U of M team to study natural microbes impact on Arctic oil spills

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This article was published 23/07/2021 (1514 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

AS sea ice declines and shipping and industry increases in the Arctic, University of Manitoba researchers will study whether naturally-existing bacteria in ocean ice and water can degrade petroleum as a response to potential oil spills.

The research team, GENICE II, received $6.7 million in federal funding from Innovation, Science and Economic Development. Experiments will be conducted at the new Churchill Marine Observatory.

“In that facility there are two big tanks, where we’re going to grow ice and… add oil to one and not to the other and look at the effects on the natural community when you add oil — look at what microbes might be present that are naturally degrading the oil,” said Eric Collins, who along with Gary Stern, heads the research team.

The team will use genomic tools — the study of genes — to examine the microbes.

“Using genomics, we can get at very subtle differences between the species of bacteria and find the mechanisms that they use to degrade the oil. For example, identifying the genes that are responsible for that pathway,” Collins said.

“You can imagine genetically engineering microbes in the future that would make that more efficient, (but) right now we are looking for naturally occurring microbes that do it.”

Stern noted microbes in warmer waters have played a role in degrading oil spills, but the research for ice-laden water has not yet been done.

Cleaning an oil spill in ice-laden waters would be difficult.

“It’s not like the Gulf of Mexico (Deepwater Horizon incident in 2010)… They had all the infrastructure available, skimming and all those other things — well, would that even work in the Arctic? And if it did work… the infrastructure simply isn’t there,” Stern said, noting the federal government does not have policy or law in place for addressing Arctic spills.

The team will partner with Inuit and other Arctic communities.

“The communities are extremely worried about (increased ship traffic and industry), because if there was ever a large scale spill it would pretty much decimate the ecosystem within and around the area,” Stern said.

Baker Lake, Arviat, Chesterfield and Rankin Inlet will be part of a monitoring program, with the team training people to collect sea ice and water samples.

“Eventually, they will be able to use those same (genomic) techniques to confirm the presence or absence of these microbes in their waters,” said Collins.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca