Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Booms deployed during fuel transfers in Puget Sound, Washington, to help prevent
any spilled oil from contaminating the ecosystem. (Washington State Department
of Ecology)
teers in oiled wildlife care, and more stringent spill reporting. But Califor-
nia is still not doing a good enough job of coordinating with responding
agencies and mobilizing volunteers, according to BayKeeper, a water qual-
ity watchdog group.
Most critical for the bay in the future is whether clean-up crews can
speed up their response time. Says Chabot, “What you do in the first two
hours after a spill is more important than what you do in the next two
weeks. If you can't contain the oil in San Francisco's tides and currents,
you've lost the war and are suddenly faced with having to use thousands of
volunteers to clean up the coast.”
Though in-the-water spills continue to defy the logistical skills of state
planners, management of polluted runoff across the land has progressed
in the last two decades. Unfortunately, runoff from farm fields, city streets,
and other contaminated surfaces into the bay doesn't come conveniently
out of the end of a pipe, where it can be captured and cleaned up before
discharge.
Tackling such diffuse sources of contamination has required both fed-
eral and local actions. In 1987, the nation's leaders passed an amendment
to the Clean Water Act requiring local municipalities to come up with
storm-water management plans. Suddenly cities and counties everywhere
were scrambling for ways to stem the flow of pesticides, gasoline, fertiliz-
