Naturally Occurring Oil Spills?

I tried to see if this question had been asked and answered anywhere on this site, but could not find anything. So:

If the current oil disaster is giving any indication of the size of oil deposits that exist beneath our oceans, it would seem improbable that this has not happened before, but by "Natural Means".

In other words, with the constant geological shifting and quaking that goes on, wouldn't this have happened over and over in the past? A crack here, a breach there.

And, if so, why is there no evidence of it? And, if it has happened over and over, why aren't our oceans destroyed already?

So, I was hoping that some knowledgeable member, or members, might be able to chime in on this.

Thank you.

MP

Petroleum seeps are quite common: California has thousands of naturally occurring seeps. Much of the petroleum discovered in California during the 19th century was from observations of seeps. The world's largest natural oil seepage is Coal Oil Point in the Santa Barbara Channel, California. Two of the better known tar seep locations in California are McKittrick and the La Brea Tar Pits.

Source

The Coal Oil Point seep is around 100-150 barrels per day. A literal drop in the bucket compared to Deepwater Horizon. I don't know about any larger, historical seeps.

[edit on 6/21/2010 by abecedarian]

I don't know but would like to. It's simply logical that there are naturally occurring leaks in low amounts that nature can handle and absord/cleanse. Who I'd particularly love to hear from those on this board who make the claim that this is nothing out of the ordinary...that oil rigs leak "all the time." Things like amounts would be helpful.

Pitch Lake in Trinidad is pretty big. there are even some extremophiles that actually not only live in the muck, but actually thrive. I was about booted off the boards for merely pointing out that the natural gas deposits are merely a product of mother nature herself.

Originally posted by ~Lucidity
I don't know but would like to. It's simply logical that there are naturally occurring leaks in low amounts that nature can handle and absord/cleanse. Who I'd particularly love to hear from those on this board who make the claim that this is nothing out of the ordinary...that oil rigs leak "all the time." Things like amounts would be helpful.

Ive hear that they all leak a bit here and there, but comparing that to what is happening now is beyond rediculous. I tried my google-fu on gettint the average that I heard before (if i remember correctly just a couple barrels a day at the most) but having anything with "oil" and "leak" in the keywords just bring up BP stuff and I dont feel like digging that hard. I too would like to know how much of this stuff leaks out naturally (oil that is, i do realize that methane is quite common actually).

Froma report done in 2000 there was an estimate of over 500,000 barrels per year from natural seep into the Gulf of Mexico.

Originally oil exploration was largely accomplished by drilling around natural seeps.

Roberto Debaca recaulked his ship using tar balls from the beach at Port Isabelle in 1519.

Despite all the mass hysteria, when the relief wells kill the blowout, it appears alot of the spill will be flushed out of the gulf by the gulf stream & hopefully the oil eating bacteria will return the gulf to a semblance of normality over time.

Originally posted by Mr Pliskin
And, if so, why is there no evidence of it?

Let me guess ... Because the dinosaurs are no longer with us to tell us about the last time it happened?

I just figured that this must have happened many times before. Maybe on the same, or an even larger scale.
So, I wondered if there was any evidence of this. And, I was also thinking that, if it has happened many times before, there might be some kind of natural mechanism the Earth has used to deal with it in the past.

reply to post by Mr Pliskin


I've wondered about that myself. With so much oil under the oceans and under such pressures, you'd think that, on a scale of thousands or millions of years, something of this magnitude could actually happen naturally. One massive earthquake in the wrong place seems like it could do the job, for example.

Like you, I don't know if there's any evidence that it has ever happened, but it seems plausible. In fact, given that the earth will slowly break down oil compounds, it may be that it has happened in the distant past several times, but the evidence has long been swept away. Who knows.

[edit on 24-6-2010 by vor78]