ABSTRACT
Due to oil exploration and other human activities, there is evidence of environmental degradation all over the area.
Discovered over five decades ago, oil became and has remained the backbone of the Nigerian economy, accounting for over 90% of the country’s foreign exchange revenue. Today however, the environment is heavily defaced as a result of crude oil spillages during exploitation and transportation and oil leakages from obsolete pipelines with delayed remediation processes.
Environmental degradation is occasioned by consistent flow of industrial waste, oil spills, gas flares, fire disaster, acid rain, flooding, erosion, etc., which has led to the pollution of farmlands and fishponds. It has also led to the destruction of properties and human lives, including aquatic and bio-diversity.
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| An Oil-Spillage polluted environment |
INTRODUCTION
Oil spill is categorized into four groups: minor, medium, major and disaster.
The minor spill takes place when the oil discharge is less than 25 barrels in inland waters or less than 250 barrels on land, offshore or coastal waters that does not pose a threat to the public health or welfare. In the case of the medium, the spill must be 250 barrels or less in the inland water or 250 to 2,500 barrels on land, offshore and coastal water while for the major spill, and the discharge to the inland waters is more than 250 barrels on land, offshore or coastal waters.
The “disaster” refers to any uncontrolled well blowout, pipeline rupture or storage tank failure which poses an imminent threat to the publichealth or welfare.
In Nigeria, 50% of oil spills are due to corrosion; 28% to sabotage; and 21% to oil production. Only 1% is due to engineering drills, inability to effectively control wells, machine failures and inadequate care in loading and unloading oil vessels.
The effect of oil resource extraction on the environment has been very glaring in terms of its negative effect. Oil exploration and exploitation has impacted disastrously on the socio-physical environment of the oil-bearing communities, massively threatening the subsistent peasant economy and the environment and hence, the entire livelihood and basic survival of the people.
Similarly, oil prospecting and exploitation processes pollute underground water. The amount of deprivation and damages the Multinational companies which are into crude oil explorations have caused in most of these communities are numerous.
Notable among them include pollution, environmental degradation leading to low agricultural yield, destruction of aquatic lives, home displacement, etc. therefore it is imperative that we try to control and if possible, totally eliminate the environmentally negative effect of oil pollution.
This is a full technical report on HOW TO CURB THE CONTINUOUS ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION AS A RESULT OF OIL POLLUTION written by a young Environmental Technologist/Scientist, Onwukwe Victory Uzoma from the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Nigeria.
To view the full report on PDF format, click the blue link above or subsequently, CLICK HERE.
Officially Submitted to EnvironmentGo!
Approved by: Head Of Contents
Okpara Francis Chinedu
