Bioremediation to Save the Coast

Substitute chemicals

Bioremediation techniques to deal with oil pollution are not new. History records bioremediation research has begun since the 40s and has been used in the United States since the 80s. Even so, until now its use has not been able to completely shift the chemicals as in the tragedy of the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010.

Deepwater Horizon tragedy

The event also called the Deepwater Horizon tragedy, made oil flow for 87 days or an estimated 4.9 million barrel. To overcome the widespread oil spill in the Mississippi River Delta, chemicals are used.

The material was sprayed using airplanes to the oil spill area. The chemical then works as a dispersion or breaks down oil molecules into smaller molecules and then takes them to sink into deeper bodies of water. Chemical dispersion techniques that generally give results in quick time.

However, this method actually does not really clean up oil contamination. So the adverse environmental effects can still occur on various marine life including fish to coral. Yeti revealed that they were making innovations so that natural bacteria could be used as dispersing agents. Innovation is important because Indonesia is also vulnerable to the tragedy of oil spills.

Indonesia is one of the five main sea transportation routes and has many oil wells. Oil spilled due to the ship going back and forth will flow to the coastal area.

Therefore, the coast is the environment most affected by oil contamination. Meanwhile, in the US, researchers continue to develop bioremediation techniques while paying attention to the balance of diversity of bacteria in the environment.

"It is important to maintain a healthy and diverse bacterial community, and we must be careful to ensure that our response to oil contamination does not interfere with the response that occurs naturally, even with the sustainability of the surrounding environment," explained a microbiologist from the University of Texas, Brett Baker, as reported by SciencqdaiLv.com.

Baker, who worked with graduate researcher Nina Dombrowski, explained that the bacterial community was actually present at the site of the oil spill and could be abundant so as to reduce existing oil compounds. There are two compounds in the oil, namely alkanes that tend to be easily broken down and aromatic hydrocarbons, which are difficult to get rid of. Bacteria can be relied upon to break down the two compounds.

Media Indonesia, Page-16, Saturday, Oct 15, 2016.