Up-stream operation at the nature conservation area: an environmental approach

Abstract

Abstract Up-stream oil industry, especially on-shore exploitation, is a land - related activity, it means that all of it's activities, -unavoidably-, affects the existing land-use system as much as the environmental quality in the surrounding area. In this point of view, it seems that the existence of a producing oil field (with all of its infra-structures) inside any environmental-protected area such as a National Park is rather contradictory, since National Park is a natural conservation area with natural ecosystem, and which is managed through a zoning system for research, science, education, and ecotourism purposes, it means only very limited, -if not none-, land-use and environmental changes, -especially for industrial purposes-, is allowed. Therefore, the existence of Pertamina EP Sangatta operation in the heart of Kutei National Park for almost 22 years is quite interesting, how far this up-stream oil activity has been affecting the environmental and ecological qualities of the park ? and what aspects of the park's environment are most affected by the existence of the oil industry ? those are questions that have triggered us to conduct the study. The demographically impact to the surrounding environment caused by the up-stream oil activities is rarely paid enough attention before, since it is usually considered as a positive side impact to the community development. For an environmental protected area such as Sangatta, things are quite different, it is found that the biggest environmental impact caused by the up-stream activities is coming through the demographical impact rather than through the decreasing of physical parameters such as water, soil or air qualities. From sangatta's experience the physical impacts are found to be easier to handle than the demographical impacts, therefore the pressures suffered by the national park's ecosystem is mainly caused by the demographical impacts.