Author(s)

F. Muttin

Abstract

The intrinsic performance of the protection of coastal zones of the Atlantic against oil-spills by using floating booms needs to be improved in the current conditions. To define a contingency plan in advance, a one-dimensional numerical code has been used for many years. A three-dimensional membrane finite-element method is proposed to give more complete results on boom geometry and boom stress. To improve the booms’ performances and validate numerical methods three experiments are described. The first experiment is conducted in the open-sea harbour of La Rochelle, with current conditions higher than 3 knots. In the Lorient oil wharf an experiment attempt shows the constraints due to the uncertainties of a coastal zone with harbour infrastructure under extension and intensive maritime traffic. In the Elorn estuary, Brittany, France, a third experiment is described with current conditions bounded by 0.9 knots. The environmental performance of a floating boom is also evaluated using an economic approach. The budgets of these three experiments are evaluated and analyzed. These budgets estimate the technical and human efforts needed to use a boom in such coastal zones. The knowledge of both environmental and economical performances must be added to the theoretical performances given by numerical computations. Keywords: spilled oil, floating boom, environmental evaluation, economic evaluation, numerical methods, scale-one experiments. 1 Introduction The protection of the maritime environment against oil pollution is governed by several international conventions (MARPOL, Boon Agreement, ERIKA

Keywords

spilled oil, floating boom, environmental evaluation, economic evaluation, numerical methods, scale-one experiments