

Gulf Oil Spill Is Already Half Gone.  - jacoblyles
http://reason.com/blog/2010/08/04/gulf-oil-disappears

======
serichsen
Yeah, right. Even if the "25% each" estimate is right: the part that
"naturally dissolved or evaporated" does not just disappear, but gets diluted
to the point where further effects are not readily attributable to it. The
part that was dispersed is still as toxic as before, it has just become
practically impossible to recover it. The real news is that only one third of
the spill can be recovered at all; the rest (plus the incredible amount of
wanton Corexit poisoning) will be a constant burden on the environment of the
gulf of Mexico for the years to come.

That article is most likely just spin.

~~~
hga
You're ignoring the role of microbes (bacteria): an estimated 21 million
gallons of oil naturally leaks into the Gul per year (and we assume has done
so for zillions of years) and there are well adapted microbes that use it as a
carbon source. We can also expect them to munch on the most toxic fraction of
Corexit, which is light petroleum distillates.

And don't forget that it's the dose that makes the poison. By my worse case
calculations from public data (starting point was a _New York Post_ article)
the Gulf has 3.5 billion gallons of water per gallon of oil spilled. Obviously
it's not equally distributed, but that gives you an idea of the scale of
things (e.g. much greater dilution than happened in the Exxon Valdez spill,
where a lot of more heavy (and more sour?) oil was spilled in a much smaller
and much colder (less microbe action) body of water).

Note that the "naturally ... evaporated" fraction does "just disappear" as far
as the sea is concerned, it's in the atmosphere, spread by the four winds, and
diluted to the point it'll take really sensitive instruments to detect at
worst.

Seriously:

    
    
      Light fractions evaporate.
      Medium fractions are eaten by microbes.
      Heaviest fractions become tar balls.
    

It's not the end of the world or even the Gulf; compare to the 1979-80 Ixtoc I
spill by Pemex of about the same size (although spread out over 10 months).
Who remembered that spill or the damage it did (limited except for some medium
term problems with some populations of crabs and turtles) until this one
occurred?

------
muhfuhkuh
Whew! That was a close one!

Well, call off the witch hunt and fines, Obama! The free market saved the
planet and will never, _EVER_ do it again.

