353
with field work. While there are some promising new technologies that have the
potential to transform and facilitate research in the deep sea, including consistent
advances in remotely operated technologies and advanced biochemical techniques
such as eDNA to document the presence of species, the most direct way to fill this
gap in knowledge is continued funding for basic marine scientific research. As
alluded to above, the NRDA framework necessarily limited the types of research the
Trustees could, and were willing to, fund. The public and litigious setting dictated
that only “tried and true” approaches, for the most part, were supported.
Despite the extensive funding that was committed for deep-sea research as a
result of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, one of the key data gaps that remained
elusive was an understanding of what, if any, were the larger ecosystem-level
effects. The NRDA approach taken is by its very nature deconstructive, whereby
numerous component parts of the ecosystem were systematically examined with the
goal of identifying and measuring concrete impacts. The Trustees were ultimately
successful in documenting what became a laundry list of harms to individual
resources. Everywhere we looked where oil was present in substantial quantity, we
found change. Yet understanding the broader impacts of those changes was a challenge. While there were some early attempts to formulate and parameterize
ecosystem- level models, this approach was ultimately abandoned. But questions of
whether or not the Trustees (and the myriad other researchers working in the Gulf
of Mexico) adequately captured the impacts of the spill remain. It is possible, and
some may claim, that there were no ecosystem-level impacts. But it is more likely,
given the interconnectedness of ecosystems, that we have simply failed to measure
them. In particular, given the role of the deep ocean in providing ecological services
related to energetic recycling, one is left to wonder how such a large input of organic
material did not cause a measurable perturbation. As alluded to above, though,
many researchers have also been surprised by the resiliency of the Gulf of Mexico
and its component natural resources. Given the slow growth of many deep-sea
organisms, however, it may be that continued research over time will yield additional information related to the chronic effects of the spill.
21.4 Conclusion
The release of oil (and associated response actions, including but not limited to the
use of dispersant at depth) presented a unique threat to the deep-sea ecosystem. It
was apparent from investigations following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the
largest deep-sea spill to date, that despite natural seepage of oil in the Gulf of
Mexico, such a spill had devastating effects on deep-sea natural resources. These
include slow-growing and long-lived corals at various depths, the vast swathes of
sediment and associated infauna and megafauna, as well as mobile fauna that reside
in these habitats. Post-spill research not only identified unexpected pathways for
resource exposure—in particular marine snow as a vector for delivery of
21 Overview of Ecological Impacts of Deep Spills: Deepwater Horizon
with field work. While there are some promising new technologies that have the
potential to transform and facilitate research in the deep sea, including consistent
advances in remotely operated technologies and advanced biochemical techniques
such as eDNA to document the presence of species, the most direct way to fill this
gap in knowledge is continued funding for basic marine scientific research. As
alluded to above, the NRDA framework necessarily limited the types of research the
Trustees could, and were willing to, fund. The public and litigious setting dictated
that only “tried and true” approaches, for the most part, were supported.
Despite the extensive funding that was committed for deep-sea research as a
result of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, one of the key data gaps that remained
elusive was an understanding of what, if any, were the larger ecosystem-level
effects. The NRDA approach taken is by its very nature deconstructive, whereby
numerous component parts of the ecosystem were systematically examined with the
goal of identifying and measuring concrete impacts. The Trustees were ultimately
successful in documenting what became a laundry list of harms to individual
resources. Everywhere we looked where oil was present in substantial quantity, we
found change. Yet understanding the broader impacts of those changes was a challenge. While there were some early attempts to formulate and parameterize
ecosystem- level models, this approach was ultimately abandoned. But questions of
whether or not the Trustees (and the myriad other researchers working in the Gulf
of Mexico) adequately captured the impacts of the spill remain. It is possible, and
some may claim, that there were no ecosystem-level impacts. But it is more likely,
given the interconnectedness of ecosystems, that we have simply failed to measure
them. In particular, given the role of the deep ocean in providing ecological services
related to energetic recycling, one is left to wonder how such a large input of organic
material did not cause a measurable perturbation. As alluded to above, though,
many researchers have also been surprised by the resiliency of the Gulf of Mexico
and its component natural resources. Given the slow growth of many deep-sea
organisms, however, it may be that continued research over time will yield additional information related to the chronic effects of the spill.
21.4 Conclusion
The release of oil (and associated response actions, including but not limited to the
use of dispersant at depth) presented a unique threat to the deep-sea ecosystem. It
was apparent from investigations following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the
largest deep-sea spill to date, that despite natural seepage of oil in the Gulf of
Mexico, such a spill had devastating effects on deep-sea natural resources. These
include slow-growing and long-lived corals at various depths, the vast swathes of
sediment and associated infauna and megafauna, as well as mobile fauna that reside
in these habitats. Post-spill research not only identified unexpected pathways for
resource exposure—in particular marine snow as a vector for delivery of
21 Overview of Ecological Impacts of Deep Spills: Deepwater Horizon