SPILLS OF NONFLOATING OILS — RISKS AND RESPONSE

Nowadays, maritime accidents resulting in oil spills are on the very top of the list of public environmental concerns. Such oil spills are extremely difficult to control and they may eventually contaminate the marine environment. Once the oil is spilled, it immediately undergoes significant chemical, physical and biological changes, being degraded by the bacteria. And the most serious problem is that most of the modern technologies of spill recovery, that are used today, are not too effective.

In case of an oil spill, only ten or fifteen percent of the oil is usually recovered with the best rates being about thirty percent - for sure, that is too far from satisfactory figures. The main objectives of the present work are to assess the most important threats that are posed by transportation of the "heavy" oil (i.e. one with the specific gravity >1) by sea and to assess the adequacy of the existing cleanup technologies, to recommend the new researches in order to develop new cleanup techniques, to identify the barriers to the most effective responses to the oil spills and recommend the measures (financial, management or technological) that would assist in promoting prompt and effective responses to the "heavy" oil spills...