has to be repeated on other sections where the degree of oil coverage may be different or where the character of the shoreline changes. At the same time, the shoreline survey provides a good opportunity for confirming access routes and the feasibility of cleanup.
Priorities for action will need to be decided after consideration of potential conflicts of interest. For example, the use of most effective techniques may be damaging to some environmental sensitive habitats, whilst elsewhere amenity interests may overrule such considerations. This will require a balance judgement on a site by site basis.
The spill from “ARISAN” was not a large spill. A total of about 150 t of oil leaked out. Still the cost of the operation ended on about 5 million US$. The very successful emergency offloading operation of 520 t reduced the cost of the cleanup operation by millions no doubt.
Discussion
Gainsford: My understanding is that now for contingency planning for the oil platforms, you instruct the oil companies to consider dispersants as one of the options that they ought to review in the contingency planning process. Is that correct?
Nerland: It has always been like that, actually. There's nothing new about that.
Gainsford: As I understand it, the emphasis now has changed to actually encouraging companies to stockpile dispersants as part of their contingency planning, particularly for the offshore sites. What I was going to lead on to is that, given that that is the case, do you think it is likely that, say, in the next five to ten years, the state pollution authorities will also consider having dispersant application equipment and dispersants in their stockpile?
Nerland: Yes.When we established our depots in the late 1970s and the early 1980s, we had a stockpile of dispersants, and we had spraying equipment that could be put on ships. But then, of course, we hardly ever used it because, as I mentioned, most of the incidents we had were at with heavy oil. And it's not very effective in heavy oil. So we don't have those stockpiles anymore, because, and also another thing-that's why I asked the question earlier here-we got the information from the manufacturer that the dispersants that we had in those days expired, and after a certain date, you couldn't use it anymore. It has changed now, I understand, but in those days it was like that, and we have never restocked, so to speak. I want to be a bit careful about saying too much about it, but it is a little different view now than it has been. But still, there is a long way before we agree completely change on policy.
Gainsford: In your list of resources, you had six coastal tankers. What are they doing each day if they're not being used during a major incident?
Nerland: Each day, they're going back and forth along the Norwegian coast, carrying oil. I don't know how many coastal tankers we have-there are quite a lot-but we have an agreement with six of them, and they are spread around the coast most of the time, so what we will use them for is, if we have an incident, we need a place to store the recovered oil. That's why we bring them in. And they also have a little bit of equipment on board-a skimmer and booms. So they will be used for storing recovered oil. That's the reason we have an agreement with them.
Gainsford: So they've got to go and off-load their cargo first, and then are ready.
Nerland: If they are fully loaded, yes, then we'll have a problem. But not all of them will be fully loaded. -it's the same thing that we have with our stockpiles around the coast. We have an agreement with ten local people to man the depot when something happens. These are school-
