Evaluating the needs of risk assessment methods of potentially polluting shipwrecks
Journal article, 2013

Shipwrecks deteriorate and the probability of a release of oil increases with time on the sea floor. The potential leakage is a risk to the marine environment and may also have social and economic consequences. The purpose of this study was to evaluate existing methods for risk assessment of shipwrecks and suggest a generic risk assessment framework. A risk assessment is necessary for providing decision support on remediation actions and thus enabling an efficient use of available resources. Existing risk assessment methods aimed for assessing shipwrecks were evaluated by comparison to relevant parts of an international standard on risk management. The comparison showed that existing methods lack several key components of risk assessment procedures. None of the evaluated methods provide a comprehensive risk assessment for potentially polluting shipwrecks and few take into account uncertainty and sensitivity. Furthermore, there is a need to develop risk assessment methods considering long-term effects of continuous release of oil into the marine environment. Finally, a generic comprehensive framework for risk assessment of shipwrecks is suggested.

Shipwreck

Oil

Ecotoxicology

Risk assessment

Author

Hanna Landquist

Chalmers, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Geology and Geotechnics

Chalmers, Shipping and Marine Technology, Division of Maritime Operations

Ida-Maja Hassellöv

Chalmers, Shipping and Marine Technology, Division of Maritime Operations

Lars Rosen

Chalmers, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Geology and Geotechnics

FRIST competence centre

Fredrik Lindgren

Chalmers, Shipping and Marine Technology, Division of Maritime Operations

Ingela Dahllöf

University of Gothenburg

Journal of Environmental Management

0301-4797 (ISSN) 1095-8630 (eISSN)

Vol. 119 85-92

Driving Forces

Sustainable development

Areas of Advance

Transport

Building Futures (2010-2018)

Subject Categories

Earth and Related Environmental Sciences

DOI

10.1016/j.jenvman.2012.12.036

More information

Created

10/7/2017