Fuel Spills

Do science and outdoor sports go together for you? They do for me! I do a lot of thinking when out in my kayak. Sometimes the things I see when kayaking remind me of birdwatching and climate change science. But most recently, while out in my kayak I passed a floating plastic bag that might have blown off a boat, and a sunken tin pie pan that was probably frisbee-ed from shore. Seeing human trash reminded me of why I had to get to my computer and write this post. There have been a series of fuel spills locally, where I live in Saanich, part of Victoria.
You can read about one of the first recent spills in the Saanich News in their article appropriately titled "Oil spill stains urban miracle." It's on the front page, with a sub-heading "Catastrophe strikes Coho-laden creek." I hadn't thought of an urban creek being the subject of study for working biologists, but it is. And there are school visits to the creek as well, so that students can learn about Nature in their own home neighbourhood.

My friend John Herbert took this photo of Colquitz Creek. That's the salmon stream that we've written about here, the one that runs from Beaver Lake through Panama Flats to Portage Inlet.

This spill was from a home heating oil tank that leaked. It happened when a fuel delivery was made to the wrong address, and the wrong home's unused tank was filled with home heating oil. A pipe leading from the fuel tank sprung a leak, and over a few days released an estimated 1,000 litres of heating oil into Swan Creek, which drains into Colquitz Creek. Once the oily sheen on the stream was pointed out to Saanich municipal workers, they traced the fuel up to the source of the leak. Other leaks have since been traced back to other tanks.


These fuel tanks weren't mine or in my own neighbourhood, but I must have walked within a hundred yards of them several times before eating and relaxing at a nearby home of friends or family. That's it, for me. Not in my back yard. Not in my friends' and families' back yards. Accidents happen, but fuel tanks are owned by people who can look after them. No excuses. When I walked back from the beach, I put the kayak away and looked at my landlady's fuel tank. No visible leaks. Not in my yard.
I'm no fuel-servicing expert. I'm not a marine biologist, or a fresh-water biologist either, but I do get out on the water often in my kayak. Every small boat user interacts hands-on with the water in a personal way. We can understand the effects of fuel spills on waterways, effects that some people don't easily understand because they don't see the plants and animals like we do. Now I'm trying to put that understanding to use.
Another recent spill of home heating fuel into the watershed in Greater Victoria can be read about here at the Times-Colonist newspaper website. The Times-Colonist article noted that:
A fact sheet from the provincial Environment Ministry says homeowners are potentially liable for cleanup costs whether they are aware of the existence of an oil tank or not.
Scary thought, eh? And home insurance doesn't cover fuel spills. One of the recent cleanups cost the homeowners $35,000.
Apparently, an old fuel tank can go from "looks ok" to "leaking" pretty darned fast... even when it's been checked by an expert from the fuel oil company. As one homeowner with an unexpected leak said to the Saanich News:
“We had a platinum protection plan where (our oil company) would do sonic testing of the tank to check the thickness of the walls. We were also using their oil that’s supposed to have additives in it that retards corrosion,” Keith says. “We were sort of relying on that plan, to some extent, to give us a head’s up if something was up. At the end of the day that didn’t help us out. We’re kicking ourselves now – it was an old tank, why didn’t we just replace it? For $2,000 we could’ve avoided a ton of grief.”

It seems that tank leaks can happen suddenly and aren't as obvious as the crack along the coaming in my second-hand Pamlico kayak from Wilderness Systems.
So I will remember the statements by experts in the local newspapers: twenty-year-old fuel tanks can and do fail suddenly. I don't have to be a fuel expert to help my landlady make a proper plan for the fuel tank at her house! That's practical science we can put to good use. With planning, this home heating system will never be the cause for an expensive and environmentally damaging spill.
We can't stop all the fuel spills in the world, but we can each look after our own equipment. And if you see any fuel spilled on the ground or water in BC, in town or out in the boonies, call the 24-Hour Spill Line toll-free at 1-800-663-3456.

Lightning Under the Hood: Part Two - The Battery Revolution

by L E Carmichael

Part One - Riker's Race

Every battery has the same basic components: the anode (negative electrode); the cathode (positive electrode); and the electrolyte. There's also a separator, which prevents electrons from traveling directly from anode to cathode within the battery chamber. Instead, they exit through a wire, traveling through a lightbulb or electric motor before re-entering the battery. According to legend, when Raymond Gaston Planté invented the first battery in 1860, he used a separator made from his wife's petticoat! 

Raymond Gaston Planté

Its lacier components notwithstanding, Planté's lead-acid battery was a major breakthrough. A writer in the June 11, 1881 edition of the New York Times said, “It is quite possible that the man who has taught us to put up electricity in bottles has accomplished greater things than any inventor who has yet appeared.”

As a power source for electric vehicles, however, early batteries had some problems. Because the electrolytes were liquid, they sometimes froze in cold weather (a problem Canadian drivers still struggle with!). Hot weather was just as bad, because the water portion of the electrolyte evaporated. This meant drivers had to "top up" their batteries on a regular basis. Charles Duryea (whose gas-powered cars lost to Andrew Riker in the 1896 race) once told The Horseless Age that “A set of batteries [is] worse to take care of than a hospital full of sick dogs.”

Planté's battery

Changes to battery housings have addressed a lot of these problems, as did the invention of the block heater!  Today's gasoline-powered cars still use Planté's lead-acid batteries as starting batteries, and they were the energy source of choice for hybrids and electrics for decades. After all, lead-acid batteries are cheap and durable.  However, there's not a lot of power relative to weight.  To address this problem, scientists had to tackle the guts of the battery - the chemical reactions that produced the flow of electrons.

One alternative chemistry that seemed promising involved replacing lead with another metal, nickel.  Nickel-cadmium batteries (NiCAD) had better energy density, which meant vehicles could be driven farther and faster before having to be recharged.  However, NiCAD batteries are highly toxic and difficult to recycle. They also have what's known as memory: if NiCADs are repeatedly discharged half-way, then recharged, they eventually "remember" this partial state of charge.  As a result, the battery's full capacity can no longer be used.

Charles Duryea

Nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries are less toxic and less prone to memory issues. However, they're also more expensive and take longer to recharge.  Before alternative vehicles could really start competing with gas-guzzlers, a completely new battery would have to be invented. But the key breakthrough had nothing to do with cars, and everything to do with portable electronics. 

Stay tuned for the final installment - From Cell Phones to Sports Cars! 

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For more information on battery chemistry, check out Battery University.

Lightning Under the Hood: Part One - Riker's Race

by L E Carmichael

Andrew L. Riker

It's September 7, 1896, at Narragansett Park in Rhode Island. The first car race ever held on a track in North America is about to begin.  These newfangled horseless carriages are the biggest draw of the State Fair, and 50,000 people have crowed around the mile-long dirt oval to see them compete.

The starter cries, "Now go, if you can!" and seven drivers throw their vehicles into gear.   At once, Andrew Riker pulls into the lead, literally leaving his competitors in the dust.  He blazes around the track at a shocking 24 miles per hour and comes "dashing over the finish line, his body bent forward as though holding the reigns over some spirited steed."  As the car Riker invented rolls to a stop, the cheering crowd rushes forward for a closer look.

That car, by the way?  It hasn't got a gas tank.

The Riker Electric Trap has leather seats and wheels that are spoked, like a bicycle's.  It weighs 1500 pounds, more than half of which come from the lead-acid battery pack.  At a speed of ten miles per hour, it can travel for four hours before the batteries need to be recharged.  The car starts with the flick of a switch, runs quietly, doesn't rattle its passengers, and produces no noxious exhaust.  And thanks in part to this race, it's about to launch Riker's career as a successful automaker, respected inventor, and the very first president of the Society of Automotive Engineers.

The 1896 Riker Electric Trap

Due to a fire that destroyed most of his personal papers in 1900, we have few first-hand records of Riker's thoughts on cars in general and his own experiments in particular.  We do know, however, that he believed electric cars were lacking something special - a battery "capable of deep discharges, but still not of excessive weight, and this requires some special type of battery."  Despite serious effort, no one in Riker's day - not even Thomas Edison - could crack the battery problem.  Electric cars, despite supporters including the King of Siam and Clara Ford (wife of Henry), were replaced with the faster, cheaper internal combustion vehicles almost everyone drives today.

Thanks to rising gas prices, air pollution, and climate change, however, there's more interest in electric vehicles today than there's been since the 1920s.  And thanks to some major battery breakthroughs, they might just replace gasoline cars - before we run out of oil.

Stay tuned for Part 2 - The Battery Revolution!


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You can find more information about Andrew Riker and his vehicles here.  More details on the Narragansett race are available in volume 1(11) of The Horseless Age, and in the September 19 and September 26 issues of Scientific American (1896).

Yes, It IS Ethical Oil

Posted by Helaine Becker

Last month, Saudi Arabia made headlines in Canada when it tried to prevent the non-profit advocacy group, Ethical Oil, from running ads in support of Canada’s oil sands. Saudi Arabia apparently didn’t like how the TV spots highlighted the Saudis’ abysmal record re human rights. (Read more here.)

Less than a week later, the oil sands were in the news again, this time receiving plaudits from a surprising source: Patrick Moore, founder of Greenpeace. Moore said, “oilsands development is necessary and often leaves the production sites in better environmental shape than they were before oil was taken from the land.” (Read more here.)

I live a world away from Alberta, in posh, ivory-tower Toronto. It's hard to really know the truth about the oil sands/tar sands here (take your pick of the terminology; which you call it reveals your attitude, pro or con). I can tell you, though, that the Lululemons in my 'hood unanimously and vociferously decry them (but then drive off in their X5s).

As a science writer, I know the world is not a chic but simplistic black-and-white. I know, for example, that as feel-good as it is to tsk tsk fossil fuels, I wouldn’t  - couldn’t - live in Canada without oil. I’m fond of my furnace come October. So until that magic day when we can switch over entirely to non-carbon fuel sources, I’m going to have to accept that oil and I are partners in the Canadian experiment.

But that’s not to say I’m not uneasy about it. It’s also why I jumped at the chance to see the oil sands for myself last June. As part of the Canadian Science Writers Association’s annual meeting, a trip to Fort MacMurray was offered. I signed up pronto.

What I wanted to know was, “What is the real impact of the mining operations on the environment? Is it really “dirty oil,” as opponents claim? What are companies doing to minimize the environmental impact? And what, really, are our alternatives?”

The day was warm as we boarded the private plane provided by Connacher Oil and Gas, one of the gazillion oil companies based in Fort MacMurray. Connacher is at the forefront of in situ mining, a method of oil recovery that only became viable in the last decade. Traditionally, oil sands were obtained through open pit mining – huge quantities of the bitumen-rich soils were scraped off the surface of the land for later extraction. This process certainly left large areas of the landscape in bad shape, and potentially exposed populations downstream to toxic wastes.

Only a fraction of the oil sands – those that lay on the surface –could be mined this way. But much greater quantities of oil – unbelievably huge reservoirs that make the Middle East's reserves look like duck puddles – remained inaccessible. Technology to access them simply did not exist until the 1980s, when a technique called SagD (Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage) was developed and proven. With SagD, hot water is pumped into underground reservoirs that contain the thick, tarry oil sands. The steam loosens the tar, enabling it to be pumped up to the surface, where it can then be refined.



The Connacher team at the well pad

SagD seems to have a much more limited impact on the environment than traditional open pit mining. The footprint of the wellpad is tiny; to my eye, about the size of an average high school gym. The official bumpf says the pads cover 85-90% less surface area than old style mines. The Connacher plant also recycles over 90% of the  water used to make the steam, using only non-potable water; it doesn’t draw water from the nearby surface water or rivers. The company also  generates its own energy, making it largely independent of the power grid.

I have to say I was impressed by the facilities we toured and the caliber of the Connacher staff we met. Like most Canadians, the engineers at Connacher were concerned with the environment, and proudly detailed for us the programs they had in place to ensure as little disruption as possible to the wildlife of the area, and the environment overall.

Our guides were not given an easy ride by our group of science professionals and journalists, which included Jay Ingram, longtime host of Daily Planet, Susan Eaton, geologist, geophysicist and committed conservationist, and award-winning science journalist Peter McMahon. They were given tough questions to answer, and were not allowed to avoid them or slide away with easy generalities. Is SagD perfect? Of course not. It still is releasing carbon into our atmosphere, which we all know is damaging. And there are still local environmental concerns that need to be addressed with stricter regulations and monitoring.

After the visit to Ft. MacMurray, the issues around the oil sands were clearer in my mind. Like Patrick Moore, I now believe that Canada, as a nation, cannot, and should not, put a stop to oil sands extraction in Alberta. We simply have no alternatives to oil yet.  Until we do, we have to get our oil from somewhere. Like the folks at Ethical Oil say, where would you rather get your oil, from Canadians who are regulated and who make the effort to obtain the oil in the cleanest possible way (no matter if we don’t always reach nirvanic perfection, at least we are trying – can you say the same about Venezuela?)? Or would you rather buy your fuel from a country where women aren’t allowed to drive, or vote, or get stoned to death if they look at a man that isn’t their relative?

Not me. I’m going to continue to use as little fossil fuel as I can, because reducing its use is good for everybody. But until I can honestly live without fossil fuels, I’m going to support the firms and countries that are more in line with my values of environmental conservation and human rights. That means Canadian oil.