Press release
Helsinki, 1 June (HELCOM Information Service) – Several small illegal discharges of oil were detected during the Helsinki Commission’s international CEPCO North 2007 aerial surveillance exercise, which took place on 29-31 May over the north-eastern parts of the Baltic Sea.
Four aircraft from Estonia, Finland, Latvia and Sweden participated in the flights, during which they continuously surveyed the agreed route for oil pollution. In the first two days, the operation was hampered by thunderstorms in the Gulf of Finland and the Archipelago Sea. As a result, the surveillance planes had fewer hours to fly than originally planned. The initial plan was to have 28 hours of continuous surveillance with two planes flying along the route every four hours.
Most of the spills were observed in the beginning of the operation using satellite imagery. Five spills were detected in four satellite pictures taken off the eastern coast of Gotland (Sweden) on 29-30 May, and one spill was detected to the west of the island of Hiiumaa (Estonia) during the aerial surveillance flights on 31 May.
The exercise was organised by the Finnish Border Guard and the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE). The base airport for CEPCO North flights this year was in Turku (Finland). Remote sensing equipment, such as side looking radars (SLAR), infrared (IR) and ultraviolet (UV) cameras, were used during the operation.
The spills have been recognized to contain only minor amounts of oil. Due to heavy ship traffic in the area no suspects have been identified so far.
During the last CEPCO North flights in 2005 five spills were detected. Two of them were considered of a large scale: one had been evaluated to contain over 30 cubic meters, another at least 1.5 cubic meter of oil.
CEPCO (Coordinated Extended Pollution Control Operation) flights are arranged annually by HELCOM in the Baltic Sea: one in the South and one in the North. During CEPCO flights several HELCOM countries jointly carry out continuous aerial surveillance activities for 24 hours or more along the prefixed flight patterns with high likelihood of operational spills. CEPCO flights are also intended to support national aerial surveillance data by detecting also those illegal discharges which would not be disclosed by regular national surveillance activities and thus get a realistic estimation of the total number of oil spills discharged to the Baltic Sea during one randomly selected day.
The total number of illegal oil discharges from ships annually observed by national surveillance planes in the Baltic Sea area increased slightly in 2006, but still remains near record lows, according to the HELCOM study.
According to the latest national annual reports provided by the Member States to HELCOM, there were 236 illicit oil spills detected during a total of 5,128 hours of surveillance flights conducted by the coastal countries over the Baltic Sea during 2006, compared to 224 discharges observed during 5,637 air patrol hours in 2005. Despite the increase, this is still the second lowest number since 1999, when 488 discharges were detected during 4,883 air patrol hours.
“Over the past eight years we have achieved a 50% reduction in the number of illegal oil discharges despite the rapidly growing density of shipping in the Baltic Sea,” says Anne Christine Brusendorff, HELCOM’s Executive Secretary. “We attribute this fact to the success of the complex set of measures known as the Baltic Strategy to prevent illegal discharges of oil and waste into the Baltic Sea, which the HELCOM Member States have been implementing since the late 1990s.”
Deliberate oil discharges from ships have been regularly observed during surveillance flights over the Baltic Sea since 1988. One of the peak years was 1989, when 763 spills were detected during 3,491 flight hours. As from 1999 the number of discharges has been steadily decreasing.
In 2006, most of the illegal oil discharges were detected along major shipping routes. Up to 86% of the discharges were smaller than one cubic metre. Only one discharge of more than 100 cubic metres of oil (in the south-western Baltic) and two of over 10 cubic meters (in the Gulf of Finland) were detected last year, compared to two discharges of over 100 cubic metres and four of over 10 cubic metres in 2005.
Regular aerial surveillance flights have contributed significantly to the decrease in discharges, as ships are aware that their illicit polluting activities can be detected. The HELCOM aerial surveillance fleet today consists of more than 20 airplanes and helicopters, many of them equipped with remote sensing equipment such as side-looking airborne radar (SLAR), infrared (IR) and ultraviolet (UV) cameras, photo and video equipment. HELCOM also uses satellite surveillance to detect illegal polluters.
The main objectives of the Baltic Strategy, which was operationalized by the HELCOM Ministerial Meeting in 1998, are to ensure ships' compliance with global and regional discharge regulations and to eliminate illegal discharges into the sea of all wastes from all ships, and thus prevent pollution of the Baltic Sea. Another objective is to ensure an environmentally sound treatment of ship-generated wastes when these wastes have been delivered to port reception facilities ashore.
Today, all discharges into the Baltic Sea of oil, or diluted mixtures containing oil in any form, including crude oil, fuel oil, oil sludge, or refined products, are prohibited. This prohibition stems from the international designation of the Baltic Sea as a “special area” under the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL 73/78).
To uphold this prohibition, HELCOM requires all ships, with a few exceptions, to deliver all such oily wastes to reception facilities before leaving port. To further encourage delivery, the countries bordering the Baltic Sea have agreed that ships should not be charged for using such reception facilities, under the “no-special-fee” system. Costs are instead recovered from general harbour fees or general environmental fees, for instance.
The increased amounts of wastes now being delivered to the Baltic Sea ports illustrate that more and more ships are delivering their oily wastes to port reception facilities rather than illegally discharging them into the Baltic Sea.
Follow-up: 2006 HELCOM report on illegal discharges observed during aerial surveillance http://www.helcom.fi/stc/files/shipping/spills2006.pdf
Note to Editors:
The Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission, more usually known as the Helsinki Commission, or HELCOM, is an intergovernmental organisation of all the nine Baltic Sea countries and the EU which works to protect the marine environment of the Baltic Sea from all sources of pollution.
HELCOM is the governing body of the "Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area," known as the Helsinki Convention.
For more information, please contact:
Ms. Monika Stankiewicz
Professional Secretary
HELCOM
Tel: +358 (0)207 412 643
Fax: +358 (0)207 412 639
E-mail: monika.stankiewicz@helcom.fi
Mr. Nikolay Vlasov
Information Secretary
HELCOM
Tel: +358 (0)207 412 635
Fax: +358 (0)207 412 639
E-mail: nikolay.vlasov@helcom.fi