How they do it in southern California

M a y 1976 • V o l u m e 7 • N u m b e r 5

How They Do It in Southern California EDITORIAL

H o w They D o It in Southern California . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

81

NEWS Oil S p i l l Recovery • A n o t h e r Environmental

Conservation A w a r d • Gulf of Mexico Study • PCB Degradation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Cornish Mackerel • Beaufort Sea Oil Drilling • Turtle Protection to Continue? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

83 84

REPORTS

C a d m i u m in Port Phillip Bay Mussels by

V. W. Talbot, R. J. Magee and M. Hussain . . . . . . . . b y T, J. Dixon and 7". R. Dixon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

84

Olympic AIliance Oil Spillage

86

Transport of Mercury Through a Laboratory Two-level Marine Food Chain by

Kathleen M. Parrish and Roderick A. Carr . . . . . . . . .

90

Trace Metals in Choromytilus meridionalis by

Helen R. Watling and R. J. Watling . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

BOOK

91

NOTES

Books on W a t e r and W a s t e w a t e r • Effects of Chromium in the Canadian Environment • CoIville River Estuary Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

95

CONFERENCES WWF Fourth International Environmental

Congress

............

Pollution Control/Effluent

Water Treatment ............................

COMMERCIAL

PERGAMON

NEWS

.....................

95

and 96

96

In European mythology, the United States is a country of extremes and this is shown nowhere more powerfully than in the response to environmental pollution. In most countries a small section of the public may agitate in a vague way about pollution, mostly in connexion with some local cause c61~bre, but for the most part they are content to let the statutory bodies whose job it is to decide these things get on with the job. Not so in the United States. Citizens of the United States have a healthy mistrust of government and all its works. So far as pollution is concerned, once it had become a public issue and a strong and vociferous lobby had sprung up, no compromise was admitted. Anyone who suggested that to call for the 'abolition' of pollution was a bit simplistic and that the world we live in is really m o r e complicated than this attitudes suggests, was automatically banished to the antienvironmentalist camp. In this climate of opinion, no-one, Federal or State agency, industry or municipality, that had a practical job to carry out could do right. At one stage, this black and white view of pollution control made it almost impossible to get a balanced judgement on any environmental matter. Scientists engaged in pollution research were polarized into "~dustrial' or 'environmentalist' camps and neither trusted the other even on statements of fact, let alone interpretation of them. There was some justification for this mistrust when reputable scientists, who exercise the utmost rigour in their own pure research, could openly state that in pollution research they were justified in exaggerating the 'facts' to increase the impact of their findings. Happily this disreputable phase has passed, perhaps because a good deal of steam has gone out of the more extreme versions of the environmental movement. The world has not come to an end and some coastal areas have actually improved in health after relatively small adjustments of effluent discharges. In other words, it has been amply demonstrated that we do not need to abolish pollution (and it is difficult to say precisely what that means or how it could be brought about), all we need to do

PRESS" Oxford • New York" Paris' Frankfurt

81

Marine Pollution Bulletir

is to control it. It turns out that it is not really very difficult technically nor ruinously expensive to reach a sensible compromise, though it does require a certain determination and strength of mind of government, which is not always there. Southern California probably epitomizes the best or worst (according to taste) of America to most nonAmericans. Where else in the world could Disneyland, Whispering Glades and so many spurious religions be spawned? It has also produced a particularly sensible scheme there for investigating marine pollution in the form of the Southern California Coastal Water Research Project. This effectively sidesteps the confrontation between 'environmentalist' and 'industry' and what is more remarkable, it was started in 1969 when the environmental lobby was growing in strength and was particularly vociferous. The Project was organized to make scientific studies of pollution problems in the coastal waters of Southern California, particularly those arising from the discharge of municipal waste. Initially it was funded for three years by a group of local authorities: the cities of San Diego and Los Angeles and Ventura, Orange and Los Angeles counties. Finance has subsequently been extended for a second three years and the Project has also been able to attract research contracts from the Environmental Protection Agency. Despite this temporary funding and generally hand-to-mouth existence, the Project has long-term objectives and it encompasses nearly 500 km 2 of sea from Point Concepcion to the Mexican border and out to a depth of more than 3000 m. From the outset the main objective of the programme has been to understand the ecology of the Southern California Bight. This is a huge undertaking but the only realistic approach to environmental management. It is remarkable, and says a lot for those engaged in the negotiations in the climate of opinion in 1969 when quick answers were expected, that it should have been possible to convince city and county authorities that it was right to support a project which could not be expected to yield tangible results for several years. Since the Coastal Water Research Project is a local authority agency, it is administered by a commission of local civic leaders and elected officials who are able to reflect public attitudes towards environmental quality. This arrangement was made deliberately to free the Project from partisan pressures but at the same time prevent it having a purely academic orientation removed from the current needs for scientific background information on which to base environmental management policies. The 30 scientists staffing the project are supported by a board of consultants made up of distinguished scientists from five universities. In this way the polarization between 'environmentalist' and 'industry' science has been avoided, to everyone's advantage, the regular meetings between scientists engaged in the project with the commissioners, the board of consultants, technical representatives of the sponsoring agencies and with local environmentalist organizations maintain a steady flow of information between all the interested parties. The urban area around Los Angeles has a human population of over 11 million and over 200 rivers and 82

storm channels and many submarine outfalls discharg~ waste into the sea. In 1973 it was estimated that the daib input was 1000 million gallons of municipal waste water 180 million gallons of industrial discharges and 560( million gallons of returned cooling water. Five larg~ treatment plants account for 94°70 of the municipal waste: and these receive at least primary treatment, but som~ contain substantial amounts of industrial effluent. Mos of this discharge is by pipeline into deep water far fron shore. While this sea area receives the whole gamut ol pollutants--domestic sewage, metals, petroleum h y d r o carbons, chlorinated h y d r o c a r b o n s - - a special featur~ has been the very high level of DDT in municipal wast~ waters until this was controlled at source by prohibiting it: use in the United States three or four years ago. The legac3 of 25 years' intensive use of this persistent insecticide stil remains. Although DDT has not been released into th~ Los Angeles municipal waste water system in larg~ quantities since 1972, it is estimated that sediments on th~ Palos Verdes shelf contain about 200 metric tons of DDq and this is still being transferred into benthic food chains As a result, although DDT levels in intertidal mussels ant benthic crabs, presumably reflecting ambient concentra tions have fallen to well below the Food and Dru~ Administration tolerance of 5 ppm, the edible portions o benthic fish still contain two or three times this level anc the fish livers (not generally eaten) much more. DDT was associated with the dramatic decline of the Californian brown pelican, double-crested cormoranl and the American peregrine falcon in the last 20 yr. The primary cause in these fish-eating birds was thin egg shells which collapsed during incubation. Since the ban on the discharge of DDT, this trend has been reversed anc pelican populations have already recovered. Les., certainly, DDT has been associated with reproductive failure in sea lions through premature birth and aborting Premature pups and their mothers contain high levels ol DDT and PCBs, and also abnormal ratios of b r o m i u m cadmium, mercury and selenium. In these animals although this abnormal load of contaminants may bc implicated, other complications such as high populatior densities and increased human disturbance may also hav~ contributed to this reproductive failure. Another feature of the Californian coast, the kel~ forests, have declined, though here, too, the causes arc complicated. In some areas the decline has been going or for a long time, and along the Palos Verdes peninsula ir the last 60 yr the extent of the kelp beds has been reducec from 6.5 km ~to less than 0.3 kmL Similar reductions hav~ been recorded elsewhere on the Californian coast. Th~ primary cause of this is undoubtedly increased grazing b~ sea urchins and abalones and urchins have increased iz numbers partly through over-harvesting of their natura predators, the sea otter and sheepshead. But wast~ discharges may also have contributed. Sea urchins thriw on organic compounds in the effluents and the suspende~ solids in the water reduce the amount of light reaching th, plants that escape the grazers and limit their growth. Kell beds are important in providing refuge and food for man ~. invertebrates and fish, and the kelp bed decline ha reduced the abundance of fish. Improved treatment o

Volume 7/Number 5/May 1976

waste discharges in reversing this trend and some of the kelp forests are recovering and extending. The Californian marine environment is resilient and dramatic changes follow the control of particularly damaging industrial inputs and reductions in the volume of settlable solids that are discharged. The Coastal Water Research Project monitored the changes following the termination of discharge from one shallow water outfall in Orange County in detail. Within a year the animal communities in the neighbourhood of the outfall closely resembled those at control sites and there was a rapid decrease in the chemical contamination of the sediments. In fact it was concluded that ecological benefits and biological responses to a reduction of certain types of pollution occurred in months or a few years, not decades as had been popularly supposed. The Coastal Water Research Project has produced a number of specialist reports and general annual reports over the years, but it has recently put together its views in a general statement on the environmental effects of the disposal of municipal waste waters in open coastal waters for the National Commission on Water Quality. It says quite bluntly that " i f reasonable precautions are followed, large volumes of municipal waste waters can be discharged into some open coastal waters without undue damage to man's interests or to the ecological balance and productivity of coastal waters." Even more bluntly it adds " t h e public is misinformed about the extent of ocean pollution and the damage to marine life by municipal waste waters, generally believing the situation to be much worse than scientific studies s h o w . " A few years ago these would have been fighting words and certainly taken as indicating that the Project had sold out to the big business interests. As befits an organization which through its administrative commission is kept in touch with public opinion, the public having to pay local taxes as well as express concern about the health of the environment, the Project is suitably cost-conscious. As local residents, the extreme environmentalists have to put their money where their mouth is and it is then, when sound information is propagated, that an air of realism comes over the scene.

Oil Spill Recovery The US Naval Civil Engineering Laboratory at Port Hueneme, California, has developed a new polyurethane foam oil spill recovery system. The system uses over 3 million chips/h of polyurethane foam, which is sprayed onto the oil spill, and then collected, squeezed to remove the oil, and then reused. It is claimed that the system can pick up 50 000 gallons/h of oil, and that it can operate successfully in winds as high as 25 knots. The chips, 1/4 × 3 × 3 in in size, are said to become 90% saturated with oil in six seconds.

Another Environmental Conservation Award The 1975 Edward W. Browning Award for environmental conservation has been presented to Professor Archie F. Carr, jr. of the Department of Zoology at the University of Florida. The award, which is presented by the Smithsonian Institution on behalf of the New York Community Trust, which administers the several Browning Achievement Awards, was given for Professor Carr's endeavours to preserve the green sea turtle, and for his demonstrations of the global migration of marine turtles. They are also ominously said to show promise as experimental animals in the study of problems of navigation.

Gulf of Mexico Study The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) are to jointly conduct a study of the Gulf of Mexico, particularly with regard to the many factors affecting marine life. Information will be collected over a period of 18 months on the coastal waters of Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi, and air and sea data will be used to check whether satellite data are a reliable source of information for the exploitation and management of the Gulf's marine life. The project will use not only ships and oil platforms, but also aircraft and satellites. Commercial fishing fleets in the area are providing some of the funds and equipment, as the results will be of great commercial importance to them. O f particular interest is the availability and distribution of menhaden and thread herrings, which fortunately swim in large schools near the sea surface, and can be monitored by satellite.

PCB Degradation Dr Dickson Liu of the Canada Centre for Inland Waters at Burlington, Ontario, has developed an effective method for biodegrading PCBs, chlorinated organic substances which have a wide variety of uses in the industrial world, and which have become an environmental hazard because of their non-degradability over long periods of time. PCBs were used in paints, inks and copying papers, and their insulating properties led to their use in the electricity industry. But the realization of the hazard they represented led to a voluntary restriction on the part of most manufacturers as to their uses. Dr Liu has developed a new and specific bacterium, a strain of the c o m m o n Pseudomonas, which is capable of breaking down even Arochlor 1254 from concentrations of 300 000 to 19 ppb in one week. Key to the process is ultrasonic treatment of the oily substance so as to achieve a hydrophobic-hydrophylic interface with a substance whose solubility is only 4 ppb. Sodium lignin sulphonate is used as an emulsifier to maintain suspension. The discovery has also led to the revelation of the basic process of aerobic digestion of PCBs. This in turn may 83