When we look at the planet we live it is becomes obvious why sixty percent of our gas and oil needs are being met by offshore oil production. Over seventy percent of this planet is water and with the way our oil needs keep going up while the reserves deplete it makes sense that the water is where we have turned to answer our needs. There are over a hundred and twenty places around the world where there are working offshore oil wells.



Offshore oil production is not as simple a procedure as drilling into the ground to find oil. This type of oil well requires an oil platform. An oil platform is where the machinery and the people work in the middle of a place where there is no land. It is sometimes freestanding, like a little island, or it can be physically fixed in place to the floor of the ocean. The platform would be not only the base of operations for the drilling, but would also have a place for the workers to live. Often the platforms have other wells attached to them through pipelines.

One of the biggest concerns about offshore oil production is the environmental issues. One particular problem occurs when it is time to take the oil platforms down. Often they are not completely removed. Instead only enough is taken away when the well is done with to permit ships to easily pass over them. The remainder of the structure is still in place below the water line, and can create other types of problems in the long run. For instance, the remaining structures are all too frequently still a problem for fishing boats, since the nets go much deeper than the boats themselves. Too many cases have been reported of nets getting caught on the parts of the platforms that remain below the water and getting torn, or not being able to get unhooked. There is also some concern about what the remaining structure does to the natural habitat of the sea. Interestingly enough, some researchers do not want them taken down any further because they believe them to be a safe haven for many underwater species. Others think that the structures are not conducive to the gradual creation of underwater habitats and that leaving the structures behind does more harm than good. Time will tell which of the two camps had it right all along.