Queensland: Oil depots spewing black smoke. Debris sinking in the Persian Gulf. Missiles pounding military sites. The Iran war has unleashed a toxic mix of chemicals, heavy metals and other pollutants that threaten everything from agriculture to drinking water to people’s health — and will leave behind environmental damage and health risks that could persist for decades, experts said.
“All the burning of oil and gas fields in the coastal areas, all the ships that are there, the oil tankers that are being burned or (sunk) — all of these mean pollution,” said Kaveh Madani, an Iranian scientist and director of the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health. “For someone like me who has fought for sustainability and protection of the environment in that region, this is like going many years backward.”
Documenting the damage has proved daunting, with a full accounting impossible for now, said Doug Weir, director of the Conflict and Environment Observatory, a U.K.-based nonprofit that monitors environmental harms from armed conflicts. The group uses remote satellite sensing and open-source intelligence to identify damage and score environmental risks to people, ecosystems and agricultural land. So far, it has recorded more than 400 environmentally concerning incidents related to the war, though much is still unknown due to delays in satellite imagery and an internet blackout in Iran, Weir said. Attacks on oil- and gas-related sites create some of the worst environmental risks because of impacts to air quality and soil and water pollution, as well as health threats to people. Harder to quantify are risks from bombed military sites, some of which are deeply buried and some near populated areas, adding to “huge uncertainties” around potential impacts, Weir said.
Perhaps the most enduring images of the war are of darkened skies from oil infrastructure set ablaze by airstrikes, including two weeks ago when black rain fell near Tehran, Iran’s capital.
Soot, ash and toxic chemicals from strikes on fuel depots and a refinery combined with water droplets in the atmosphere and fell back to Earth as an oily, acidic rain that prompted warnings to stay indoors. Microscopic soot raises risks of lung and heart problems, while toxic chemicals pose long-term cancer risks and heavy metals from the fallout could contaminate soil and water supplies, experts said. Debris and contamination from missiles, as well as potential strikes on manufacturing facilities also could unleash harmful pollution, experts said.
“If you hit an ammonia-producing plant for fertilizer or for food production ... those release chemicals that are absolutely toxic,” said Mohammed Mahmoud, head of Middle East Climate and Water Policy with the United Nations University Institute of Water, Environment and Health.