When a person is sick and has a diagnosis, they receive treatment and are encouraged to observe key parameters of their body. The importance of monitoring vital signs such as temperature, pressure and heart rate is that they provide basic information to identify early symptoms of health disorders and, from there, decisions can be made to prevent major complications.
The Gulf of Mexico is not necessarily sick, although it is highly vulnerable and has many comorbidities due to the extractive and polluting activities to which it is subject. This semi-enclosed sea that we share with the United States and Cuba is, like a human body, a complex system that needs to be monitored to ensure that the use of its resources does not compromise its state of health and continues to provide the ecosystem services from which our society benefits so much.
This sea is key for Mexico because it is where most of the country's oil is extracted, which is one of the main engines of our economy, as well as because of the food benefit it provides us through the fish and seafood that we extract and that enrich our diet, and on whose capture, processing and sale thousands of families depend for work.
Landscape of the oil extraction area. Image: Ecosur.
The implications of oil in the Gulf of Mexico
Since there are large hydrocarbon deposits under the seabed of the Gulf of Mexico, their presence is part of the ecosystem and it is common to find natural oil spills or emanations. The fisherman Rudesindo Cantarell made the discovery of one of these water showers and since then his surname would be used to name one of the largest oil fields ever discovered in the world. With the use of the Cantarell complex, Mexico positioned itself as one of the main oil producers and, as a result, the landscape of the Campeche Sonde in the Gulf of Mexico was populated with platforms, pipelines and ships from the hydrocarbon industry.
As the industry expanded, the possibility of adverse situations occurring in isolated places increased and made the actions necessary to prevent, contain and mitigate major disasters more complex and specialized.
Scientific project to address challenges
With the goal of promoting the use of innovative methodologies to address the key challenges facing our society and strengthening the country's technological independence, the now National Council for Humanities, Science and Technology (Conahcyt) funded through its Frontier Science call the project “The challenging coexistence of coupled socio-ecological systems; the fishing and oil industries in the Campeche Sonda”, since 2021.
With this project, a group of 40 people, —scientists, and students from various disciplines and institutions, including ECOSUR, the Instituto Superior de Centla, CONAHCYT-UNAM, the Autonomous University of Baja California and the Universidad Autónoma del Carmen— answers several important questions for the sustainable use of this marine space. One of the objectives is to detect and monitor the presence of oil on the surface of the sea to know the areas of the Gulf and the periods in which it occurs most frequently, for which we rely on the use of satellite images.
An indicator of the health status of the Gulf of Mexico
We identified the presence of hydrocarbon on the sea surface as one of the key indicators that should be monitored to determine the health status of ecosystems in the Gulf of Mexico. Something like the temperature in the human body.
Since 2021, in coordination with different Mexican academic institutions, we have implemented protocols to analyze public satellite images obtained every 3 or 4 days and, if an anomaly (stain) suspected of being oil is detected, the sea surface is recorded and categorized as a splash or anthropogenic spill in order to update the body of knowledge about this activity in the Gulf.
In the event that the origin of the stain is related to some human activity (platform, vessel, submarine pipeline, wells) and its dimension is larger than those commonly recorded, a map is created showing the location of the suspected stain and the interpretation in terms of its location, characteristics and level of certainty. Since September 2022, we began sending these reports to the competent authorities—SEMAR, ASEA, INAPESCA, CONANP and state agencies in the southern Gulf of Mexico—in order to provide them with scientific information on potential oil spill events with which they can assess situations and make appropriate decisions.
To date, more than 1,500 satellite images have been analyzed and 36 reports issued for suspected spills.
Always taking care of the quality of our work and aware of the economic and politically sensitive nature of the information we generate, all of the above has been done in accordance with international standards developed in a framework of multinational collaboration. For example, with the COAST Program, coordinated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), we interact in a learning and mutually reinforcing community in Mexico, the United States, Trinidad and Tobago, Peru and Colombia.
Citizen science
It is important to mention that in the project we also seek to promote citizen science processes that validate or rule out some suspicious spots based on information provided by the fishermen themselves about the area. With this, people who work and depend on fishing become key collaborators in the monitoring of marine spaces. In addition, to avoid risks to their health and equipment, they are provided with knowledge about the dynamics and extent of natural emissions that they already know in the sea, but that for the first time they can see on a map.
The importance of monitoring
This monitoring has proved useful in reporting the presence of hydrocarbons in significant quantities due to an oil spill in October 2019 in Cayo Arcas, prior to the formalization of this project, but with initial satellite monitoring efforts by the leading group; and in monitoring spill events on June 6 and July 4, 2023 in the Cantarell production area. The June event confirmed the intensity and extent of the spill stain over several days, the largest observed in almost 5 years of satellite monitoring of the area.
This systematic and independent monitoring of the presence of hydrocarbons on the surface of the Gulf of Mexico is an unprecedented effort in the country and of vital importance for several reasons. First, it adds to our scientific and technological sovereignty by providing unprecedented information on natural oil releases that create unique ecosystems in our seas and that are part of our biodiversity.
Then, it promotes scientific vocations in our universities and public research centers while addressing a national socio-environmental problem in energy and food issues. In this regard, aware of the importance of building local capacities, our team constantly trains undergraduate and graduate students to promote scientific vocations of national talents.
Then, by accompanying and adding to the intersectoral capacities of key actors in the government, civil society and the fishing sector, this monitoring effort innovates with the integration of local expert knowledge with systematically generated scientific data and information, and is a strategic approach to strengthening the capacities of management, territorial planning and co-management of our seas in a landscape where human communities are just another element of the system and are not alien to it.
Finally, as part of an exercise of transparency and strengthening of Mexican government institutions, the need and right of society to have universal access to knowledge of the conditions of our marine environment is addressed. This academic exercise to address socio-environmental problems provides key elements for the management of our seas and strengthens social responsibility for information about the conditions of the marine environment, which provides us with well-being due to its ecosystem functions and livelihood options for thousands of families in southeastern Mexico.
The health of the Gulf of Mexico belongs to all Mexicans.
Comentarios (0)