Source: The Conduqtor / CC BY-SA 3.0As oil platforms near the end of their service lives, researchers from the University of California (UC) Santa Barbara are seeking to determine the impact the decommissioned structures will have on surrounding fish populations that have transformed the structures into artificial reefs.

Faced with three potential solutions for handling decommissioned oil platforms in the ocean — which include options for leaving them intact, removing them entirely or removing only those components that are not underwater — the UC Santa Barbara team looked at data from 24 different oil platforms to make predictions about how fish populations might fare under the three different scenarios.

Using visual survey data and bottom-trawl data on the biomass and composition of fish that live along the underwater portions of the 24 oil platforms under observation, UC Santa Barbara researchers developed mathematical models to predict the outcomes of the three scenarios. According to the model, the complete removal of an oil platform could potentially reduce fish biomass by 95%. Meanwhile, the mathematical model predicted that fish biomass would be reduced by 10% with only the partial removal of the oil rig. As expected, leaving the structures intact would have little to no impact on the fish biomass, according to the research.

Such data is designed to inform decisions about the future of decommissioned oil platforms along with other factors such as cost.

The research appears in the journal Ecological Applications.