How, then, does oil enter the marine environment in other ways?
• Sources of oil input to the marine environment are often divided into natural, sea-based and land-based sources. • Natural sources of oil in the marine environment are places where crude oil and natural gas seep naturally out of fissures in the ocean seabed and eroding sedimentary rock. These seeps are natural springs where liquid and gaseous hydrocarbons leak out of the ground (like springs that ooze oil and gas instead of water). • [READ MORE] • Land-based sources include discharges of untreated or insufficiently treated municipal sewage and storm water (urban runoff); discharges with rivers; discharges of untreated or insufficiently treated waste water from coastal industries; accidental or operational discharges of oil from coastal refineries, oil storage facilities, oil terminals, and reception facilities; emissions of gaseous hydrocarbons from oil-handling onshore facilities (terminals, refineries, filling stations) and from vehicles exhausts (traffic). • [READ MORE] • Sea-base
