Chronic oil pollution in Europe - International Fund for Animal Welfare

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8 2. Summary Chronic Oil Pollution in Europe Measuring the scale and impact of chronic oil pollution • Beached-bird surveys have been routinely conducted in many European countries over the past decades, enabling a proper historical evaluation of temporal trends in marine oil pollution. • Oil rates in seabirds found dead on beaches are highest in areas bordering shipping lanes. • Significant declines in oil rates have been found over the past 30 years. • Aerial surveys are an instrument to measure oil pollution more directly and the results confirm that most oil slicks are formed in the vicinity of the major shipping lanes. These surveys have generally confirmed the declining trend of oil slick occurrence, but long-term comparable data are not readily available for analysis. • Recent technology offers the possibility to detect oil slicks from space. This technology is particularly promising for the future, but long-term trends cannot be deduced from these data at the moment. • Despite good intentions and collaboration from different countries, an international overview of oil pollution is impeded by difficulties in harmonising the available data. Recent initiatives by the EC Joint Research Centre to develop standard nomenclature and an on-line database are described. • OSPAR introduced a series of Ecological Quality Objectives to monitor characteristic parameters in the marine environment. EcoQOs are intended to act as monitoring guidelines until a set target has been reached. • The oiled-guillemot EcoQO, soon to be implemented, is intended as an instrument for monitoring chronic oil pollution in 15 European sub-regions. The objective of this particular EcoQO is defined as follows: “The average proportion of oiled common guillemots should be 10% or less of the total found dead or dying in each of 15 areas of the North Sea over a period of at least 5 years. Sampling should occur in all winter months (November to April) of each year.” We would expect that this will motivate the development and implementation of similar monitoring tools (and policy targets) in other parts of Europe. Chronic oil pollution in Europe • The sources of chronic oil pollution are diverse and estimates of total quantities vary widely. • Two aspects deserve attention: oil pollution has declined over the past decades, but illegal discharges by vessels are still a major source of the chronic oil pollution currently observed. • The EC JRC oil spill database, presented on the web at http://serac.jrc.it/midiv/, is consulted to evaluate recent developments in chronic oil pollution. Composite maps of the Special Areas within Europe (the Black Sea, the Mediterranean, the Baltic and the North Sea) show the locations of nearly 20,000 oil slicks detected over a period of six years (only three years in some areas). • The recent data from high tech remote sensing equipment provide a very clear signal that European waters are by no means free of oil spills. Sensitive species, sensitive areas • Oil Vulnerability Indices (OVI) are widely used to rank species in terms of vulnerability to oil. Important parameters are behaviour, exposure, biogeographical population, reproductive potential, and reliance on the marine environment. OVIs should preferably be calculated at the subspecies level. • OVIs have not been calculated for numerous European taxa of seabirds.
• Recent work assessing the sensitivity of different sea areas to oil pollution has been evaluated. Key information needed consists of the OVIs of the species living in the area, and adequate (offshore) census data to evaluate spatial and temporal patterns of abundance at sea. • Possible changes in the (wintering) distribution of seabirds should be taken into consideration with regard to the vulnerability of certain areas, and a deeper understanding of offshore habitat requirements is therefore needed. • The Greenland Sea, Icelandic waters, Bay of Biscay, Portuguese and Spanish Atlantic coasts, Macaronesia, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea are data-deficient in terms of knowledge regarding their sensitivity to oil pollution. • Knowledge pertaining to the sensitivity of the Barents Sea, Norwegian Sea, Channel and Celtic Sea is partly data-deficient. • The North Sea, Irish Sea, waters west of Britain, Faeroese waters and the Baltic Sea are well studied and their sensitivity to oil pollution has been evaluated. The effects of chronic oil pollution on seabird populations • The effects of oil spills on seabirds have often been exaggerated in the past. • Adequate surveys, coupled with drift experiments and accurate information on the age structure of oil spill casualties and their possible (breeding) origin are required to enable a proper evaluation of the scale and impact of accidental or chronic oil pollution on seabirds. • Oil pollution is a major threat to seabirds mainly in their European wintering areas. • Direct effects on seabird populations, such as on survival rates and age structure, are rarely detected because specific long-term studies involving individually marked birds need to be in place in the area affected by the spill before it actually happens. • A recent review of major oil spills revealed that adequate data usually have been collected but those post-spill evaluations making use of that data tend to be rare. • Recent studies showed that winter mortality of adult guillemots was doubled by major oil pollution incidents, demonstrating that oil pollution can have wide-scale impacts on marine ecosystems, and that these impacts can be quantified using populations of marked individual seabirds. Law and programs to reduce levels of oil pollution, and minimising the effects of spills • The UN Convention for the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) has recognised pollution from vessels as one of the main threats to the marine environment. In response, UNCLOS has established the framework for the multi-lateral development of rules and standards acting mainly through the competent international organization, namely the International Maritime Organization (IMO). The IMO has adopted several instruments to control the environmental impact of shipping, the most important being the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL 73/78). • Within Europe, “Special Areas” have been identified under MARPOL (Annex I) as waters where oil discharges are essentially illegal. Special Area status within Europe was applied to the Mediterranean, Black, and Baltic seas in 1978. The marine region corresponding to North West European waters (mainly the North Sea) was designated as a Special Area in 1999. • The designation of Special Areas under MARPOL is a significant step, but without enforcement, such legislation is pointless. 2. Summary Chronic Oil Pollution in Europe 9
Page 1 and 2: Chronic oil pollution in Europe Kee
Page 3 and 4: Table of contents List of abbreviat
Page 5 and 6: List of abbreviations and acronyms
Page 7: 2. Summary This report reviews rece
Page 11 and 12: 3. Recommendations 3.1 National IFA
Page 13 and 14: • Following the proposals from th
Page 15 and 16: An effect of oil pollution that rea
Page 17 and 18: 5. Chronic oil pollution as an issu
Page 19 and 20: Table 2 Average worldwide annual re
Page 21 and 22: c. Offshore platforms versus transp
Page 23 and 24: Type two casualties are heavily oil
Page 25 and 26: 6. Measuring the scale and impact o
Page 27 and 28: The ICES Working Group for Seabird
Page 29 and 30: Figure 5 North Sea Oil Rate Analysi
Page 31 and 32: d. Detecting oil spills from space
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Page 43 and 44: Anker-Nilssen (1987) assessed 17 fa
Page 45 and 46: Moderately sensitive seabirds are p
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Page 49 and 50: . Counts and drift experiments as t
Page 51 and 52: In cases when “floaters” buffer
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Page 55 and 56: MARPOL 73/78 legally recognized tha
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comply with this body of environmen
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• The sensitivity of European wat
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12. References Abelló P. & D. Oro
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Camphuysen C.J. 1990a. Verstrikking
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European Commission 2005. Third Mar
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Kies B. & T. Tomek 1990. Bird morta
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Patin S. 1999. Environmental impact
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Verwey J. 1915. De Trekvogels, de O
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Appendix II Overall breeding (B) an
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Appendix II English name Genus Spec
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Faeroese waters - recently well cov
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Portuguese and Spanish Atlantic coa
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f. Ghost nets Nets that become lost
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IFAW EU Office Boulevard Charlemagn
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