Fate of Crude and Refined Oils in North Slope Soils

Résumé

Prudhoe Bay crude oil and refined diesel fuel were applied to five topographically distinct tundra soils at Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. The penetration of hydrocarbons into the soil column depended on soil moisture and drainage characteristics. Biodegradation, shown by changes in the pristane to heptadecane and resolvable to total gas chromatographic area ratios, appeared to be greatly restricted in drier tundra soils during one year exposure. Some light hydrocarbons, C9-C10, were recovered from soils one year after spillages. Hydrocarbons were still present in soils at Fish Creek, Alaska, contaminated by refined oil spillages 28 years earlier, attesting to the persistence of hydrocarbons in North Slope soils.