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Environ Monit Assess (2014) 186:83038315 DOI 10.1007/s10661-014-4004-2
Dispersion pattern of petroleum hydrocarbon in coastal water of Bay of Bengal along Odisha and West Bengal, India using geospatial approach
P. K. Panigrahy & D. R. Satapathy & C. R. Panda & R. N. Kar
Received: 20 March 2014 /Accepted: 12 August 2014 /Published online: 28 August 2014 # Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014
Abstract Petroleum hydrocarbon (PHC) concentration was monitored in water of estuaries, ports, and coastal transects up to 10-km distance in East Coast of India once in every year during 20022009. The highest concentration was observed at Haldia port (1.6020.11 g/l) due to the impact of hydrocarbon discharges from nearby oil refinery, petrochemical industries, handling of crude oils, etc. The concentration of PHC exhibited relatively higher values during low tide than the high tide in all the four estuaries indicating riverine inputs and land-based discharges, which contribute substantial amounts of PHC to the coastal water. Hoogly estuary recorded higher values of PHC (1.1718.50 g/l) due to the influence of industrial wastes, land runoff, and port activities. The spatial distribution of PHC estimated by the kriging method showed a variation in concentration of PHC over the whole region. To discriminate the dispersion pattern of PHC, principal component analysis (PCA) was performed using a correlation matrix.
Keywords Petroleum hydrocarbon . Water quality.
Industrial waste . GIS . Bay of Bengal
Introduction
Pollution of the sea by petroleum hydrocarbons occurs mainly through marine operations, land-based discharges, and atmospheric and natural inputs (IMCO 1977; GESAMP 1993; Law et. al 1997; Laws, 2000). The total input of petroleum to the oceans through anthropogenic activities and other sources such as atmospheric fall out, natural seepage, etc. is estimated at 2.37 106 t y1 (Kennish 1997). Out of these, about 65.3 % is contributed by municipal and industrial wastes, urban and river runoffs, oceanic dumping, and atmospheric fallout; the remaining 26.2 % is derived from discharges during transportation, dry docking, tanker accidents, deblasting, etc. and 8.5 % comes from fixed installations like coastal refineries, offshore production, and marine terminals (GESAMP 1993). Though a considerable fraction of petroleum hydrocarbon (PHC) entering into the marine environment is removed by evaporation, a portion gets distributed in water, accumulated in sediment, and transferred to biota....