total oil storage capacity, lack of secondary containment, proximity to navigable waters, transfer operations, threat to animals and drinking water, and previous history of oil spills.

EPA expects the FRP to be consistent with the National Contingency Plan and applicable to the Area Contingency Plans. The plans must also identify worst cases of oil discharges to remove them effectively as soon as possible. It helps owners to improve their discharge prevention methods through early identification of risks involved. The facility’s name, location, and owner’s name along with training programs, unannounced drills, and response actions of people on the vessel or facility should be mentioned in the plan. The plan must be also be updated periodically for future references.

In case of oil spills, it is safer to use green cleaning technologies for oil spill cleanup than use harmful chemicals. Facilities can make use of biodegradable products for oil spill cleanup and oil stain removal from rocks and runways. Oil Gone Easy offers eco-friendly products like Oil Gone Easy S-200, which helps in cleaning oil spills without damaging the environment.

Popularity: 57% [?]

Several studies have been conducted by researchers the world over to address the various aspects of oil behavior during marine oil spills and oil spills on land. There may be many reasons for oil spills, but to ensure a successful oil spill response, it is very important to know the behavior of oil in different circumstances.

In marine oil spills the most common type of oil spilled is crude oil. When marine oil spills occur, the oil disperses rapidly in the same direction as the wind causing long and narrow slicks. The lighter fractions of the oil evaporate at a faster rate, whereas the denser particles tend to sink to the seabed, causing widespread harm to the aquatic life. Due to the wave action some oil even mixes with the water and emulsifies. The hierarchies on the food chain, from sea plankton to the largest of whales are greatly affected.

In contrast, on land, the lightest of oils prove to be a larger problem, as these oils seep through the soil at a much faster rate. This poses a risk to the purity of groundwater. The heavier and denser oils have higher viscosity and cannot penetrate through the ground easily. In cases of oil spills on land, spreading does not take place, so there will not be any evaporation of the lighter fractions or emulsification. The chance of the oil mixing with gravel, vegetation and other soil is also at hand.

The crucial steps in a response action plan include speedy response times, efficient control of widespread dispersion both on land and on sea, skimmers and pumps to take care of the resulting debris, and a temporary storage facility. Oil spill cleanup is one of the most important steps in any response plan. Oil Gone Easy S-200 is an eco-friendly oil spill cleaner that biodegrades any kind of oil, on any surface without causing any environmental harm.

Popularity: 57% [?]

Pollution may be defined as the contamination of the natural environment by addition of harmful substances. Basically, the source of pollution is differentiated into two types – point source pollution and nonpoint source pollution. When pollutants are discharged from a single source, then it is called as point source pollution. It could be from sewage discharge plants or industrial waste from companies. Large scale oil spills from oil tanks or ships are best examples of point source pollution.

Unlike point source pollution, the sources of nonpoint source pollution are very diverse. Rain water or flowing water picks up many contaminants including motor oil, grease, sand, wastes, and other toxic materials. These pollutants are finally deposited into waterways such as coastal waters, rivers, lakes, and underground water, thus polluting them. According to the Environmental Protection Agency of the United States, nonpoint source pollution is the number one cause of water quality problem in the country.

Even individual households contribute to nonpoint source pollution through improper usage of chemicals and pesticides and other household practices. Waste water from houses may contain toxic substances, such as oil, grease, metals, pesticides, and PCBs which are the major sources of nonpoint pollution. Motor oil spills from parking lots or runways, oil spilled from storage tanks or motor boats, and off-shore drilling operations are the leading sources of water pollution along shore lines and other areas.

The ecological impact of oil spills on marine as well as land animals can be terrible, which results in reduced flora and fauna. Oil spill cleanup, if done immediately helps prevent the spilled oil from being washed away by running water. You can use eco-friendly products offered by Oil Gone Easy for oil spill cleanup. These biodegradable products break down toxic substances into simple substances that do not cause water pollution.

Popularity: 52% [?]

Oil spills not only affect environmentally but also economically. The economic impacts are directly or indirectly related to the environmental impacts of oil spills. But, the economic impacts of oil spills are not much talked about as the environmental impacts are.

The most direct economic impact of oil spills is the loss of oil. The losses incurred depend on the size of the spill; the bigger the spill, the higher the economic impact. Oil spill cleanup costs too increase with the size of the spill.

Most of the people along coastal areas depend on tourism for income. The restrictions imposed on recreational activities, such as diving, bathing, and boating in the polluted area affect tourism. As a result, they suffer huge economic losses. Until and unless oil spill cleanup is done, these continue to suffer.

Fishing industry is another prominent sector that bears the brunt of oil spills. Contamination or death of commercial marine animals and plants result in economic loss for the fishermen. Oil spill cleanup actions usually take a very long time. The fishing and shellfish area are closed during these periods. This interrupts the fishing activities, resulting in further loss to the fishermen. Fishing boats and equipment get damaged when they come in contact with the spilled oil.

Industries like hydroelectric power plants, desalination plants, and nuclear central stations depend on seawater for their operations. The whole operation of the large scale industries is affected if the spilled oil is mixed in the water being used by them.

With such obvious economic impacts, it is our responsibility to protect our environment from such disasters. Preventing oil spills and using environmentally-friendly oil spill cleaners, such as Oil Gone Easy S-200 rather than other toxic products will help a great deal in minimizing the impact of an oil spill.

Popularity: 50% [?]