Oil Spill Cleanup: Role of Environmental Biotechnology - Applied Environmental Biotechnology: Present Scenario and Future Trends - page 127

9

Oil Spill Cleanup: Role of
Environmental Biotechnology

Sangeeta Chatterjee

Abstract
Oil spills are a major environmental concern in today's world. With the
increase in anthropogenic activities, accidental and incidental spillage of
oil has severely affected the environment, causing both ecological and
economic damage. Mechanical, chemical, and biological approaches have
been utilized as remediation strategies for oil spill cleanup. The time pe-
riod just after oil spillage being the most crucial for oil spill cleanup, it is
imperative that primary and secondary oil spill cleanup response and con-
tingency plans should be in place for mediating immediate intelligent re-
medial action. On the basis of type of oil spilled, weather conditions, and
topography of the surrounding area, careful selection of remedial methods
should be done. Mechanical approaches such as booms, skimmers, and
sorbents are utilized in conjunction with one another for cleanup opera-
tions and are one of the widely used primary responses. Chemical disper-
sants when sprayed on oil slick accelerate the rate of natural dispersion
of medium- and light-weight oils and also increase the availability of oil
for microbial colonization. Close monitoring of economic and ecologi-
cal implications of addition of dispersants has to be done before under-
taking dispersant application since they are known to be detrimental or
ineffective if not applied intelligently. Biostimulation, bioaugmentation,
phytoremediation, and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have all
been tried as remedial strategies for oil spills with varying success. As
biological strategies are safest, we need to redesign them with the help of
genomic and molecular tools to make them more successful.

Keywords
Bioremediation ﾷ Oil spill ﾷ Molecular tools

9.1 Introduction

When we talk of oil spill, liquid petroleum comes
in our mind as oil and the affected area as a sea
or an ocean. However, it should be noted that oils