Study of the effect of water-soluble fractions of heavy-oil on coastal marine organisms using enclosed ecosystems, mesocosms

Abstract

Mesocosm facilities composed of 4 experimental and 2 reservoir tanks (1.5 m in diameter, 3.0 m in depth and 5 tons in capacity) made of FRP plastics, were constructed in the concrete fish rearing pond in the Fisheries Laboratory, The University of Tokyo. The water-soluble fraction of Rank A heavy residual oil was formed by mixing 500 g of the oil with 10 l of seawater, which was introduced to the 5000 l-capacity tanks. Experimental Run 4 was conducted from May 31 to June 7, 2000. Oil concentrations in the tanks were 4.5 μg/l called LOW, and 13.5 μg/l, called HIGH tank. Bacterial growth rates very quickly accelerated in the HIGH tank just after the loading of oil which corresponded with a high increase of bacterial cells in the same tank after 2 days. Later, bacterial numbers in HIGH tank rapidly decreased, corresponding with the rapid increase of heterotrophic nano-flagellates and virus numbers on the same day. Sediment traps were deployed at the bottom of the experimental tanks, and were periodically retrieved. These samples were observed both under light microscope and epi-fluorescent microscope with UV-excitation. It was observed that the main components of the vertical flux were amorphous suspended matter, mostly originating from dead phytoplankton and living diatoms. It was further observed from the pictures that vertical transport of oil emulsions were probably conducted after adsorption to amorphous suspended matter and living diatoms, and were settling in the sediment traps at the bottom of the tanks. This means that the main force which drives the soluble fraction of oil into bottom sediment would be vertical flux of such amorphous suspended particles and phytoplankton. Further incubation of the samples revealed that the oil emulsions were degraded by the activity of autochtonous bacteria in the sediment in aerobic condition.