Ever since the oil leak at Ein Evrona, the company has been working tirelessly to rehabilitate the nature reserve. EAPC has not spared resources or actions to rehabilitate the nature reserve, and enlists competent local and international help on a regular basis to proceed in the most professional and efficient manner possible for the location and the circumstances. EAPC’s clean-up operations in the Ein Evrona nature reserve began on the day of the incident, and will continue until the nature reserve’s rehabilitation. Its operations are in several spheres:
Stopping the leak and pumping up the oil from the soil
From the detection of the leak, EAPC’s teams worked around the clock to stop the flow of oil and to pump it up from the ground’s surface, at points where it had accumulated in puddles and in gullies.

Soil

As part of the land rehabilitation efforts following the leak, several measures were taken to clean up the soil and to improve it so that it can continue to serve as a habitat for flora and fauna living in the nature reserve.

Over 55,000 tons of contaminated soil were removed from areas inside and outside the nature reserve.

Soil cleanup pilot

On December 17, 2014, EAPC and the Israel Nature and Parks Authority (INPA) issued a joint public statement calling on companies specializing in soil cleanup technologies to submit proposals for solutions to clean up the soil at the Ein Evrona nature reserve. Companies that met the threshold conditions defined by the INPA were invited to conduct a feasibility test on a strip of land allocated for this purpose. EAPC and the INPA are currently working on the terms of the tender for cleaning up the entire affected area in the nature reserve.

Scarification and wetting of the soil

As part of the nature reserve rehabilitation process, different courses of action for rehabilitating the soil are being investigated. One of the ways currently being explored is a technique for cleaning up contaminated strips of land by natural means, without the use of chemicals, by means of soil scarification (loosening the soil layers, turning over the soil and crumbling it), and wetting the soil with water. This trial was conducted by the INPA in collaboration with EAPC.

The advantages of this method, generally accepted practice worldwide, are clearly evident: it enables soil rehabilitation without the use of chemical substances, airing of the soil and renewal of microorganism activity, better water drainage of the plant rhizosphere on the land strips, and creates a soft bed that enables plant roots to grow comfortably and robustly.

Flora

The concern arose that the layer of oil created over the soil following the leak creates a “barrier” making it difficult for seeds and plants to germinate, as they are unable to break through the compacted soil layer (due to the presence of the oil). Because of this concern, EAPC paid for a soil chelator to break the sealed crust of the soil surface. The chelator creates intervals that enable the penetration of air and moisture to allow the germination of new flora.

Fauna

Shortly after the free crude oil was pumped up, the land that had absorbed the crude oil was removed, the fauna at Ein Evrona was observed to have started to resume routine life. The annual deer count conducted by the INPA after the event indicated unequivocally that the deer population had not been hurt.

REHABILITATION