Oil Spill Contingency Plans
Sullom Voe Harbour Oil Spill Contingency Plan -
The approaches to Sullom Voe have several areas of high environmental sensitivity, including SSIs in Yell Sound and a mSAC which covers the whole of the voe itself. The Sullom Voe Harbour Oil Spill Plan was developed many years ago before legislation made such plans mandatory, and has evolved over time in recognition of the need to protect the various species of conservation importance, the marine habitats and wildlife in general.
The Sullom Voe Oil Spill Contingency Plan, which was the first in Scotland and second in the UK to be approved by the MCA under the “The Merchant Shipping (Oil Pollution Preparedness, Response and Co-Operation Convention) Regulanions 1998 provides for a response up to, and including, a Tier 2 level oil pollution. the above act has been amended and published as “The Merchant Shipping (Oil Pollution Preparedness, Response and Co-Operation Convention) (Amended) Regulanions 2015.
Scalloway Harbour Oil Spill Contingency Plan -
The Scalloway Harbour Oil Spill Plan has been approved by the MCA under the “The Merchant Shipping (Oil Pollution Preparedness, Response and Co-Operation Convention) (Amended) Regulanions 2015, and provides for a response up to, a Tier 1 level oil pollution.
Shetland Marine Pollution Contingency Plan-
Whilst local authorities have no statutory duty for the provision of an oil spill contingency plan for its coastline outside of its Statutory Ports and Harbours, the Shetland Islands Council is clearly aware of its obligations to protect its coastline to the best of its ability and be prepared insofar as is practicable to respond to any shoreline pollution and so has prepaired the Shetland Marine Pollution Contingency Plan
The Shetland Marine Pollution Contingency Plan has been prepared in line with the National Contingency Plan Guidelines.
Sensitivity Maps – available online
Shetland’s coastline is the best known and well mapped in the UK, with environmental data in the existing oil spill plans. At the request of SOTEAG, Dr Lorraine Gray of Marine Atlas Ltd has produced marine sensitivity maps for the Sullom Voe Harbour area.that will aid in planning and implementation of wildlife response. The aim of these maps is provide effective visualisation of a wide array of data that will help improve the effectiveness and efficiency of our response to an oil spill in the Sullom Voe area.
The Sullom Voe Harbour area was divided into 9 sub areas (basemaps), each with its own two-page data summary. Data was collated from multiple sources and prioritised into five themes: (1) basemaps, (2), coastal protection and clean-up priorities, (3) biological resources, (4) human use and activities, and (5) logistical and operational resources. These data were uploaded in layers onto Google Earth, a platform that was chosen in order to maximise the maps’ usability by on-the-ground personnel during a spill incident.
These maps are accessible via online download of PDFs or through the Google Earth link, both of which can be found on the SOTEAG website. They are for anyone wishing to use them for oil spill response or related activities, dependent on the user agreeing to the terms and conditions of use the End User Licence. Annual updates will be carried out to maintain the map database. The maps are therefore password protected so that SOTEAG can maintain an up-to-date mailing list for all End Users, in order to be able to inform End Users when updated versions of the maps are available.
Instructions for accessing the maps and the End User Licence can be accessed via the following link