Title: Investigating the effectiveness of cotton wool and sponge on cleaning up oil spills Background research: What is a dispersant? A dispersant is a chemical that is used to break up oil into smaller droplets. They are often used in sea oil spills to help with clean up. Some people also use washing up liquid dispersant to break up the oil into smaller pieces, which can make it easier to clean up. But not all materials may be equally effective at cleaning up oil spills. Why did we choose cotton wool and sponge? Different materials can be used to clean up oil spills, such as cotton wool and sponge because they are absorbent but also easy to access and cheap. We selected sponge because it comes from the sea and cotton because it comes from plants. We did not want to use synthetic sponge because it could have its own harmful impact on the environment. Materials that are compostable would be better because they will break down on their own. What is the impact on the environment from oil spills? Oil spills can harm the environment and wildlife. It is important to clean them up as quickly and efficiently as possible. We researched the impact of the BP oil spill in 2010. National geographic stated that there were still long-term impacts from this to the marine life. Even after over 10 years there is still an impact, although this was a particularly large oil spill. What could be the impact for Oman? Oman has 3,165 km of coastline and uses this coastline for ports and business. Fishing is a big industry in Oman. All of these could be effected by an oil spill which could result in marine life dying and the water being polluted. It would also have an effect on businesses. This is why it is important that we understand how to clean up oil spills in the most efficient way. Hypothesis: We think that the cotton wool will be the most effective at cleaning up oil spills because it is absorbent. We also think that using washing up liquid as a dispersant will make cleaning up the oil spills easier for all materials. Method and equipment list: 4 small beakers 2 large beakers 2 measuring cylinders Pipette Vegetable oil Food colouring Salt Sponge Cotton wool Water Stopwatch Method: Step 1: we dissolved 6 spoons of salt into 400ml of water Step 2: we measured out 80 ml of the salt solution into four separate beakers Step 3: We added 10ml of oil to each beaker using a pipette Step 4: we added in 1 spoon of food colouring to each beaker and stirred it with a stirring rod Step 5: We placed the cotton wool and sponge into the first two beakers and timed it for 1 minute. We made sure not to push them down. We removed them after one minute and observed how much oil had been absorbed. Step 6: we added 4 drops of dispersant to the last 2 beakers and set a timer for 1 minute, placing the next pieces of sponge and cotton wool onto the top of the liquid. We observed how much of the oil had been absorbed. Results: Cotton wool no dispersant Sponge no dispersant Cotton wool with dispersant Sponge with dispersant Observations It sank below the oil slightly. It absorbed some water. Some oil was left on the top. It absorbed 20ml of liquid. The sponge floated on the surface. It absorbed the most oil and the least water. Some oil was left. It absorbed 10ml of liquid. It sank. It only absorbed some oil. It absorbed 25ml of liquid. The sponge sank. Left a lot of oil behind. Absorbed 30ml of liquid. Conclusions: We have concluded that the sponge with no dispersant was the best at absorbing the oil and not the salt solution. This is because it had the least oil left behind and the most salt solution remaining. It is important that not too much of the salt solution is absorbed. This is not what we predicted at the beginning. We thought that cotton wool with the dispersant would be the best. Evaluation: If we were to do this again we would make the following changes: Mix in the food colouring before adding the oil. This would have stopped the food colouring settling between the oil and the salt solution. We would weigh the salt to get a more accurate amount. We would use pipettes for the dispersant to also make it more accurate. We could have also measured the mass of the beakers before adding oil, after adding oil and after adding the cotton wool and sponge. This would have given us more accurate results for how much oil was being absorbed. We only had vegetable oil available which is very different to crude oil or a heavy fuel oil which we do not have available. These changes would help to make it the most efficient and reliable method to test out the materials used to clean oil spills. Bibliography: "Oil spills and marine pollution." National Ocean Service, NOAA, 21 Oct. 2021, https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/oilpollution.html "How to clean up an oil spill." BP, https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/sustainability/the-energyfuture/cleaning-up-oil-spills.html "Oil spill cleanup techniques." Spill Control Association of America, https://www.scaa-spill.org/technical/oil-spillcleanup-techniques/ Dispersants: https://www.epa.gov/emergencyresponse/dispersants#:~:text=Dispersants%2C%20also%20called%20dispersing%20agents,from%2 0a%20well%20blowout%20source. BP oil spill: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/how-is-wildlife-doing-now--ten-years-afterthe-deepwater-horizon fishing in Oman: https://www.omanobserver.om/article/1123799/opinion/business/fish-farming-can-havebeneficial-impacts-for-the-omani-economy
