Environmental Issues

The devastating effects of maritime oil pollution are often neglected in the media due to the remoteness of the events from major population centers. While major oil spills such as the Exxon Valdez off the Alaska coast in 1989 released nearly 11 million gallons of North Slope crude oil into the waters of south central Alaska, and more recently, the explosion of an oil rig in the Timor Sea between Australia and Indonesia have made headlines, it is often deliberate pollution by international cargo vessels which cause most damage to marine environments on a consistent basis. However, due to greater government and industry cooperation and awareness of the damage to fragile environmental systems by oil pollution, the total number and volume of tanker spills has significantly decreased since the 1970s.

Both Canada and Australia share many similarities in the dimension of their size, geographical diversity, history and political and legal systems. Not surprisingly, both countries have exhibited more similarities than differences in their approach to dealing with prevention, cleaning, and prosecution in the event of oil spills and pollution. Thus, this essay will explore the respective approaches of Canada and Australia to offshore oil pollution, demonstrating a common philosophical underpinning of the Polluter Pays Principle (PPP) as well as the co-ordination between Federal and State Agencies, and the use of technology to detect and prevent oil pollution.

Canada possesses the world s longest coastline and largest freshwater reserves, together with busy commercial maritime channels. The two main sources of oil on the sea surface are shipping and offshore oil activity. Every year, more than 300,000 birds are killed off the coast of the island of Newfoundland alone. The table below demonstrates the vulnerabilities of Canada s maritime bird life on its east and west coasts to international freighter traffic. The potential economic impact of an oil spill involves not only wild fisheries and fish processing but also aquaculture industries as well as tourism.

Transport Canada is the lead federal agency which coordinates the Marine Oil Spill Preparedness and Response Regime. The regime was established in 1995 with the guiding principles of effective and responsive legislation where potential polluters pay for preparedness, reasonable response costs, industry-government partnership, comprehensive contingency plans, and mutual agreements with neighbors.

Transport Canada seeks to regulate maritime safety under the Canada Shipping Act and the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, as well as under international conventions such as the International Convention on the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL) and the International Convention on Oil Pollution Preparedness, Response and Co-operation that aim to manage oil pollution. The Canadian Shipping Act provides for a framework of response organizations to oversee actions when an oil spill occurs. The Polluter Pays Principle is a feature of this legislation whereby oil handling facilities and ships both pay an annual fee to response organizations to maintain an adequate response level in the event of an oil spill. In the event of a spill, the polluter is to report the spill and appoint an on-scene commander. The response organization is then activated, then the Canadian coast guard monitors the response. However, this is contingent on the polluter willingly informing the authorities of such a spill. In case the polluter does not cooperate with the governmental authorities, the Canadian Coast Guard must become the on-scene commander. Currently, employed technology which aims to detect oil spills using radar technology is prone to much interference, and equipment that measures relative slick thickness requires further development.

Australia is the worlds largest island and home to many fragile maritime ecosystems. Research has shown the long term impact of oil spills on the increased seedling mortality and leaf defoliation in intertidal areas, from the heavy oil fuel spilled into the port of Gladstone in Queensland Australia in January 2006. More recently, on August 21, 2009, an accident at the Montara offshore drilling operation led to a 25,000 square km oil slick spreading across the ocean and spilling into Indonesian waters, consequently threatening marine reserves of the Ashmore and Cartier reefs. This environmental catastrophe highlighted Australia s vulnerability to such oil spills and its governmental framework to deal with the pursuant environmental and economic damage.

Australia has a  National Plan to Combat Pollution of the Sea by Oil and other Noxious and Hazardous Substances  by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA, 2008). It is the AMSA which coordinates the National Plan with other federal agencies, state governments, and industry groups. AMSA operates under national legislation, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority Act 1990. The National Plan has an elaborate division of powers between the national agency and the state governments. For example, within three nautical miles off the coast, it is the state government (through a sub-committee) which is responsible for the execution of the National Plan while the area beyond the three nautical mile limit is managed by AMSA. This division becomes even more complicated in the case of the oil drifting back ashore from beyond the three nautical mile designation, in which case responsibilities are shared between the Federal and State agencies. One key feature of the federalstate division of powers is the Port State Control program which enforces inspections of ships in order to ensure compliance with pollution and safety requirements (Watkinson, 2000). The Australian government has also developed a fixed wing dispersal spraying capability, capable of spraying dispersant on an oil spill within a specified time. The National Plan is further supported by the National Maritime Emergency Response Arrangements in which emergency towage vessels are located strategically on the Australia s coasts and a maritime emergency response division commander acts on behalf of AMSA during a shipping accident. As in Canada, Australia follows the polluter pays principle, and a levy is imposed on commercial ships sailing through Australian ports. However, both Federal and State governments also fund the national plan.

The Canadian and Australian approaches to oil pollution exhibit key similarities. Most notably, peak national government departments oversee the implementation of national legislation. In the case of Canada, Transport Canada works within the ambit of the Canada Shipping Act 2001 to prevent oil pollution and manage spills if they occur, although in Australia, the AMSA was created by the AMSA Act 1990. Both countries have adopted the polluter pays principle by levying a tax upon the shipping and oil industry. Furthermore, both nations attempt to use technology to detect offshore oil pollution. However, while Transport Canada is less encumbered by state and sub federal regulatory authorities in its operations, the AMSA has a more complex division of powers with its state governments and their departments which could lead to paralysis at times of emergency.

Although it is the major oil spills which receive media attention such as the Atlas oil disaster in the Timor Sea and the Exxon Valdez oil spill off the Alaskan Coast, daily pollution from commercial ships goes largely unnoticed. While both Transport Canada and the AMSA employ technology such as satellites and helicopters to detect offloading of oil and other waste from ships, both of their detection of enforcement of laws remains weak. Moreover, the polluter pays principle is of limited use when the polluter cannot be traced, does not volunteer information on pollution, or even evades the authorities. This pollution happens on a daily basis but it is the environment and the tax payer who pays. Ultimately, even an accurate estimation of the cost of cleaning oil pollution is difficult, and there is a lack of consensus on the most effective methods of cleaning an oil spill (Shahriari, 2008 ).

The Canadian authorities have been criticized for their uneven implementation of the relevant legislation. Although Transport Canada has pursued polluters with fines, the subsequently formed Newfoundland Offshore Petroleum Board has been less rigorous in prosecuting or fining. Furthermore, the Canadian authorities have been criticized for their under estimation of oil spill frequency predictions. While more rigorous litigation and better forecasting could be pursued in Canada, in Australia, AMSA largely reacted well to the Atlas disaster in the Timor Sea in the months after the explosion in late 2009. However in both cases, greater international coordination could be developed. In the case of the Atlas oil rig disaster in the Timor Sea, the disaster while within the ambit of the Australian Maritime Safety Authority also affected Indonesia, and the oil rig which caused the pollution was owned by a Thai company.  Thus, better coordination between the Australian and Indonesian authorities could have limited the affects of the oil spill on the people and environment of the area. Even though the Australian Maritime Authority was praised for its response, it can be seen that the oil spill was not controlled in a timely manner.

The road ahead for both Canada and Australia lies in strengthening international cooperation with neighboring countries in order to combat major environmental catastrophes which move rapidly beyond boundaries. It is due to lack of international coordination that oil drilling companies and international freight ships in many cases pollute but do not pay, or pay only for a fraction of their pollution. When Australia better cooperates with Indonesia and Canada with its neighbors, the polluter pays principle, which both counties have adopted, will become a reality. Greater international cooperation can make use of dynamic environmental risk modeling by directing efforts toward ships and areas that have been identified as high risk prior to a potential accident (Eide, 2007). Such risk modeling would require sharing of data between nations. However, both countries having such vast maritime boundaries will always struggle to accurately detect pollution, and only the most obvious cases which come to the media s attention will be likely to be pursued.

Canada and Australia share many similarities and very few differences in their approach to offshore oil pollution. Both nations have empowered a federal agency to oversee implementation of national legislation with some amount of devolution to state agencies. Both Canada and Australia have also adopted the polluter pays principle, although the implementation of such a principle remains uneven. A key difference between the two is the more fragmented approach of the Australian system, with division of powers and funding between the federal and state governments. Both nations need to increase the use of technology to detect offshore pollution and bolster prosecution of offenders. Both countries can also increase cooperation with regional neighbors to better enforce laws and lower response times in the event of major oil spills.  The recent case of the West Atlas oil rig disaster in the Timor Sea and the continued devastation of Canada s maritime bird life demonstrate that the approaches of both nations require further refinement to clean up the coast lines of both nations.