Quote Originally Posted by Frank S View Post
After the fires were finally extinguished in Kuwait a huge area in the desert was slick with a thick coating of the spilled oil When we first arrive there in 2003 the ground was still black out there by the time we left in 2013 a lot of that area was showing signs of sparse vegetation taking root the oil was slowly being broken down by the UV rays of the sun and the sparse rainfall into enzymes adding nutrients into sand that had never grown anything.
On our family farm when I was a kid, we poured our old oil along the fence rows for weed control. Years later we noticed that had backfired horribly as grass and weeds grew faster along there the oils had been poured than anywhere else.
Given enough time nature will correct all of man's mistakes it just takes longer to break down the many additives put in motor oils
That's really interesting about the motor oil for vegetation control. It was common to spray oil on dirt roads for dust control when I used to work in the Alberta oil patch. It worked really well.

So interesting story. In about 2008 there was a big forest fire here. Fire crews used foam to help put out the fire. Normally after a fire all the vegetation is supercharged, and you can practically watch it growing. Not after the foam. Absolutely nothing grew for the first dozen or so years, and it has only recently started to turn green. Whatever was in that foam really did a number on the soil, and what's more worrying is that it's persistent.