American Petroleum Institute

Review of Natural Resource Damage Assessments in Freshwater Environments Task 2 - Effects of Oil Releases into Freshwater Habitats
 N PUBL 4514

Annotation

2.1.2 Scope of Literature Search

The search was restricted to those publications, both primary and grey, dealing with the effects on natural resources of petroleum releases into freshwater. However, unlike Task 1 that was restricted to the continental U.S., this report includes studies reported from Canada, Europe, and other world locations.

An initial broad search of available published aquatic oiling literature (ca. 8,000 citations) extracted over 500 scientific and technical papers relevant to oiling in freshwater. However, these included all those papers reporting on the fate of petroleum and on experimental/laboratory studies with freshwater organisms, investigations of biochemical or physiological mechanisms, and other less directly related subjects. They were divided generally into three groups:

• Field studies of petroleum releases directly into freshwater (both accidental and experimental);

• Laboratory studies of the effects of petroleum and petroleum products on freshwater organisms (toxicity, mortality, behavior alteration, community alteration, reduced growth or survival, and changed reproduction); and

• Laboratory studies of second-order effects where they supported findings reported in papers in the second group.

A second search with more restricted scope identified about 250 publications and reports dealing more directly with effects of petroleum and petroleum products. These still contained numerous studies on microbial degradation of petroleum and studies of hydrocarbon metabolism, uptake, depuration, and secondary physiological effects.