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This special meeting took place in June 2001 and proved to be a major event attended by a broad cross section of interests including Government, offshore oil and gas operators, environmental groups, academia, and other relevant sectors such as fisheries and chemical companies. Previously there has been no central co-ordination of research priorities, and the purpose of this meeting (proposed by UKOOA) was to gather and disseminate information on relevant research and to identify priorities for future work aimed at improving protection of the environment in relation to offshore activities.
The outcome of the June meeting was presented to the UK Offshore Forum in December 2001 (see DTI Website for minutes etc. of the Forum) and an R&D workgroup was set up initially with representatives from DTI, DEFRA, UKOOA, CEFAS, FRS, Crown Estates, JNCC, NERC and ITF. Others have now expressed interest in joining and the group is expanding. The R&D workgroup has agreed that a call for proposals in each of the above areas will now go out for responses by September 2002, and that a review be carried out of all currently funded environmental research. In addition an environmental monitoring workgroup has been set up with Government and its agencies to develop a long-term strategy and programme for monitoring environmental impacts in the North Sea.
UKOOA itself has now established a Research workgroup, under the Environment Committee, which will consist of the chairs of the different Environment Committee workgroups, who may wish to make a case for research work in their particular area of concern.
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Case Study:
The Monitoring and Research Special meeting in June 2001 identified a number of areas for research.
a) Marine Discharges (produced water, chemicals and drilling fluids)
- Development and field validation of risk assessment models on the environmental impact of produced water and other discharges.
- Gaining a better understanding of chemicals in the discharge phase and field evaluation of their sub-lethal, chronic and cumulative effects.
- Development of methods for measuring the quantity of chemicals and other potentially harmful components in produced water, quantifying their full environmental effects and assessing options for reduction.
b) Atmospheric Emissions (flaring and other atmospheric discharges)
- Development of reliable spatial and temporal offshore emission inventories including dropout and consideration of more accurate and accepted emission factors.
- Investigation of the possibility of the sequestration of CO2 from offshore emissions (See Commitment No.47).
c) Protection of Species and Habitats
- Determining what habitats and species are present, their sensitivity to oil and gas activity (including long-term environmental effects) and degrees of recoverability.
- Assessing what information already exists or is in the process of being collected (e.g. Strategic Environmental Assessments).
- Development of a framework for evaluating priority species and determining effective management tools to protect them.
- Investigation of the medium and long-term effects of noise on marine species, including dose response, exposure risk and mitigation measures.
d) Monitoring: compliance
- Consider whether current monitoring techniques remain suitable for new areas, address cumulative effects over a wider area, distinguish the effects of oil and gas activity from natural changes and from effects of other sectors (e.g. shipping), assess the effectiveness of mitigation measures.
- Identification of indicators and markers.
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Sustainability Strategy Commitments