The Global Marine Oil Pollution Information Gateway

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[Halfmanhalfamazing]

Crude oil and natural gas seeps naturally out of fissures in the ocean seabed and eroding sedimentary rock. These seeps are natural springs where liquid and gaseous hydrocarbons leak out of the ground (like springs that ooze oil and gas instead of water). Whereas freshwater springs are fed by underground pools of water, oil and gas seeps are fed by natural underground accumulations of oil and natural gas (see USGS illustration). Natural oil seeps are used in identifying potential petroleum reserves.

As pointed out by the National Research Council (NRC) of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, "natural oil seeps contribute the highest amount of oil to the marine environment, accounting for 46 per cent of the annual load to the world's oceans. -- Although they are entirely natural, these seeps significantly alter the nature of nearby marine environments. For this reason, they serve as natural laboratories where researchers can learn how marine organisms adapt over generations of chemical exposure. Seeps illustrate how dramatically animal and plant population levels can change with exposure to ocean petroleum".

NOAA describe a natural seepage area in California: "One of the best-known areas where this happens is Coal Oil Point along the California Coast near Santa Barbara. An estimated 2,000 to 3,000 gallons of crude oil is released naturally from the ocean bottom every day just a few miles offshore from this beach".

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

This is bookmarkworthy. Lots of links enclosed. Some of it just basics, but useful either way.

[Old Texan]

Let me get some of our rigs out there. We can relieve some of the underground pressure, and stop those leaks pretty quick.

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[PIF]

Just to add to the list, the largest man-made oil seep on fresh water comes from outboard engines...

[Son-Joshua]

I wrote about oil naturally seeping from the ocean floor while in college. That was a long time ago. What a great argument the oil industry can use to justify sinking more rigs off the Calif. coast. The environ-mentalist-wackos wouldn’t have any ground to stand on if the oil industry argued that by sinking oil wells they can actually help the environment!

[PIF]

Here's an old story maybe you've heard it:

Down in the Gulf, a bunch of envirowackos hired a boat to go to an oil rig and film a documentary on the horrible fish habitat destruction by the evil oil companies.

The boat they hired was owned by some commercial fishermen who told them at the outset that the best fishing was near the rigs - to loud laughs from the self-assured wackos.

The boat launched a skiff with the wackos who dove off and went down to film the carnage.

When they came back up and climbed back on the skiff, the fishermen began to laugh. The wackos were seemingly in shock - all they could do was sputter about the vast schools of fish swimming around the underwater part of the rig.

They asked the fisherman why they were laughing. The fishermen just laughed harder. It was then that one scrawny wacko wench noticed she had lost her top sometime during the dive...

[ModelBreaker]

If it’s natural, how can the greens call it pollution. That assumes that oil-free sea water is, I think they would use the term, “normative.” I bet theres some stupid species of snail or some bacterium that just loves the oil seepage.

[pointsal]

row boats and canoes... now, that is a solution

[pointsal]

Same situation in the Santa Barbara Channel.... The lefty loons have an agenda...plain and simple-minded.

[SatinDoll]

When I was a small child, 6 to 8 years old, we lived on Oxnard Beach in Ventura County.

Gobs of petroleum would wash up on the beach daily. It wasn’t from passing oceanic tankers. This stuff wasn’t slippery - it was like tar, as in La Brea Tar Pits in down town Los Angeles, only a bit softer.

[Halfmanhalfamazing]

I’m not sure that analysing it logically is the best way to go about it. Does anything about liberalism make sense?

[pointsal]

Yep....still there. Only change are the natural oil deniers.

[FatherofFive]

The environ-mentalist-wackos wouldn’t have any ground to stand on if the oil industry argued that by sinking oil wells they can actually help the environment!

They never let facts get in the way of their opinions and beliefs.

[aruanan]

If it’s natural, how can the greens call it pollution. That assumes that oil-free sea water is, I think they would use the term, “normative.” I bet theres some stupid species of snail or some bacterium that just loves the oil seepage.

Oil wells off the California coast have, in some places, caused natural seeps to slow or stop to the point of altering the environments. I guess the greenies could complain that oil was responsible for harming these environments because it was being taken out elsewhere and was, therefore, endangering the other location by the possibility of a spill. They're just friggin nuts. They don't really care about the environment. They care about their idea of the environment.