Integrated modeling of oil spill response strategies: a coastal management case study

Oil spills are commonly considered as one of the worst forms of marine pollution. Often they constitute a challenge for an operational contingency management, since an oil spill contingency management encompasses multiple and often conflicting objectives and has to face various sources of uncertainty. Focusing on a well-documented case, the Pallas oil spill in Germany, the selection of optimal strategy among others is formulated as a multi-criteria decision-making problem that involves various environment, socio-economy and management related effects. These effects may not be directly comparable and compatible due to the fact that they are measured in multiple metrics. To solve such a multi-criteria decision-making problem, this paper proposes monetary evaluation models to assess performances of using different response strategies. Combined with the benefit cost analysis and the cost effectiveness analysis, this method enables to further determine the favored and rational strategy and the worthwhile investment of using combat facilities, respectively. Through the case of Pallas, such a proposed method is demonstrated as an important decision-making support tool in the domain of coastal zone management.