Deepwater Horizon: EPA finds dispersants less toxic than oil
Aug. 3, 2010
After two rounds of testing, the US Environmental Protection Agency says the dispersant used at the Macondo oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico had no “biologically significant endocrine disrupting activity.”
Offshore staff
WASHINGTON, D.C. – After two rounds of testing, the US Environmental Protection Agency says the dispersant used at the Macondo oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico had no “biologically significant endocrine disrupting activity.”
The agency also said that all the dispersants tested had about the same affect on aquatic life, and that the dispersants alone are less toxic than either crude oil or a mixture of crude oil and dispersant.
Both phases of the study found that the specific dispersant used by BP at Macondo, Corexit 9500A, was comparable with all other approved dispersants available. The Phase II results indicated “that dispersant-oil mixtures are generally no more toxic to the aquatic test species than oil alone.”
The eight products tested are on the National Contingency Plan Product Schedule, and Louisiana Sweet Crude Oil was the oil used in the testing as representative of the Macondo oil.
