Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Clean Up Chaos

This August, with funding from the Gulf Restoration Network, the nonprofit public interest law firm Earthjustice co-authored “The Chaos Of Clean Up: Analysis of Potential Health and Environmental Impacts of Chemicals in Dispersant Products”. This was in response to widespread concern about the safety of chemicals used to disperse oil during the Deepwater Horizon disaster April 2010.

MERI Director Susan Shaw was actively involved in researching the consequences of the spill and in May 2010 was one of the first scientists to express concern over BP’s use of oil dispersants known to be toxic to wildlife and people. As a toxicologist she pointed out that crude oil and dispersants are more toxic when combined than either oil or dispersants alone.

“The Chaos of Clean Up” states that of the fifty seven chemical ingredients in the two most extensively applied dispersants Corexit products 9500 and 9527, eight of them are suspected or known to be toxic to aquatic organisms Five are suspected to have a moderate acute toxicity to fish, four possibly absorb on suspended solids in theater and thereby are more likely to enter the food chain through consumption and one has a high potential for bioaccumulation. For potential impacts on human health, the list is much longer and includes five chemicals that are linked to cancer.

When the EPA did not respond in a timely way to requests for a full list of ingredients in the dispersants, Earthjustice sued under the Freedom Of information Act. EPA responded with details of the Corexit products and nearly a year later an aggregate list of fifty seven chemicals found in all fourteen dispersants. However, there is no data on which chemicals were found in which dispersants.

Nearly two million gallons of dispersants were applied directly to the disaster site and it is evident that very little is actually known about the effects of these chemicals. For thirteen of the dispersant ingredients no relevant data could be found.

It is not surprising that when Dr. Susan Shaw visited Grand Isle, Louisiana one year after the catastrophe she met many people who had been exposed to oil and dispersants and who were exhibiting very severe and debilitating symptoms . As she declared on the first year anniversary of the catastrophe:” We are at the beginning, not the end of this toxic nightmare”

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