Degraded oil tested for dispersant

Degraded oil collected in the Mississippi Sound tested positive for several of the main ingredients in Corexit, the dispersant used to break up oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. That's according to scientists working for a New Orleans-based lawyer. The oil was collected a mile north of Horn Island Aug. 9. (Source: Mobile Press-Register, 08/31/10) Earlier this month, Dauphin Island Sea Lab Director George Crozier and Robert Shipp, chairman of the University of South Alabama's Marine Sciences Department, said at a lecture that using dispersants to combat the spill will cause problems in the northern Gulf of Mexico for years to come, but not because the chemicals used to break up the crude pose any health risk. They said the problem is that by suspending bits of oil in the water column, generations of filter-feeding organisms could be lost in portions of the northern Gulf. (Source: Mobile Press-Register, 08/28/10)