Infographic: 13 Oil Spills in the Last 30 Days

Managing Editor Heather Libby from the Huffington Post created this infographic titled “13 Oil Spills in the Last 30 Days”: it showcases the large oil spills, like the one in Arkansas in late March, as well as smaller ones. Although, when it comes to the environment, no spill is a small spill.. Click through for the full infographic.

This infographic goes over the oil spills in the last 30 days around the world, even covering Nigeria and Equador as well as the United States and Canada. Sadly, oil spills are becoming more and more common as there has been a world-wide push for crude oil.

The most astounding figure in the graphic for me is the total amount of oil spilled: 1,185,000 gallons. Granted, it’s not as much as the BP oil spill (205 million gallons over the course of a few weeks), but as I mentioned before, no spill is a small spill when it comes to the well-being of the environment. We also have to think about how this happened: in the Deepwater Horizon (BP) oil spill, safety regulations promoted equipment failure, causing a breakage of the cap and malfunctioning equipment in the drill site, but how can all of these spills keep occurring? I hope that the fines places on BP and the awareness of oil spills from that tragedy have a global impact on drilling regulations in the future.

Here is a video of the damage done in Arkansas:

Spills like this are also getting the attention of the national media, and people are beginning to question what impact the proposed Keystone XL pipeline will have on the environment. As sad as it is, seeing oil spills in their community is really motivating people to respond negatively towards Keystone XL in hopes of saving the environment from oil spills. Not only does the still have direct affects on the environment, but oil is notorious for sticking around, literally, on wildlife and vegetation. The Huffington Post also reported that schoolchildren were throwing up from the fumes in Mayflower, Arkansas after the spill. So, as we have known from previous environmental tragedies,  people are only mobilized when it affects them personally. Let’s hope that these 13 spills have an effect on the American public and there is a gigantic push for regulation, as there always should have been.