© Katie Chalmers-Brooks / University of Manitoba
Oil spill response
Searching for ways to address disasters in the Arctic
Global warming is melting sea ice and enabling increased ship traffic in the Arctic, raising the risk of oil spills. As ERIC COLLINS and GARY STERN explain, the good news is that a state-of-the-art Arctic research facility is helping researchers and communities understand the risks.
Some four decades ago, 65 kilometres by sea from the community of Mittimatalik in Nunavut, Canada, a group of government and industry researchers intentionally dumped 30 tons of crude oil into a sandy lagoon. They were planning to study its effects on the Arctic marine ecosystem.
It was the 1980s, and the simulated oil spill was part of the Baffin Island Oil Spill (BIOS) project. Researchers discovered that while much of the oil dissipated naturally, more than a third remained on beaches two years later. Periodic visits over the following decades revealed that, in most cases, harmful oil components still exceeded baseline levels.
Although the BIOS project provided valuable insights into the long-term effects of oil spills, conducting such studies is no longer ethically or politically feasible. But as our warming climate causes Arctic sea ice to melt, making room for ever more ships, the need to find ways to prevent and mitigate the effects of an oil spill in the Arctic has never been more critical.
Growth in shipping
Fast forward to 2024: It’s a sunny summer day on the Churchill River estuary when an oceanographer hauls up a net full of algae, surprised at the rich haul. The net contains mostly single-celled diatoms, microscopic algae that are crucial for photosynthesis. These jewel-like microbes are food for zooplankton (tiny animals), which are in turn eaten by fish, eventually ending up in the bellies of whales (and people).
Moments later, a group of belugas swim under the boat while locals and tourists alike marvel at how curious and interactive they are.
Despite nearly a century of investment in the only deep-water port in the Canadian Arctic (and the ageing rail line that serves it), Churchill’s economy is still driven mainly by tourism—the town is known as the “polar bear capital of the world.”
But a new Indigenous-owned project, NeeStaNan, is poised to change this reliance. The project would export potash and petroleum products from the prairie provinces via rail and ship through Hudson Bay, which is home to more than a third of the world’s belugas.
Regardless of whether this particular plan goes ahead, one thing is clear: Arctic shipping is set to grow. This raises concerns about oil spills and other threats to this fragile ecosystem.
© ARLIS Reference, CC BY-SA 2.0 via Flickr.com
Sea otter covered in oil from the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska.
A new facility to study oil spills
When oil spills into water, its composition naturally changes over time through a process called weathering, or natural attenuation. Evaporation, sunlight, aggregation, sinking and microbial activity alter the oil’s physical, chemical and biological properties, including its toxicity. But the sea ice that is present for much of the year in Hudson Bay makes this process unpredictable—and human interventions, such as the use of chemical dispersants, add complexity.
With the BIOS project long gone, Canada has invested millions in the Churchill Marine Observatory (CMO), a state-of-the-art facility in the province of Manitoba designed to fill the gap. Located near hundreds of belugas (and a playful polar bear), the CMO was built to safely study processes to address oil spills. Opened in August 2024, it features tanks the size of swimming pools that can be filled with water from the Churchill River estuary to enable Arctic oil spill response experiments that were previously impossible.
The first experiments will take place in November 2024, co-led by us and funded by Genome Canada and the University of Manitoba as part of the GENICE II study. The plan is to study how microbes break down oil in sub-zero temperatures. Researchers have already shown that microbes are nature’s first responders. For example, microbes cleaned up far more oil during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico than human efforts did. By examining oil-degrading microbes in Hudson Bay and measuring their response in different spill scenarios, we aim to better understand the risks and limitations of current Arctic spill response plans—which, despite local concerns, remain unknown.
The plan is to study how microbes break down oil in sub-zero temperatures.
– Eric Collins & Gary Stern, University of Manitoba
Oceanographer CJ Mundy (University of Manitoba) examines algae near the Churchill Marine Observatory. Photo credit: © Katie Chalmers-Brooks / University of Manitoba
Taking a closer look at microbes
The Hamlet of Chesterfield Inlet’s location on the west coast of Hudson Bay puts it at high risk of spills from ships navigating the fast-flowing, mostly uncharted Chesterfield Narrows, which run 300 kilometres to Baker Lake and the Meadowbank Gold Mine beyond. Since 2007, there have been four reports of vessel groundings in the area. A sea can full of Coast Guard equipment is stationed nearby, but local officials have not been trained to use it in the event of a spill.
To safeguard the ecosystem, we are collaborating with hunters’ and trappers’ organizations (such as the Aqigiq HTO in Chesterfield Inlet) and Indigenous Guardians Programs in the region to test genomics tools for monitoring environmental disturbances like oil spills. New technologies, like MinION—the harmonica-sized DNA sequencer from Oxford Nanopore Technologies—will enable real-time microbial monitoring by and for communities. Microbial diversity, a key biomarker of environmental health, will inform research that supports Inuit self-determination and the management of marine environments, including the creation of a marine protected area in the Southampton Island area of interest (at the opening of Hudson Bay).
Microbes play vital roles in the marine ecosystem, from supporting the food web to cleaning up oil spills. Monitoring microbial diversity will help researchers and Indigenous communities better understand the rapid environmental changes caused by global warming and better predict and prevent the potential impacts of oil spills on the Arctic marine environment.
By Eric Collins
Assistant professor & Canada Research Chair, Arctic Marine Microbial Ecosystem Services
TwitterERIC COLLINS is an assistant professor at the Centre for Earth Observation Sciences at the University of Manitoba, Canada. He is also the Canada Research Chair in Arctic Marine Microbial Ecosystem Services.
By Gary Stern
Associate professor & director, Petroleum EnvironmenTal Research Laboratory (PETRL)
TwitterGARY STERN is an associate professor at the Centre for Earth Observation Sciences at the University of Manitoba, Canada. He is also the director of the Petroleum EnvironmenTal Research Laboratory (PETRL).
