(February 16, 2001)
http://earthtimes.org/feb/environmentoilspillofffeb16_01.htm
Oil spill off coast of Taiwan threatens ecological preserve
By CHIU YU-TZU
© Earth Times News Service
TAIPEI--Taiwan government is pondering what to do with a half-sunk Greece registered ship that became trapped on submerged reefs in mid January and led to the worst oil spill in the country since 1977.
The ship, the M.V. Amorgos, became stranded near an ecologically fragile national park in southern Taiwan on January 14 after floating 19 hours due to mechanical malfunction. The captain and other 24 crewmembers were rescued immediately by the Coast Guard. The sinking ship with fuel oil and 6,000 tons of iron ore, however, was totally forgotten. Four days later, oil began to disperse from the sinking ship, half a mile east off Olianpi, the southern tip of Taiwan.
Fishermen reported to local environmental department on January 18, saying that oil spilled had polluted coastal reefs. Authorities blamed navigational error and asked the Bureau of Immigration not to issue exit permits to the captain and other three key crews. It was days before the one-week-long Chinese New Year holidays. Short stories covered by the media appeared on local pages did not draw too much attention. Local environmental protection bureau did nothing but fine the agent approximately $10,000.
The oil continued to leak. The ship's agent volunteered to handle the half-sunk ship for the sake of insurance. The agent asked a UK-based non-profit corporation, Oil Spill Response Limited, to help speed up the shore cleanup. Local fishermen who lost fishing grounds turned into workers in charge of removing oil from coastal gullies. Failing to race against the clock, the agent did not carry out oil cleanup until January 25. By that time, coastal reefs in Lungkeng ecological reserve in Kenting National Park, had been covered by oil and creatures living in the intertidal zone were injured.
Soon, the agent found that it could not handle the case alone. Some 200 workers hired by the ship's agent were only able to collect five tons of oil a day.
"Removing sticky oil from gullies is even more difficult than catching fishes," Mr. Chang, a fishermen in his late forties, told the Earth Times.
"The unpleasant smell makes me sick and sometimes begin to vomit," Wang Mei ying, a female worker, told the Earth Times.
When television news showed polluted coast and workers struggling to remove oil from reefs, the public was irritated by the government's slow response to the oil spill.
Taiwan's Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) did not established the Cabinet's task force for the oil spill until early February. It was too late for the task force to prevent the oil spill from turning into an environmental disaster. The EPA then estimated that at least 1,150 tons of oil had been spilled.
"The huge environmental disaster can be partly attributed to bad connection among governmental agencies," Chiau Wen-yan, a marine environment association professor in National Sun Yat-sen University, told the Earth Times.
According to Taiwan's Marine Pollution Prevention Law, which went into effect last November, the EPA is obligated to form a task force to handle oil spills right after such a huge disaster happens. Due to the lack of experience, the EPA failed to take emergency measures to deal with the oil spill.
Other governmental agencies involved, professor Chiau said, should had been responsible for the slow response too. As certain regulations in the new law were not established, the Cabinet decided that the Ministry of Transportation and Communication would be responsible for mounting salvage operation, including rescue work and cleaning up oil spilled, as was the case before. But the ministry did not do so this time.
On February 10, Premier Chang Chun-hsiung demanded the Cabinet's Research, Development and Evaluation Commission to investigate into alleged administration negligence in dealing with the oil spill. Meanwhile, the Control Yuan carried out a comprehensive investigation and considered to censure officials involved the case.
Under the pressure of the urgent circumstances, a deadline for cleaning up the oil spill case was given. The EPA head Edgar Lin, who is the commander of the Cabinet's task force, vowed to finish cleanup within one month. In mid-February, 1,500 soldiers blazed roads in the ecological preservation area in Lungkeng to speed up the shore cleanup. The army spent four days to finish the shore cleanup task by using pumps, pipes, containers and tanks. Environmental experts worry about the army's involvement, saying that the ecological reserve could be damaged by the workers, soldiers, officials and even reporters that has descended on Taiwan's southern tip.
Experts said that wildlife might be affected by the activity while several trails have recently been blazed by cars. According to the control center for the reserve, the daily limit for visitors to enter the area was previously only 200.
Environmental experts also said that using high pressure water sprays to wash oil from reefs away was unwise.
"This measure may make the coastal landscape look better. But it will damage the marine environment unless all the oil which has been flushed back into the sea can be collected," professor Chiau said.
As for the way to deal with the half-sunk ship with 200 tons of oil and 60,000 tons of iron ore remained, no conclusion has been drawn by both Taiwan government and the ship agent.
Officials said that one possible handling method would be to pump out remaining 200 tons of fuel oil and then break up the ship after disposing of the iron ore by discarding it on nearby coastal land.
Marine environmental experts, however, have told the Earth Times that placing iron ore on coastal land could damage the local ecology. "The 60,000 tons of iron ore is a potential threat to the maritime ecosystem, especially to plankton," said Dai Chang-feng, professor of the Institute of Oceanography at National Taiwan University. Plankton would benefit from the iron more than other creatures, and this increased plankton population would disturb the ecological equilibrium.
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