Let’s start off with a list of your top 5 cities in the world. How many of them were on the coast? All of them, maybe?

Well, we all love the view of the horizon. With this short story on oil, our travel buddy, let us examine exactly why an international lock down has heaved such a sigh of relief across natural ecosystems of the world and in particular the oceans. (fact check: there is truly only one global ocean on Earth).

Our first departure is to the historic Mediterranean Sea. Though the Mediterranean Sea accounts for only one percent of the world’s ocean surface, 22 percent of the planet’s oil travels across the Mediterranean each year. Untreated or inadequately treated sewage flows into the Mediterranean waters from more than 120 coastal cities and each year thousands of tons of industrial waste and agricultural chemicals reach the sea.

Now let’s ship across to Marina Bay Sands, Singapore. Singapore, which is located on the Strait of Malacca’s eastern end, is one of the world’s largest refinery centers. Along with refinery operations come the inevitable spills and accidents at coastal docking operations.

Flying to the EU countries (albeit skipping UK for now) is everyone’s dream! The European continental shelf has been a commercial hustler since a long time now. To date, the North Sea is one of the busiest marine regions. However, we are just not aware of the physical stress pushed down onto our ocean. Since the industrial revolution, this region contains the largest assemblage of industrial plants on earth, accounting for 15 percent of the world’s industrial output.

From everyone’s dream to the dream maker - The Persian Gulf. Its coastline is one of the most rapidly developing regions on earth due to its central role in global oil production and shipment. Life-giving estuaries, coral reefs and tidal communities are replaced by the infrastructure required to support oil production and an ever-growing population. So where does all the fresh water come from? The region has the world’s largest concentration of desalinization plants. The residual stuff goes right back into the gulf and disturbs the entire ecosystem. A major and unique issue with this gulf is its shallow depth and small size. 60 percent of the world’s oil production sails though this bottleneck!

And finally, we visit the pristine Caribbean. Sun, Surf, Sand, and Oil Platforms - more than 2,000 fixed offshore oil platforms garland the US Gulf of Mexico waters and counting!

There are some who have a unison view that oil spills are to blame, for most part, to the deteriorating ocean ecosystem. Surprisingly, oil spills account for just 5% of the oil entering the aquatic environment. As we’ve seen through our travels in this story, most oil enters the aquatic environment from land-based sources and effluent (dirty stuff) from wastewater treatment plants.

For now, travel has hit the pause button. This has given nature much needed time to rewind. There is neither a need to eliminate our use of oil nor a need to encourage a ban on oil or any of its byproducts. This episode in our lives, a pause, has showcased the importance of prudence in our overall consumption. Let’s extend that to oil. We must help the ocean continue to rewind even as we transition back to normalcy.

Let’s be guests to our travel buddy - oil. Let us not be mere consumers.

The fun stuff:

Virtual Dives: Interested to see WWII remnants underwater? The Pacific was a theater for some of the greatest battles of World War II. See the remnants of war as they stand today. Is Raja Ampat your dream dive destination? Coral reefs in Raja Ampat have a higher diversity of coral and reef fish species than anywhere else in the world. Take the giant stride from home:

https://theoceanagency.org/oceanedu

A Bathroom Escapade: Let’s flush some things permanently:

https://www.cleanseas.org/features/whats-your-bathroom

Glowing corals: Glowing corals are a highly visual sign of climate change. This organization is using colors to warn us:

https://www.glowing.org/the-warning

The inspiration for this story comes entirely from my readings of the Project Aware Book - “Our World Our Water.”