[Coral-List] Corexit 9500 and corals
vassil zlatarski
vzlatarski at yahoo.com
Thu May 20 09:32:17 EDT 2010
Dear Coral-Listers,
The effect of the oil dispersant Corexit is ominously hinted by its name (coral+exit).
Do we have the necessary information about the effect of all used dispersants to human body, especially to divers, working in waters treated with oil dispersants?
Cheers,
Vassil
131 Fales Rd., Bristol, RI 02809, USA; tel.: +1-401-254-5121
--- On Thu, 5/20/10, Carys Mitchelmore <mitchelm at umces.edu> wrote:
From: Carys Mitchelmore <mitchelm at umces.edu>
Subject: Re: [Coral-List] Corexit 9500 and corals
To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
Date: Thursday, May 20, 2010, 12:30 AM
Hi,
I havn't been following very many of the threads lately. But I see
some people are asking about dispersant toxicity to corals. I would be
happy to provide my 2 pennies worth on dispersants to corals generally
(I co-wrote the NRC dispersant effect book in 2005 and wrote the
section on corals!).
In addition I carried out a 2 year study (yet to be published although
the interim reports are available from the funding agency; CRRC UNH)
specifically on Corexit 9500 on the soft coral Xenia. Bottom line is
at levels that may be environmentally relevant they were acutely
toxic, they stopped pulsing (nearly instantly), they lost algae,
ulcerated (not sure in which order) and with time (or higher doses)
simply dissolved. Short-time low dose exposures showed delayed effects
and much reduced growth after one month in recovery. Dispersed oil was
worse (affected by the dissolved and droplet phases).
I'd be happy to help with any questions. I would also like to ask
about the hydrous oxide stated to be in the dispersant? How did you
find this information?
Best wishes,
Carys
--
Carys Mitchelmore
Associate Professor
University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science
Chesapeake Biological Laboratory
PO Box 38
(1 Williams Street)
Solomons
MD 20688
USA
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