Bird covered in oil from a spill on Sakhalin Island

One of our worst nightmares came true yesterday, when a cargo ship spilled 58,000 gallons of bunker fuel into San FranciscoBay.  The ship was traveling out of San FranciscoBay in heavy fog when it hit the BayBridge.

I commute into work on the ferry, so I was on the look-out for oil and oil spill response this morning.  Standing out on the front deck of the ferry, I smelled the oil before I saw it; there’s certainly a strong smell of oil hanging in the air.  I saw ribbons of oil, many with dark globules of floating oil, fromRichardsonBay in Sausalito to the FerryBuilding in San Francisco.  Some areas were harder hit than others – I particularly saw a lot of oil near Alcatraz and Fisherman’s Wharf, two of San Francisco’s biggest tourist attractions.  

According to news reports, beaches to the north of Golden GateBridge on the Pacific have been the worst hit so far – apparently the tide and the currents pushed the oil that direction.

This article starts to talk about some of the effects of the oil spill:  http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/08/MND7T870A.DTL  We’re just starting to see a lot of birds come back into the Bay for the winter, including cormorants, grebes, and pelicans, all of which I saw this morning from the ferry. We can only hope and pray that the effects on fisheries and birds are not serious.

To my surprise, I did not see any oil skimmers or other oil spill response equipment working in the Bay this morning.  I did see one Coast Guard helicopter, hopefully looking for oil sheens.  But I was surprised at the lack of oil spill response boats, especially since the weather is pretty good right now and the Bay is calm – as good conditions as you can get for cleaning up spilled oil.

According to this article, officials are “meeting” about how to respond:  http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/08/BAD8T8PLU.DTL  On the radio this morning, one official said proudly that 13 agencies were involved in the response.  I have a sinking feeling that it’s going to take a lot of meetings to get everyone on the same page before we see oil spill response vessels out on the Bay!

This is why we talk about the need for good oil spill response plans BEFORE accidents like this happen!  Once they happen, time is of the essence to clean up whatever is possible.  This is why we are so worried about the potential for oil spills in places like SakhalinIsland and Alaska – where the biological resources or so rich, yet we don’t have the cleanup technologies to prevent the damage from a major oil spill when it happens.  And as this oil spill shows, even with some of the best oil spill prevention measures, accidents do happen.  It’s not a question of if, but a question of when.

Of course, once the oil is in the water, it’s pretty much too late.  At best it will be possible to clean up a tiny fraction of the oil spilled, even in the best conditions.  I’m sure we’ll be spending a lot of time figuring out who’s guilty.  From the ferry, I could see the guilty cargo ship, with Hanjin spelled in large letters on the side.  But in this article (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/08/BAH3T81G7.DTL), the finger-pointing for responsibility is already starting:  “The ship is owned by a Greek firm that is chartering the vessel to Hanjin Shipping Co. Ltd. of Seoul. Hanjin spokeswoman Sonya Cho said the ship ‘is operated by the Greek owner and his crew’ and that Hanjin ‘has no responsibility in any matter concerning this accident.’”  Hmmmm, sounds like Exxon to me!  Nice way to start avoiding responsibility.

I arrived before dawn in Wuhu, Anhui. The city, although the most prosperous in Anhui, isn’t serviced by an airport, so I made the 1000km trip from Hubei Province by overnight train. 

Anhui Province, in eastern China, is the region where Pacific Environment’s partner Green Anhui works. They’re programs stretch from the north, where they work on the Huai River, to the south, where they’ve just launched a program on environmental health from their new Wuhu office. 

I’m here, not only to meet with Green Anhui, but to facilitate a water pollution network meeting. Green Anhui is one of a dozen groups that Pacific Environment works with to address water pollution in China. This is the third time we’ve brought together this network for two days of sharing ideas, developing strategies and building stronger partnerships. We’ve worked ahead of time with Green Anhui to develop an agenda and invite our partners; all told, over 20 participants have traveled from across China for the meeting. 

The first day, our main meeting day, each group gave presentations about their work, using power-point to outline their programs and showed pictures and maps. After lunch, we dove into deeper discussions on what people’s biggest challenges were, if we can develop shared strategies, and how Pacific Environment can be a more effective partner. 

On the second day, we took a field trip into the rural regions of southern Anhui to Peach Blossom, the home of a famous Chinese poet; and the military base of the 11th Infantry Army and the site of the Anhui Incident. Ultimately, this day was an equally as important part of the meeting. It helped solidify relationships and it gave people the space to talk informally and feel a little more “at ease” and connected in their work. This is crucial since many of our partners work independently. 

Finally, it was encouraging to be somewhere beautiful where people freely swam in the clear waters and walked barefoot in the grass. I think this gave us all hope. 

Alaska is a hard place to leave in early June.  Earl Kingik and Ernie Frankson were missing the preparation for the annual whaling festival, ‘Nalukatuq’, in their home village of Point Hope, the oldest continuously occupied community in North America.  The village celebrates the harvest of the bowhead and beluga whales caught in the previous fall and the spring.  Norm Anderson is usually out on his boat near his hometown of Naknek, catching the first run of King Salmon, not catching a two-day plane flight from Dillingham to D.C. I am usually planting my garden, trying to catch what I can of the short 3 month vegetable growing season in my hometown of Palmer.  As good Alaskans, we found it hard to leave the State at the beginning of June for hot, muggy Washington D.C.   But we had to. 

Never before have the federal waters of Bristol Bay, the Chuckhi Sea, and the Beaufort Sea been under such threat.  In its’ five-year outer continental shelf (OCS) oil and gas leasing program, the Minerals Management Service (MMS) proposes to open 83 million acres to leasing for oil and gas drilling.   

In a conversation in preparation for the visit to Washington D.C., Norm Anderson, the Economic Program Director for Bristol Bay Native Association, a commercial and subsistence fisherman, and a Native of the village of Naknek, likened the gathering of our dynamo group to the re-forming of the Blues Brothers.  “The band is back!” he belted with his characteristic enthusiasm.  We have worked alongside each other over the years on a myriad of natural resource issues in Alaska – from working to ensure the sensible management of federal lands that are habitat to a caribou herd half a million animals strong to preventing the richest salmon fishery in the world from becoming a mining district.  We were now united in a time of dire straits for Alaska’s offshore.  Our goal was to educate as many members of Congress as possible about Alaska’s Bristol Bay, Chukchi Sea and Beaufort Sea and why they should not be unilaterally opened to oil and gas drilling activities.   

Earl, Ernie and Norm, and their families, depend upon healthy populations of marine mammals and fish to nourish their subsistence-way-of-life as well as religious and cultural practices.  They shared many stories and images with Congress to drive home the connection between the basic human right to fish and hunt and the threat of an overly aggressive leasing program that ignores good science and common sense.   

Senator Lisa Murkowski and Representative Kucinich were among the Congressional members that we had face-to-face time with.  Dinah Bear, counsel for the Council for Environmental Quality also took the time to have a dialog about our concerns.   

While most (friendly) members of Congress are well versed on the reasons why we should not drill our way to energy independence in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, nearly none of them had heard the word ‘Chukchi’, or met a Native Alaskan before, much less an Inupiat whaling captain.  Ernie is no stranger to Washington D.C. and was incredibly effective at sharing his experiences as a whaling captain with members of Congress.  Earl is also a whaler and subsistence hunter.  He hand delivered a resolution from the federally recognized sovereign tribe of the Native Village of Point Hope stating strong opposition to the development of oil and gas in the Arctic Ocean.  Earl also delivered other resolutions specifically opposing the proposed leasing plan including the Alaska Inter Tribal Council which represents over 240 of Alaska’s tribal councils. 

On day four we took inventory and found after 22 visits to Congressional offices and meetings, everyone but Earl had blisters on our feet!  We decided this was a sign of a successful week of work on the hill in D.C.   

The leg work and sweat paid off.  Within two weeks of our visit, Whit Sheard, Alaska Program Director was invited by the House Natural Resources Committee to speak to the Subcommittee on Energy and Minerals on the deficiencies and environmental impacts of the 5 year OCS plan. 

As Earl, Ernie, Norm and I said good-bye and prepared to head to the airport to fly home to Alaska, Norm handed us each a sampling of deep red smoked salmon he had brought from Naknek.  It felt good to board the plane home with tender, tired feet yet feeling nourished and smelling sharply of Alaskan salmon.