Abstract
This study analyzed the fluorometric laboratory tests for the detection of the presence of oil in seawater in cases corresponding to the real situation in the sea: when the point of seawater sampling is not in the same place as the appropriate sensor. The phenomenon of fluorescence exhibited by both natural and alien substances (oil) in the sea was used. The possibility of oil detection in the water column based on a fluorometric index (FI) extracted from the excitation–emission matrix (EEM) was studied. Laboratory tests were carried out on water taken from the Gulf of Gdańsk (Baltic Sea). Seawater samples were contaminated with small amounts of various types of oil (the lowest oil-to-water ratio was 0.5 × 10−6). A statistically significant difference was found between FI values for uncontaminated seawater and seawater exposed to various kinds of oil (i.e., crude oils, lubricant oils, and fuels).
Highlights
Oil pollution is an ongoing problem for the marine environment
Activities aimed at limiting the share of oil substances polluting the marine environment include the possibility of early detection before they spread in the sea
In cases when the oil has spread in the sea and flows deeper into the sea under the influence of the wind and waves, different methods based on UV-visible, IR, and Raman spectroscopy, or those based on oil fluorescence [15,16,17,18], are required for the detection of oil substances
Summary
Oil pollution is an ongoing problem for the marine environment. this issue was significantly reduced as a result of the MARPOL Convention [1]: tanker construction was improved, strict standards for oil discharges were established, a legal system of deterioration was developed, and methods for the early detection of oils on the sea surface were improved. In the scientific literature, the issues of remote detection of oil stains appearing at sea are widely discussed [6,7,8]. Both optical and radar methods [3,9,10,11,12,13,14] are well developed in this field. Activities aimed at limiting the share of oil substances polluting the marine environment include the possibility of early detection before they spread in the sea. For underwater oil pollution detection, different sensors can be used [19,20,21,22,23]
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