Prince William Sound: An Ecosystem in Transition

NOAA's Long-Term Monitoring Program

The March 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska, left an indelible mark on the American environmental consciousness. The images of heavily oiled shorelines, dead and dying wildlife, and the thousands of workers mobilized to clean beaches reflected what many people felt was the ultimate environmental insult in a previously pristine and biologically rich area. Since the spill, scientists, the public, and, inevitably, attorneys, have asked:

• What were the effects of the oil?
  
• Did the massive cleanup operations cause harm?
  
• How long will it take for Prince William Sound to recover?

NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration (NOAA OR&R) in Seattle continues to study the effects of oiling and cleanup in Prince William Sound, with the goal of improving response and cleanup activities in the future. Since 1989, teams of NOAA OR&R biologists, geologists, and chemists have studied the affected shorelines to understand how a system like Prince William Sound responds to and recovers from an incident like the Exxon Valdez spill.

This long-term monitoring program is the only one of its kind to have resulted from the spill, and remains the only study to continuously track the progress of recovery from the initial year to the present.

More Information Elsewhere

What is Recovery? Ecosystems are constantly adjusting themselves. Against that background, how can we identify recovery?

How Toxic Is Oil? There are many kinds of oil, and each is a complex mixture of chemicals. So how can oil toxicity be assessed?

What Is Weathering? The remaining Exxon Valdez oil ranges from very weathered to relatively fresh. What does this mean?

What about Salmon? Harvests of pink salmon have improved after years of poor production. But will the improvement prove to be temporary or long-term?

What We've Observed

Resiliency of the Sound Generally, the ecosystem of Prince William Sound has proved surprisingly resilient.

Remaining Impacts Impacts from the spill remain in Prince William Sound, in the form of oil still leaching from beaches and populations of plants and animals that haven't yet completely recovered.

Oil Remaining in the Environment Although little of the spilled oil remains, oily vestiges are still evident on many beaches.

An Ecosystem in Transition The plant and animal populations of the Sound seem to still be adjusting themselves in response to the spill.

Implications for Spill Response Some of the study's findings have changed our thinking about spill response.

The Future of NOAA's Monitoring Our monitoring study continued through the year 2000, with a smaller-scale, experimental research phase begun in 2001.