The Barcelona Convention and Its Role in Oil Pollution Prevention in the Mediterranean Sea

Abstract

An oil spill, whether via dumping from ships and aircraft, from operational or accidental discharge, from land-based sources or from offshore commercial activities, is an event that has been portrayed by both academics and environmental specialists as a form of “disaster” that causes irreparable damage to the marine environment. The Mediterranean region, like other regions of the globe, is considered to have unique marine features that make the region particularly vulnerable to oil pollution, and hence, there is a dire need for a framework that can assist the coastal states to combine their efforts when trying to prevent, abate, combat and eliminate all potential and actual threats from oil pollution. With the burgeoning concern regarding pollution caused by oil and generic substances, the Barcelona Convention and its Protocols appear as a legislative “soft law” tool that has the full potential, if implemented at the national level, to tackle oil pollution from all potential sources. There is a certain cadence in the way the Barcelona Convention and its Protocols have emerged over time, inevitably forming the most appropriate basis for the coastal states of the Mediterranean Sea area to take actions from a platform that can be labelled as “collaborative”. As such, the Barcelona Convention and the Protocols relevant to oil pollution speak to those states as beginning with the notion that efforts to deal with oil pollution need to be combined. They also prescribe how those states can limit and intervene promptly. This prescription is also coupled with a form of recognition that there ought to be a consistent approach when dealing with an element that has a diametric personality, i.e. advantageous when used for operational purposes and disadvantageous when there is a spill. This chapter provides an overview of the Barcelona Convention and proceeds with an incisive examination of the Protocols that provide guidance to states on how to protect and preserve the Mediterranean marine environment from oil pollution.