Just When The World Starts Making Some Progress..

Militia's in the countries of Africa hand over their captive child soldiers, Ecuador gives its' native species inalienable rights, President Obama takes the first steps toward a more energy efficient planet and then oil spills and kills hundreds of birds on Russia's shore.
The thing about this story is that the people responsible are not stepping up to take the necessary actions to rehabilitate the infected environment. The spill, in Aniva Bay on the south side of Sakhalin, Russia, took place six kilometers from the building of a major plant.
The Sakhalin II LNG plant {LNG stands for Liquefied Natural Gas} is, to be, the first of its kind in Russia. It will receive over an estimated 1,200 million barrels of crude oil and 500 billion cubic meters of natural gas, treat it and then send it through a process, a highly complex process, to liquefy natural gas. Sakhalin II is of vital importance to Russia's present energy policy. A policy created in 2000 with a goal they hope to reach by 2020. The plan goes as follows: an increase in energy efficiency, reducing the impact on the global environment, sustainable energy development and technological development, as well as improved effectiveness and competitiveness.
Wind direction had linked the spill to an oil tanker on route to the LNG plant. However, a spokesperson for Sakhalin II Energy project, said that, "There had not been a single incident connected with the spill of oil products into the Aniva Bay."
Shareholders for the plant include Shell (of course), Mitsui and the Mitsubishi Corporation.
One other thing with to story is this: the oil spill is immobilizing sea birds and making them very intising for the Steller's Sea Eagle. And besides being a gorgeous creature, the eagle is the islands leading wildlife attraction and will definitely choke and die if it eats the oil slicked prey.
Not leaving it up to large, irresponsible companies, the citizens have taken control to clean up their environment. "..The local population are trying to rescue the birds that are still alive and wash them," Vladimir Bardin, the head of the Sakhalin diving centre, has said.
Go HERE {to the WWF site} to read more about the Stellar's Sea Eagle and see what an amazing bird it is and how devastating it would be to loose them.
To Read more about Russia's Energy Policy Go HERE.

Slow Korea Cleans Up Their Oil Clobbered Coast

As most of you already know, South Korea suffered a major environmental catastrophe on Friday when an oil tanker, carrying over 10.5 tons of oil, was struck by a runaway sea barge.
But that's only the beginning of this tale.
Citizens and neighboring countries accuse South Korea for not acting fast enough to deal with the accident. On the other hand, South Korea states that seasonal winds were to blame for the reaction time to put the booms up and that those same winds pushed the oil faster towards the coastline.
Either way, South Korea now has to deal with tons and tons of oil in their waters. Lee Jae-Hak of the Korea Ocean Research and Development Institute, states that it will take upwards to a year to completely remove the oil from the water and the land surface, "..but it will take four or five years to remove chemicals and other pollutants."

TurmOil

The seas have been seriously polluted this past week in two separate incidences on opposite ends of the world.
Due to an unusual amount of fog on the morning of November 7th, a Cosco Busan oil tanker struck a tower of the Bay Bridge in San Francisco, CA. The collision caused the tanker to suffer a long gash from the bow to the stern, releasing 58,000 gallons of fuel oil into the ocean.
"This is a major spill," said Wil Bruhns, a division chief at the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board. "It certainly has the potential to cause damage to birds, fish and other wildlife."
Oil spill clean-ups have continued to advance with every passing crisis; if rescuers can get to it in time. The Coast Guard initially called the spill minor but later realized the amount of fuel was greater than first thought. Environmentalists faulted the U.S. Coast Guard for not notifying organizational clean-up crews fast enough and for being slow to put inflatable booms on the water's surface to prevent oil from spreading. While San Francisco is hard at work cleaning wildlife and 58,000 gallons of fuel out of the water, Russia is scrambling to recover from a catastrophic accident.
A severe storm broke a small Russian oil tanker in two off the Ukrainian port of Kerch on Sunday, spilling up to 2,000 tons of fuel oil into the ocean. Russia's Environmental Agency's major concern right now is that of the migratory birds since the spill happened at the center of a migration route from central Siberia into the Black Sea of the seabirds, the red-throated and black-throated Siberian divers and now is the peak of their migration. The same area is also home to porpoises not to mention the countless fish.
"This problem may take a few years to solve. Fuel oil is a heavy substance and it is now sinking to the seabed," Oleg Mitvol, deputy head of Russia's environment agency Rosprirodnadzor told state-run Vesti-24 television channel.
"This is a very serious environmental disaster." Source.