Louisiana Universities Marine
Consortium
LUMCON
8124 Hwy. 56
Chauvin, LA 70344 USA
Tel (PWS): 1-985-851-2876 FAX: 1-985-851-2874
email:
psammarco@lumcon.edu
Press Release
October 13, 2010
Sampling in Louisiana’s Inshore
Waters Indicates Presence of Crude Oil
Dynamic's New Dyna-Aqua Oil
SorbTM Used to
Determine the Presence of Petroleum
Hydrocarbons and Corexit®
in Water involved with BP Oil Spill
The BP-Deep Horizon oil spill of
April 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico was the worst in US
history and one of the worst in the world.
Contamination of inshore and offshore waters,
beaches, salt marshes, bays, etc. has been widely
reported, along with ill effects on estuarine and
marine fauna. Reports of petroleum hydrocarbon and
dispersant concentrations in the water have been
variable. Shortly after the leaking well had been
capped in July, the federal government announced
that most of the 200,000,000 gallons of crude oil
released into the Gulf of Mexico was no longer
evident.
On August 20, 2010, Dr. Paul W.
Sammarco of the Louisiana Universities Marine
Consortium (LUMCON) conducted reconnaissance on the
NW side of Timbalier Island and off Rock Island,
Louisiana to determine the presence or absence of
petroleum hydrocarbons in inshore Louisiana waters
(Terrebonne Bay) using a new, state-of-the-art
adsorbent material – Dyna-Aqua Oil SorbTM from Dynamic
Technology, Inc. The composition of petroleum
hydrocarbons was determined along with their
concentrations in the cloth and estimates of their
concentrations in the seawater.
The water samples derived from
the adsorbent cloth yielded 39 hydrocarbon
compounds, 23 of which were clearly identifiable. Of
those 23, 13 were identified to be petroleum
hydrocarbons derived from crude oil. One of the 21
compounds was identified to be 2-butoxy-ethanol - a
toxic component of Corexit®, the dispersant used
by BP and the US Coast Guard in treating the spill.
The cloth collected high
concentrations of these compounds ranging from
14-233 mg l-1. When standardized by the estimated
volume of seawater sampled, the range of
concentrations fell to 0.002-0.033
mg l-1.
Considering the circumstances, this was not logical.
NOAA’s concentrations were reported from in an
offshore environment just E-SE of the spill site on
May 30, 2010 – 5.5 wks into the spill. One would
expect those concentrations to be much higher –
since they were sampling down-current of the spill
(with respect to major long-shelf currents) while it
was still active. Sammarco’s samples were taken
up-current of the spill site and 5 wks after the
well had been capped. Concentrations reported in
this study may also be considered to be
conservative, based on the mode of sampling
(non-forced/flow-through filtering). This, in turn,
indicates that NOAA’s numbers would appear to be
lower than expected for the period of their sampling
and in comparison to the data here. In addition,
underwater video footage taken by Mr. Scott A.
Porter on May 7, 2010 shows that the dispersant may
have been effective at submerging the oil but was
not 100% effective at dissolving it, causing high
concentrations of it to be patchily distributed in
shallow water. Point-sampling using Niskin bottles
to sample seawater when the oil is distributed in
this fashion could easily have missed these patches.
The sampling technique we used here is broad-scale,
cumulative, and is probably better suited to provide
representative data of actual concentrations under
these circumstances.
This adsorbent material’s high
sensitivity to petroleum hydrocarbons makes it well
suited for a variety of purposes, including surface
oil adsorption, fill for adsorbent booms – replacing
dated absorbent ones, adsorption of sunken oil
concentrated at depth, environmental monitoring,
industrial clean-up, and estuarine filters.
Contacts:
Dr. Paul W. Sammarco
Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON)
8124 Hwy. 56
Chauvin, LA 70344-2110
USA
Tel: (985) 851-2876
FAX: (985) 851-2874
Email: psammarco@lumcon.edu
Website: www.lumcon.edu
Mr. C.D. Pat Patterson
President
Dynamic Technology, Inc.
5100 Monument Ave., Unit #1202
Richmond,Va. 23230
Tel: (804) 310-2694
Email: cdpatterson3@yahoo.com
Website: www.dynamicadsorbents.com
Mr. Ronde Bacquie
Chairman
Dynamic Technology, Inc.
Tel: (301) 266-5919
Email: JDR_Baquie@yahoo.com
Dr. Mark Moskovitz
Chief Technical Officer, Dynamic Technology
President and CEO, Dynamic Adsorbents, Inc.
3280 Peachtree Corners Circle, Suite E
Norcross, GA 30092
Tel: (770) 817-0123
Fax: (770) 455-4380
Mobile: (404) 229-1537
Email: mmoskovitz@aol.com
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