Shoreline ecology program for Prince William Sound, Alaska, following the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Part 1: Study design and methods

Conference · Sun Dec 31 04:00:00 EST 1995

OSTI ID:382760

Page, D S; Gilfillan, E S ^[1]; Boehm, P D ^[2]; Harner, E J ^[3]

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1. Bowdoin Coll., Brunswick, ME (United States)
2. Arthur D. Little, Inc., Cambridge, MA (United States)
3. West Virginia Univ., Morgantown, WV (United States)

This paper describes the design and analysis of a large field and laboratory program to assess shoreline recovery in Prince William Sound following the Exxon Valdez oil spill. The study was designed so that results could be generalized area-wide (biology, chemistry) or habitat-wide (toxicology) and projected forward in time (chemistry). It made use of the sediment quality triad approach, combining biological, chemical, and toxicological measurements to assess shoreline recovery. Key aspects of the study include the following: coordinated field sampling for chemical, toxicological, and biological studies; stratified random sampling (SRS) as a basis for spatial generalization; periodic sampling to assess trends, including sites with worst-case conditions; analysis of oil-spill effects on hundreds of species; statistical methods based on normal and non-normal theory, consistent with the structure of the data, including generalized linear models and multivariate correspondence analysis. 45 refs., 5 figs., 4 tabs.

• OSTI ID: 382760
• Report Number(s): CONF-930442--; ISBN 0-8031-1896-1
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

02 PETROLEUM
56 BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE
APPLIED STUDIES
BENCH-SCALE EXPERIMENTS
CHEMICAL ANALYSIS
FIELD TESTS
GULF OF ALASKA
HYDROCARBONS
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
OIL SPILLS
REMEDIAL ACTION
REMOVAL
SHORES
TOXICITY
WATER POLLUTION