Oil Spill Off Huntington Beach
How ironic the juxtaposition of the news can be. On Feb. 9 the big story, nearly filling the first section of the paper, is the 394,000 gallons of oil spilled off the Orange County coast. A disaster that has all the politicians and conservation groups up in arms calling for new regulations.
And then on Page 2 of Metro is a short little compilation put together by AQMD listing the 20 top releasers of hydrocarbons in the Air Quality Management District. The total annual release from just these few amounts to about 3.3 million gallons or the equivalent of one spill the size of the one off Huntington Beach every 33 days! And because AQMD estimates that the majority of hydrocarbon release is from our autos, this is only a fraction of the oil spill that Southern Californians create everyday.
These smaller, less dramatic spills end up in the same places as the big one, our air and water, and have greater effects on health and the environment. Certainly we should work to prevent major releases of hydrocarbons, yet at an accident rate of once every 20 years, the offshore spill pales in comparison to our everyday bad habits.
ROBERT P. ILCHIK
Los Angeles
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