2014 Israeli oil spill

Last updated
2014 Israeli oil spill
2014 Israeli oil spill in Evrona nature reserve (2).jpg
2014 Israeli oil spill
Location Be'er Ora, [1] Israel
Coordinates 29°40′29.28″N35°0′25.56″E / 29.6748000°N 35.0071000°E / 29.6748000; 35.0071000
Date4 December 2014
Cause
Causefailed maintenance work on the Trans-Israel pipeline
Operator Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company
Spill characteristics
Volume3,000,000–5,000,000 litres (660,000–1,100,000 imp gal; 790,000–1,320,000 US gal)
2014 Israeli oil spill in Evrona nature reserve 2014 Israeli oil spill in Evrona nature reserve (1).jpg
2014 Israeli oil spill in Evrona nature reserve

In December 2014, a major oil spill occurred in the vicinity of Be'er Ora Israel, [2] with an estimated 3-5 million liters [3] of crude oil leaking from a breached pipeline, contaminating much of the Evrona nature reserve. An Environmental Protection Ministry official stated that the cleanup would likely take years, and that the spill was one of the gravest natural disasters in the country's history. [4] [5]

On December 9, 2014, Ofir Akunis was appointed as the deputy environmental protection minister. Akunis replaced Amir Peretz, who resigned from his post at the helm of the ministry. [6] The appointment by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office came a week after the massive crude oil spill in Israel's Arava region. Akunis said that "it is the deputy minister's intention to prioritize treatment of the ecological disaster in the south and to do all that is necessary to prevent the spread of the crude oil, and to prevent a health and environmental disaster." [7] Akunis ordered crews to raise the side walls of the dams that had been built in the Arava to prevent flooding. Thanks to the infrastructure that had already been built in the area, the risk that the oil would reach the Gulf of Eilat significantly dropped. Akunis instructed that the reserve remain closed as long as high values of pollutants were still registered in air quality tests.

In the end of December 2014, the government approved a NIS 17 million Environmental Protection Ministry plan to rehabilitate. According to Akunis, program would serve to treat the soils contaminated by the spill, as well as help restore the wildlife populations damaged over the course of the event. As part of the plan, a special team would be appointed to evaluate the environmental impact of various Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company activities on both dry land and beaches. The approved plan also involved opening a closed Eilat beach on EAPC-owned property to the city's residents and visitors. [8] In January 2015, air quality tests found that there had been a 90% reduction of pollution in Evrona.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pipeline</span> Pumping fluids or gas through pipes

A pipeline is a system of pipes for long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas, typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than 2,175,000 miles (3,500,000 km) of pipeline in 120 countries around the world. The United States had 65%, Russia had 8%, and Canada had 3%, thus 76% of all pipeline were in these three countries. The main attribute to pollution from pipelines is caused by corrosion and leakage

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oil spill</span> Release of petroleum into the environment

An oil spill is the release of a liquid petroleum hydrocarbon into the environment, especially the marine ecosystem, due to human activity, and is a form of pollution. The term is usually given to marine oil spills, where oil is released into the ocean or coastal waters, but spills may also occur on land. Oil spills may be due to releases of crude oil from tankers, offshore platforms, drilling rigs and wells, as well as spills of refined petroleum products and their by-products, heavier fuels used by large ships such as bunker fuel, or the spill of any oily refuse or waste oil.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trans-Israel pipeline</span> Oil pipeline in Israel

The Trans-Israel pipeline, also Tipline, Eilat–Ashkelon Pipeline, or Europe–Asia Pipeline is an oil pipeline in Israel extending from the Gulf of Aqaba on the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. It was originally built to transport crude oil originating from Iran inside Israel and to Europe.

The Enbridge Pipeline System is an oil pipeline system which transports crude oil and dilbit from Canada to the United States. The system exceeds 5,000 kilometres (3,100 mi) in length including multiple paths. More than 3,000 kilometres (1,900 mi) of the system is in the United States while the rest is in Canada and serves the Athabasca oil sands production facilities. Main parts of the system are 2,306-kilometre-long (1,433 mi) Canadian Mainline and 3,057-kilometre-long (1,900 mi) Lakehead System. On average, it delivers 1.4 million barrels per day of crude oil and other products to the major oil refineries in the American Midwest and the Canadian province of Ontario. The Canadian portion is owned by Enbridge, while the U.S. portion is partly owned by that company through Enbridge Energy Partners, LP, formerly known as Lakehead Pipe Line Partners and Lakehead Pipe Line Company.

The Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company operates several crude petroleum and refined petroleum products pipelines in Israel, most notably the Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline – which transports crude oil across southern Israel, between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. The EAPC also operates two maritime oil terminals as well as oil storage depots in the country.

Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. is a master limited partnership engaged in pipeline transport, marketing, and storage of liquefied petroleum gas and petroleum in the United States and Canada. Plains owns interests in 18,370 miles (29,560 km) of pipelines, storage capacity for about 75 million barrels of crude oil, 28 million barrels of NGLs, 68 billion cubic feet of natural gas, and 5 natural gas processing plants. The company is headquartered in the Allen Center in Downtown Houston, Texas. Plains is a publicly traded Master limited partnership. PAA owns an extensive network of pipeline transportation, terminalling, storage and gathering assets in key crude oil and NGL producing basins and transportation corridors at major market hubs in the United States and Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arava Institute for Environmental Studies</span> Israeli study and research institute

The Arava Institute for Environmental Studies is an academic studies and research institute located in Kibbutz Ketura on the Israeli side of the Arava Valley. Following the understanding that "nature knows no borders", the Arava Institute's mission is to advance cross-border environmental cooperation in the face of political conflict.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Keystone Pipeline</span> Oil pipeline in North America

The Keystone Pipeline System is an oil pipeline system in Canada and the United States, commissioned in 2010 and owned by TC Energy and, as of March 2020, the Government of Alberta. It runs from the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin in Alberta to refineries in Illinois and Texas, and also to oil tank farms and an oil pipeline distribution center in Cushing, Oklahoma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ofir Akunis</span> Israeli politician and diplomat

Ofir Akunis is an Israeli politician and diplomat. Since May 2024, he has been the Israeli Consul General in New York, his first diplomatic posting. As a politician, Akunis previously served as a member of the Knesset for Likud. He was the Minister of Science and Technology from 2015 to 2020 and from 2022 to 2024. He has previously held the posts of Minister of Labor, Social Affairs and Social Services in 2020, and Minister of Regional Cooperation in 2020-2021.

The Yellow River oil spill was an oil spill in the Yellow River in Shaanxi, China which took place due to the rupturing of a segment of Lanzhou-Zhengzhou oil pipeline on December 30, 2009. Approximately 150,000 L (40,000 US gal) of diesel oil flowed down the Wei River before finally reaching the Yellow River, the source of drinking water for millions of people, on January 4, 2010.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kalamazoo River oil spill</span> 2010 oil spill in Calhoun County, Michigan, US

The Kalamazoo River oil spill occurred in July 2010 when a pipeline operated by Enbridge burst and flowed into Talmadge Creek, a tributary of the Kalamazoo River near Marshall, Michigan. A 6-foot (1.8 m) break in the pipeline resulted in one of the largest inland oil spills in U.S. history. The pipeline carries diluted bitumen (dilbit), a heavy crude oil from Canada's Athabasca oil sands to the United States. Cleanup took five years. Following the spill, the volatile hydrocarbon diluents evaporated, leaving the heavier bitumen to sink in the water column. Thirty-five miles (56 km) of the Kalamazoo River were closed for clean-up until June 2012, when portions of the river were re-opened. On March 14, 2013, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ordered Enbridge to return to dredge portions of the river to remove submerged oil and oil-contaminated sediment.

Ashdod Refinery Ltd. situated in the coastal city of Ashdod is the second largest oil refinery in Israel. It is located in the industrial zone in the northern part of the city, nearby the Port of Ashdod. As of 2014, it has an annual refining capacity of 5.4 million tons of oil, with a Nelson complexity index of 9.8.

The Nahal Zin fuel leak was a severe ecological disaster caused in June 2011 when a backhoe loader struck and ruptured an underground fuel pipeline in southern Israel. 1.5 million liters of jet fuel leaked into the surrounding soil, resulting in localized soil contamination, damage to nearby flora, and wasted fuel. It is considered the worst ecological disaster ever to befall a nature reserve in the history of the State of Israel.

The High-speed railway to Eilat (Med-Red) is a proposed Israeli railway that will enable the connection of the main Israeli population centers and Mediterranean ports to the southern city of Eilat on the Red Sea coast, as well as serve commercial freight between the Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea (Eilat). The railway will spur southward from the existing rail line at Beersheba, and continue through Dimona to the Arava, Ramon Airport and Eilat, at a speed of 350 kilometers per hour (220 mph). Its length will be roughly 260 km (160 mi) of electrified double-track rail. Currently Dimona railway station is the southernmost passenger train station in Israel and the one with the least boardings/alightings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alon Tal</span> Israeli politician, activist, and academic

Alon Tal is an Israeli environmental politician, academic and activist. He was a member of the 24th Knesset between 2021 and 2022, representing the Blue and White political party; founder of the Israel Union for Environmental Defense and the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies; and co-founder of Ecopeace: Friends of the Earth–Middle East, This Is My Earth, the Israel Forum for Demography, Environment and Society, Aytzim: Ecological Judaism, and the Green Movement. Tal was appointed chair of the Department of Public Policy at Tel Aviv University in 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2013 Mayflower oil spill</span>

The 2013 Mayflower oil spill occurred on March 29, 2013, when the Pegasus Pipeline, owned by ExxonMobil and carrying Canadian Wabasca heavy crude from the Athabasca oil sands, ruptured in Mayflower, Arkansas, about 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Little Rock releasing about 3,190 barrels of oil. Approximately 3,190 barrels of oil and water mix was recovered. Twenty-two homes were evacuated. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) classified the leak as a major spill.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Enbridge Line 5</span> Major Canadian oil pipeline

Enbridge Line 5 is a 645-mile oil pipeline owned by the Canadian multinational corporation Enbridge. Constructed in 1953, the pipeline conveys crude oil from western Canada to eastern Canada via the Great Lakes states. Line 5 is part of the Enbridge Lakehead System and passes under the environmentally sensitive Straits of Mackinac, which connect Lake Michigan to Lake Huron. The 30-inch pipeline carries 540,000 barrels (86,000 m3) of synthetic crude, natural gas liquids, sweet crude, and light sour crude per day as of 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2021 Mediterranean oil spill</span> Ship spill impacting the coast of Israel and Lebanon in February 2021

The 2021 Mediterranean oil spill was an ecological disaster which occurred in February 2021 along the Mediterranean coast of Israel and Lebanon. Starting on 16 February 2021, dozens to hundreds of tons of tar washed up on the beaches along a 160-kilometre (99 mi) stretch of Israel's coast from Rosh Hanikra to Ashkelon, following a heavy storm and unusually high waves. Tar deposits also heavily impacted the beaches in south Lebanon. European Sentinel satellite photos showed 12 apparent oil slicks at various distances from the shore between 11 and 13 February 2021 according to Greenpeace.

The Line 3 oil spill was a 1.7 million gallon crude oil spill in Minnesota on March 3, 1991. The Line 3 pipeline, then owned by the Lakehead Pipeline Company, ruptured on a wetland near Grand Rapids, Minnesota, spilling oil into the Prairie River, a tributary of the Mississippi River. It was the largest inland oil spill in the history of the United States.

References

  1. "קצא"א מודה: דליפת הנפט בערבה כפולה מהדיווח - דינמו ורכב - הארץ". Archived from the original on 2016-08-18. Retrieved 2016-03-04.
  2. Frenkel, Billie (8 December 2014). "Southern Israel oil spill four times worse than initially reported". Ynetnews.
  3. "Clean-up of Israeli desert oil spill could take years: experts". Reuters. 10 December 2014.
  4. "Israel Oil Spill: 600,000-Gallons Lost in Eilat Pipeline Breach". NBC News .
  5. "UPDATE 1-Oil spill floods into Israeli nature reserve". Reuters. 4 December 2014.
  6. "Minister". sviva.gov.il.
  7. "Ofir Akunis Appointed Deputy Environmental Protection Minister". sviva.gov.il.
  8. "Government approves NIS 17 million fund for Arava oil spill rehabilitation « Pacific Piano Performance Posts". kristinelmingforum.net. Archived from the original on 2015-01-28.