Oil spill response capabilities and technologies for ice-covered Arctic marine waters: A review of recent developments and established practices

Jeremy Wilkinson,Alun Lewis,Mark Reed,Karl-Ulrich Evers,Nick Hughes,Cj Beegle-Krause,Peter Wadhams

doi:10.1007/s13280-017-0958-y

Abstract

Renewed political and commercial interest in the resources of the Arctic, the reduction in the extent and thickness of sea ice, and the recent failings that led to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, have prompted industry and its regulatory agencies, governments, local communities and NGOs to look at all aspects of Arctic oil spill countermeasures with fresh eyes. This paper provides an overview of present oil spill response capabilities and technologies for ice-covered waters, as well as under potential future conditions driven by a changing climate. Though not an exhaustive review, we provide the key research results for oil spill response from knowledge accumulated over many decades, including significant review papers that have been prepared as well as results from recent laboratory tests, field programmes and modelling work. The three main areas covered by the review are as follows: oil weathering and modelling; oil detection and monitoring; and oil spill response techniques.

Highlights

Politics, economics and climate change are the driving forces behind the ‘industrialisation’ of the Arctic marine environment
Whilst we have seen a substantial increase in Arctic fisheries and tourism, the recent slump in world oil prices combined with the need to reduce our carbon footprint in line with the legally binding Paris Climate Agreement has potentially reduced the attractiveness of investment in the Arctic
This study found that the dogs were able to pinpoint the locations of very small oil spills that had been left for a week, determine the dimensions of larger oil spills consisting of clusters of small spills and indicate the direction to larger spills up to 5 kilometres away upwind

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Economics and climate change are the driving forces behind the ‘industrialisation’ of the Arctic marine environment. Modelled oil trajectories can be validated against daily spread of oil as detected by satellite or airborne sensors Few such datasets are presently available for the ice-covered seas, the ‘best’ in recent years being the spill from the loss of the MV Runner 4 in the Gulf of Bothnia (Wang et al 2008) and the MV Godafoss in Norway in 2011 (Brostrom et al 2011). In May 2009, a combination of industry and research partners undertook fieldwork off eastern Svalbard as part of a Joint Industry Program (JIP) project on oil spill contingency for Arctic and ice-covered waters (Babiker et al 2010) This acquired different types of SAR imagery, including Envisat ASAR, Radarsat-1 and -2 and COSMO SkyMed, to assess oil in ice detection for single- and dualpolarisations. The acoustic systems were able to accurately measure the thickness of oil below the ice, a valuable trait for oil recovery operations

Summary of oil detection and monitoring

Summary of oil spill response techniques

Findings

CONCLUSIONS