A climate-change resistant Red Sea reef is being flooded with toxic wastewater, leaked documents show.
The leaked documents indicate Egypt's government has known about the wastewater problem since at least 2019, after British oil company BP sold its 50% stake in the plant to United Arab Emirates' firm, Dragon Oil. The other 50% is owned by Egypt's state oil company.
BP told the BBC the sale of its share of Gupco was for financial reasons, not as part of any plan to meet climate targets. It referred questions about the wastewater to Gupco.Access to the facilities at Ras Shukeir is restricted to oil workers and government inspectors. However, the BBC was able to use satellite images to examine the extent of the water pollution.
That same green plume is visible in the earliest satellite image the BBC could find, from 1985, indicating that the oil terminal may have been dumping "produced water" into the Red Sea for decades. It still appears in the most recent image of the plant, from September 2022. Dr Gera Troisi, a lecturer at Brunel University London who studies the effects of toxins on organisms, says compounds contained in "produced water" can react with sea water, absorb oxygen, and suffocate even the most resilient marine life.
Some scientists believe Red Sea coral could hold the secret to saving coral around the world. One of them, oceanographer Sylvia Earle, says more research is needed to find out what makes this coral less vulnerable to rising temperatures. Scientists, both in Egypt and internationally, have recommended the area where Gupco operates should be included in a new extended marine protection zone in the Red Sea, to cover the whole an area known as the Great Fringing Reef. Currently about 50% of the reef is in the zone.
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