A comprehensive solution to the problem of ensuring a good environmental status of the marine environment across the coastal area that is adjacent to the northern part of the City of Odesa

Abstract

The research identifies and describes the most urgent problems associated with the anthropogenic impact on the sea's coastal zone affecting the northern part of the city of Odesa and the marine-origin water bodies that are adjacent to it, i.e. Odesa Bay of the north-western part of the Black Sea, the Khadzhybeiskyi and Kuialnytskyi Estuaries. These problems include: impossibility to discharge the return water coming from the municipal sewage biological treatment station (BTS) "Pivnichna” into the sea’s coastal zone or to use it economically wise as technical water because of insufficient degree of treatment; a high degree of water pollution and unsatisfactory environmental condition of the Khadzhybeiskyi Estuary that is adjacent to Odesa, increase of its water level to critical marks because of the constant flow to the estuary of return water from BTS "Pivnichna"; shallowing and potential complete drying up of the hypersaline Kuialnytskyi Estuary that may lead to loss of natural resources of the resort of state importance and salinization of its adjacent territories; periodic deterioration of the sea water quality within the coastal recreation area of Odesa, prohibition of swimming at certain beaches after heavy downpours because of influx into the sea of untreated stormwater runoff coming from the city. The research demonstrates that all these problems are interconnected to a certain extent and can be solved comprehensively in the course of implementation of a single strategy of environmental protection measures that are defined and substantiated in this article. The key and high-priority element of such strategy consists in modernization of sewage treatment facilities and introduction of modern technologies of advanced wastewater purification at BTS "Pivnichna”. It is recommended to include the constituent elements of the strategy into the Action plan to achieve and maintain the "good" environmental status of the Azov and Black Seas for the period 2022-2027 being jointly developed by the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine alongside with interested executive central and local bodies as part of implementation of the Marine Environmental Protection Strategy of Ukraine.