ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the impact of oil pollution on estuarine and coastal marine waters. While major oil spills and accidents are perceived by much of the public as a principal danger to estuarine and marine environments, it is the chronic oil pollution associated with routine operations of coastal oil refineries and oil installations, discharges of industrial and municipal wastes, that actually affect a greater area. R. B. Clark encapsulates the range of observed effects of oil pollution on annual and perennial plants inhabiting salt marshes. Both the inter- and subtidal habitats of estuaries are highly susceptible to oil pollution. Among the benthic invertebrates impacted by oil pollution, bivalve mollusks have received much attention. Marine mammals are less likely to be impacted by oil pollution than seabirds, although Clark writes of occasional reports of seal pups being oiled and possibly killed by crude or bunker oil.
