ENVIRONMENT : Kuwait: Still Cleaning Up

With the recapping earlier this month of the last burning well, the fires from the Iraqi-sabotaged oil fields are now out. But the sands are still crusted in black, the long-term cleanup costs are almost incalculable and the environmental effects of last year’s Iraqi invasion and occupation will haunt Kuwait and the Persian Gulf for years.

THE WELLS: Early this month Kuwait formally capped the last of the 732 wells sabotaged by Iraqi troops or damaged in the fierce six-week conflict. Environmentalists say the effects of the thousands of tons of toxic gases released into the atmosphere by the oil field fires will linger for decades.

OIL POOLS: Oil that gushed from the wells left 200 pools in the desert containing 20 million to 30 million barrels of oil, devastating the fragile environment.

LEAKING OIL: Oil is still leaking from Kuwaiti and Iraqi terminals into the Gulf. Six to eight million barrels of crude spilled during the war, forming the world’s biggest slick and destroying marine life along Saudi Arabia’s Persian Gulf shoreline as well as parts of the Iranian coast.

COASTAL DAMAGE: Remaining sea mines sowed by the Iraqis are hindering repair of the coast.

FISHING: The fishing industry in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait has been disrupted, and the shrimp fishing season in clear parts of the Persian Gulf was postponed because of immature catches attributed to pollution. Fish off Bahrain have also been dying of a mysterious disease that scientists attribute to the slick. The food chain has been interrupted.

COSTS: Gulf environmentalists say cleanup costs are estimated at $2 billion.

Sources: Times staff reports and wire services