COMPLEX MONITORING OF OIL POLLUTION IN THE BALTIC, BLACK AND CASPIAN SEAS Kostianoy A.G. (1) , Lavrova O.Yu. (2) , Mityagina M.I. (2) , Bocharova T.Yu. (2) , Litovchenko K.Ts. (3) , Lebedev S.A. (4, 5) , Stanichny S.V. (6) , Soloviev D.M. (6) , Sirota A.M. (7) (1) P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology, Russian Academy of Sciences, 36 Nakhimovsky Pr., Moscow, 117997, Russia, E-mail: kostianoy@mail.mipt.ru (2) Russian Space Research Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia, E-mail: olavrova@iki.rssi.ru (3) Russian Research Institute for Space Instrument-Making, Moscow, Russia, E-mail: konlit@mail.ru (4) Geophysical Center, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia, E-mail: lebedev@wdcb.ru (5) State Oceanographic Institute, Moscow, Russia (6) Marine Hydrophysical Institute, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Sevastopol, Ukraine E-mail: sstanichny@mail.ru (7) Atlantic Research Institute for Fishery and Oceanography, Kaliningrad, Russia E-mail: amsirota@dialoglan.ru ABSTRACT Since 1993 there is no regular aerial surveillance of the oil spills in the Russian sector of the southeastern Baltic Sea and in the Gulf of Finland, as well as in the Black and Caspian seas. In June 2003 LUKOIL- Kaliningradmorneft initiated a pilot project, aimed to the complex monitoring of the southeastern Baltic Sea, in connection with a beginning of oil production at continental shelf of Russia in March 2004. Satellite monitoring in operational regime was performed in June 2004 – November 2005 on the base of daily satellite remote sensing (AVHRR NOAA, MODIS, TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1, ENVISAT ASAR and RADARSAT SAR imagery) of SST, sea level, chlorophyll concentration, mesoscale dynamics, wind and waves, and oil spills. As a result a complex information on oil pollution of the sea, sea surface temperature, distribution of suspended matter, chlorophyll concentration, sea currents and meteorological parameters has been received. 1. INTRODUCTION As highlighted by Oceana in its report “The Other Side of Oil Slicks”, chronic hydrocarbon contamination from washing out tanks and dumping bilge water and other oily waste represents a danger at least three times higher than that posed by the oil slicks resulting from oil tanker accidents [1, 2]. For example, in the North Sea the volume of illegal hydrocarbon dumping is estimated at 15,000–60,000 tons per year, added to which are another 10-20,000 tons of authorized dumping. Oil and gas platforms account for 75% of the oil pollution in the North Sea via seepage and the intentional release of oil- based drilling muds [3]. In the Mediterranean Sea it has been estimated at 400,000–1,000,000 tons a year. Of this about 50% comes from routine ship operations and the remaining 50% comes from land-based sources via surface runoff [3]. In the Baltic Sea this volume is estimated at another 1,750–5,000 tons a year [1, 2]. But, according to Finnish Environment Institute (http://www.ymparisto.fi, 2004), the total annual number of oil spills into the Baltic Sea may reach 10,000 and the total amount of oil running into the sea can be as much as 10,000 tons which is considerably more than the amount of oil pouring into the sea in accidents. Detection of oil pollution is among most important goals of monitoring of the European seas. After a tanker accident or illegal oil discharge the biggest problem is to obtain an overall view of the phenomenon, getting a clear idea of the extent of the slick and predicting the way it will move. For natural and man-made oil spills it is necessary to operate a regular and operational monitoring. Oil pollution monitoring in the Mediterranean, North and Baltic Sea is normally carried out by aircrafts or ships. This is expensive and is constrained by the limited availability of these resources. Aerial surveys over large areas of the seas to check for the presence of oil are limited to the daylight hours, good weather conditions and borders between countries. Satellite imagery can help greatly identifying probable spills simultaneously over very large areas and then guiding aerial surveys for precise observation of specific locations. The Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) instrument, which can collect data almost independently of weather and light conditions, is an excellent tool to monitor and detect oil on water surfaces. This type of instrument is currently on board the European Space Agency's ENVISAT and ERS-2 satellites, and the Canadian Space Agency’s RADARSAT-1 satellite. The application of satellite SAR technology to the investigation of oil pollution in the Mediterranean, Black, North and Baltic seas was done in the OCEANIDES Project (2003-2005), which was an EC _____________________________________________________ Proc. ‘Envisat Symposium 2007’, Montreux, Switzerland 23–27 April 2007 (ESA SP-636, July 2007)