Efficacy of commercial inocula in enhancing biodegradation of weathered crude oil contaminating a Prince William sound beach

Technical Report · Wed Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1992

OSTI ID:5752996

Venosa, A D; Haines, J R; Allen, D M

In a laboratory study evaluating the effectiveness of 10 commercial products in stimulating enhanced biodegradation of Alaska North Slope crude oil, two of the products provided significantly greater alkane degradation in closed flasks than indigenous Alaskan bacterial populations supplied only with excess nutrients. These two products, which were microbial in nature, were then taken to a Prince William Sound beach to determine if similar enhancements were achievable in the field. A randomized complete block experiment was designed in which four small plots consisting of a no-nutrient control, a mineral nutrient plot, and two plots receiving mineral nutrients plus the two products were laid out in random order on a beach in Prince William Sound that had been contaminated 16 months earlier from the Exxon Valdez spill. These four plots comprised a 'block' of treatments, each block being replicated four times on the same beach. Triplicate samples of beach sediment were collected at four time intervals and analyzed for oil residue weight and alkane hydrocarbon profile changes. The results indicated no significant differences among the four treatments in the 27-day time period of the experiment.

• Research Organization: Environmental Protection Agency, Cincinnati, OH (United States). Risk Reduction Engineering Lab.
• OSTI ID: 5752996
• Report Number(s): PB-94-101714/XAB; EPA-600/J-93/420
• Resource Relation: Other Information: Pub. in Jnl. of Industrial Microbiology, Vol. 10, 1-11(1992). See also PB--94-101607
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

02 PETROLEUM
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
OIL SPILLS
BIODEGRADATION
ALASKA
BACTERIA
BIOCONVERSION
COMMERCIAL SECTOR
CONTAMINATION
FERTILIZERS
INOCULATION
MICROORGANISMS
NUTRIENTS
OPTIMAL CONTROL
PETROLEUM
PRUDHOE BAY
RANDOMNESS
REMEDIAL ACTION
SAMPLING
SEDIMENTS
STATISTICAL DATA
WATER POLLUTION
ARCTIC OCEAN
BAYS
BEAUFORT SEA
CHEMICAL REACTIONS
COASTAL WATERS
CONTROL
DATA
DECOMPOSITION
DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
ENERGY SOURCES
FOSSIL FUELS
FUELS
INFORMATION
NORTH AMERICA
NUMERICAL DATA
POLLUTION
SEAS
SURFACE WATERS
USA
020900* - Petroleum- Environmental Aspects
540250 - Environment
Terrestrial- Site Resource & Use Studies- (1990-)
540350 - Environment
Aquatic- Site Resource & Use Studies- (1990-)
550700 - Microbiology