Bonn Agreement Actions to Eliminate Illegal and Accidental Oil Pollution from Ships in the North Sea

Preventing maritime disasters is very important. Accidental or illegal pollution from ships is a threat to the maritime environment. The Greater North Sea and its wider approaches are one of the busiest and intensively used maritime areas in the world. With the ever‐increasing competition for space comes an increased risk of accidents that could result in marine pollution; the Bonn Agreement contracting parties decided to establish the BE‐AWARE project to undertake the first area‐wide risk assessment of marine pollution using a common methodology that allows the risk to be mapped and compared under different scenarios. Under the International Convention on Marine Pollution from Ships (MARPOL 73/78), the whole of the North Sea area is a ‘special area’ for oil discharges; any oily discharge that is visible as a sheen on the water is illegal. The number of oil slicks detected shows that there is still work to do to bring to justice the offenders responsible for those slicks. The North Sea Network of Investigators and Prosecutors and the Bonn Agreement work together on enforcement. The contracting parties have also undertaken to conduct surveillance of the area as an aid to detecting and combating pollution and to preventing violation of anti-pollution regulations, known as MARPOL. Satellite surveillance also plays an (still growing) important role in the detection of possible pollution at sea. The contracting parties have developed an Aerial Operations Handbook (AOH).