{"id":10764,"date":"2015-02-13T00:06:01","date_gmt":"2015-02-13T08:06:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=10764"},"modified":"2015-02-12T20:56:17","modified_gmt":"2015-02-13T04:56:17","slug":"cleaning-up-oil-in-arava","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2015\/02\/13\/cleaning-up-oil-in-arava\/","title":{"rendered":"Cleaning up oil in Arava"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tran-Israel oil pipeline spill near the Evrona Nature Reserve in the Arava Desert has harmed flora and fauna.\u00a0<\/strong>(photo by Menachem Zalutzki via Israel Ministry of Environmental Protection)<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

On Dec. 3, 2014, a fractured pipe created the biggest oil spill in Israel\u2019s history, releasing some five million litres of crude oil far into the Arava Desert. In the days that followed, experts from around the world were contacted to clean it up, including from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.<\/div>\n
\"photo<\/a>
Hebrew University\u2019s Dr. Yoel Sasson (pictured here) and his colleague Dr. Uri Stoin have developed a technology that can treat waste caused by any organic compound, including oil. (photo from Yoel Sasson)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Dr. Yoel Sasson, a professor at Hebrew University\u2019s Casali Institute of Applied Chemistry, specializes in environmental catalysis, and he and student Dr. Uri Stoin have developed a soil decontamination process that can treat waste caused by any organic compound, including oil.<\/p>\n

According to Sasson, spills are common in countries where oil is being moved by pipes and, considering how old the pipe is in Israel, it was just a matter of time that such a leak would occur, he said.<\/p>\n

Exacerbating the situation was that it took hours for the break to even be detected. \u201cIt\u2019s horrible, because the oil is simply killing everything,\u201d said Sasson. \u201cAll the farmland, the flora and fauna \u2026 nothing is left alive once the oil is there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Ministry of the Environment is now in charge of cleaning up the spill and they will have to select the contractor to do the job. According to Sasson, there are several companies that have placed bids, one of which is Man Oil Group, the Swiss company licensed to commercialize this technology developed at HU.<\/p>\n

A superoxide, the technology is a variation of an oxygen molecule. \u201cUnlike the oxygen molecule, which is relatively inert, superoxide is a very aggressive, free agent,\u201d explained Sasson. \u201cAnd it actually oxidizes every organic material.\u201d<\/p>\n

It works by breaking down the organic (carbon-based) matter into water and CO2<\/sub>, and the organic material very rapidly oxidizes, he explained. \u201cNormally, within 10 minutes, oil simply disappears … the soil re-mineralizes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the oil is killing everything, when you apply the agent, you do not revive the plants, but you take the soil back to its virgin condition. And then, with time, nature will come back. We estimate six to 12 months, [then] it comes 100 percent back to life.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CO2<\/sub> released in the process can also be neutralized and turned into sodium carbonate, which is soluble with water. With rain, it will be washed away.<\/p>\n

Typically, technologies of this kind are termed as either \u201cbiological\u201d or \u201cchemical.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biological means bacteria is applied (i.e. eating or digesting the oil), a technique that has been used for many years. While this does work, it has some drawbacks. \u201cIt\u2019s very slow,\u201d said Sasson. \u201cIt would take a half a year to a year to start to see something developing. And it requires excavating the soil, digging it out, so the bacteria will have some air. They are aerobic material.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur method is chemical,\u201d he continued, \u201cwhich means it\u2019s fast, a matter of minutes, actually.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sasson estimated that the oil did not seep deeply into the Arava soil, approximately 10 or 20 centimetres maximum. Regardless, he said, the agent is not limited to any particular depth. It can be drilled into the soil and the whole treatment can take place underground.<\/p>\n

\"photo<\/a>
A cormorant that fell victim to the oil spill. (photo by Menachem Zalutzki via Israel Ministry of Environmental Protection)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Man Oil Group has been cleaning up oil spills with superoxide in Siberia, Africa and in the Gulf States, and is now looking at the soil in the Arava. The areas that it cleaned in Siberia were larger than that of the Arava spill, and the company has also conducted a successful test cleaning a stretch of a Swiss railway track. The track base, which is comprised of limestone, was restored to its white state, eliminating years of oil drips that were becoming an environmental problem, killing everything around it. Man Oil also conducted a test on the Arava spill site, with positive results.<\/p>\n

According to Sasson, oil-caused damage is a worldwide problem that is very serious. But he is focused on cleaning up other contaminated areas as well, one of which is the result of military industries that have left organic pollution underground in Jerusalem.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis particular case involves mainly those from a group of materials called \u2018organic chlorine compounds,\u2019\u201d said Sasson. \u201cThese types of compounds, nature doesn\u2019t recognize, and they are polluting underground water. It\u2019s really a disaster.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we started, we worked on the destruction of these materials. This was very successful. But, we noticed it takes a lot of time with the authorities to get permission. It takes many years to start such a cleanup. Meanwhile, the oil cleanup is faster and is needed in many more places.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another application focus for Sasson is sewage sludge, a by-product of bacteria used to digest sewage waste being disposed of into the environment, causing contamination.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou feed bacteria your waste,\u201d said Sasson. \u201cThey convert the waste into CO2<\/sub> and water again but, at the same time, they are growing. And, normally, for one kilogram of waste, you will build up a weight of about 450 grams of bacteria (about 50 percent) and then you create a new waste. So, instead of having one kilogram of waste, now you have half a kilogram. But you\u2019re still stuck with it, because there\u2019s nothing to do with the bacteria. So, what we are trying to do is really decompose this waste using our agent. So far, initial experiments show it is working but, of course, we have to substantiate it and develop it into larger scale.\u201d<\/p>\n

At press time, Sasson was still waiting to hear from the Ministry of the Environment if the process they developed will be chosen to clean up the\u00a0Arava spill.<\/p>\n

\u00a0***<\/p>\n

The Evrona Nature Reserve rehabilitation team began its work on Jan. 12, 2015, with a meeting headed by Deputy Environmental Protection Minister Ofir Akunis. Air quality tests found that there has been a 90 percent reduction of pollution in Evrona, one of the sites most harmed by the December 2014 oil spill in Israel\u2019s southern Arava region. Some 30 companies are now vying to be selected to decontaminate the soil that was contaminated by the oil spill. The reserve, noted Akunis, will open once there is no fear that the health of visitors could be affected. The hope is that this will be in the near future.<\/p>\n

\u2013 Israel Ministry of Environmental Protection (sviva.gov.il<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Tran-Israel oil pipeline spill near the Evrona Nature Reserve in the Arava Desert has harmed flora and fauna.\u00a0(photo by Menachem Zalutzki via Israel Ministry of Environmental Protection) On Dec. 3, 2014, a fractured pipe created the biggest oil spill in Israel\u2019s history, releasing some five million litres of crude oil far into the Arava […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10738,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4329],"tags":[3150,3153,3151,1834,2842,3154,3152],"class_list":["post-10764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israel","tag-arava","tag-casali-institute","tag-evrona","tag-hebrew-university","tag-oil-spill","tag-superoxide","tag-yoel-sasson"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}