Leaking Tankers. Baltic Sea Threatened with Ecological Disaster?

By Marek Grzybowski

So far in the 21st century, there have been 37 oil spills of 7 tons or more, resulting in the loss of 38,000 tons of oil. 91% of the spills can be attributed to 10 major incidents, and 9% to the remaining 27 incidents, reports ITOPF, which maintains a database of oil spills from tanker ships, including combination vessels, FPSO units and barges. After the recent incidents involving damage to installations of strategic importance, can we expect a catastrophic spill? Can such a disaster be expected in the Baltic Sea. Is the Gulf of Gdansk at risk? It is possible.

In the 1990s, there were 358 spills of 7 tons or more, resulting in the loss of 1,134,000 tons of oil. 73% of this amount leaked from the hulls of tankers in just 10 incidents. In the first decade of the 21st century, there were 181 spills of 7 tons and more, which resulted in the loss of 196 thousand tons of oil. 75% of this amount of spills was caused by leaks in 10 incidents. In the second decade of the 21st century, 63 spills of 7 tons and more were identified, which resulted in the loss of 164 thousand tons of oil. 91% of the oil leaked into the sea in 10 incidents. With one incident accounting for about 70% of the spill, ITOPF analysts calculate in the study “Worldwide Oil Tanker Spill Statistics 2024”.

 

There is one more aspect that ITOPF did not foresee. There are about 200 tankers sailing in the Baltic Sea. According to an analysis conducted by Greenpeace, 192 tankers are carrying Russian crude oil in poor technical condition. 171 of these ships have passed through the Baltic Sea off the coast of Germany and the Kadetrinne Strait in the Bay of Mecklenburg once or more in the last two years.

The tankers are outdated, many of them have technical defects, have temporarily switched off the automatic identification system or have transferred cargo to other tankers on the high seas as part of an STS operation, Greenpeace informs on its website, and warns that “this is a particularly risky operation”. It may also result in a spill. In light of the above, the question arises: Will there be a spill and when? The water areas mentioned by Greenpeace are certainly at risk, but also the Gulf of Finland, the Gulf of Gdansk, and the Danish Straits.

ITOPF experts note that “the majority of oil spills (>7 tons) recorded between 1970 and 2024 were caused by collisions and groundings.” Analysts note that 19 of the 20 largest recorded spills occurred before 2000. The Sanchi shipwreck is the only major spill that caused significantly less environmental impact compared to other recorded oil spills.

 

Oil Disasters

Let us recall that the Sanchi, a Suezmax class tanker, was registered in the Panamanian registry and sailed under the Panamanian flag at the time of the disaster. The tanker was owned by the National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC). The tanker was carrying a cargo of 136,000 tons of condensate from Iran to South Korea.

The cargo was lost when the ship collided with the bulk carrier CF Crystal, registered in Hong Kong, 300 km from Shanghai on January 6, 2018. As a result of the collision, the tanker caught fire and exploded, and sank on January 14. All crew members were declared dead or missing (three bodies out of 32 were found). The crew of the CF Crystal were rescued, and the ship itself was towed to port.

The State Oceanic Administration of China said in a statement that the oil spill had more than tripled over the weekend. Because it was a light fraction, more than three oil slicks were created, covering an area of ​​about 332 km2, or 128 square miles. The spill tripled over the weekend, from 101 km2 (38 square miles) in size three days after the tanker ruptured.

The oil spill off the coast of China is now the world’s largest since the Deepwater Horizon disaster in 2010, when millions of gallons of crude oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is the largest marine oil spill in history. On April 20, 2010, an explosion occurred on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico, about 41 miles (66 km) off the coast of Louisiana.

 

The operator was the drilling company Transocean. The platform was leased to BP. The oil well over which the platform was placed was located on the seabed 4,993 feet (1,522 m) below the surface and extended to about 18,000 feet (5,486 m) below the seabed. Thanks to documents published by Wikileaks, it turned out that a similar incident occurred on a drilling platform belonging to BP in the Caspian Sea in September 2008, reports Britannica. Analyses show that the installed cores were probably too weak to withstand the gas pressure.

Oil that leaked from the well before it was capped created a slick that stretched across 57,500 square miles (149,000 km2) of the Gulf of Mexico. 1.8 million gallons of dispersants—substances that emulsify oil, allowing bacteria to metabolize it more easily—were used to clean up the spill. Barrages were also deployed to block off parts of the slick, and the contained oil was either pumped out or burned. As the oil began to foul Louisiana beaches, it was removed by hand. The state’s marshes and estuaries were also contaminated. By June, globs of oil and tar had reached beaches in Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida. In all, an estimated 1,100 miles of coastline were contaminated.

 

Oil incidents

Six major spills (>700 tons) and four medium spills (7-700 tons) were recorded in 2024, according to an analysis of incidents involving active tankers. Major spills were mostly fuel oil and occurred in South America, Asia and Europe. Many incidents, despite their large size, required little or no response, as the oil was spilled some distance from the shore and did not affect the coastlines. For this reason, some of the identified spills may have unknown names, ITOPF analysts note.

– Four medium spills also involved fuel oil, two in Europe, one in Asia and one in North America – ITOPF calculates and calculates that “This brings the decade average to 7.4 spills (>7 tons) per year. This is currently a slight increase from the average of the decade after 2010. The optimistic fact is that this is a significant decrease compared to the disasters that occurred in previous decades. It is emphasized that “These data refer to spills of confirmed volumes and do not include incidents resulting from military operations.”

The total volume of oil that entered the marine environment due to spills from oil tankers in 2024 was about 10 thousand tons. Over the past half-century, statistics on the frequency of spills larger than 7 tons from tankers have shown a clear downward trend. Spills exceeding 7 tons have decreased by more than 90% since the 1970s. ITOPF analysts note that “although increased tanker traffic may indicate increased risk, it is reassuring that the downward trend in oil spills has continued despite the overall increase in oil trade over this period.”

 

It is emphasized that, in addition to the reduction in the frequency of spills, there has been a significant decrease in the amount of oil spilled over the decades. In the decade after 2010, about 164 thousand tons of oil were lost due to spills from tankers, which is a 95% decrease compared to the 1970s. The average oil loss for the last 5 years is currently 38 thousand tons. In terms of the volume of oil spilled, the data for a given year can be seriously distorted by a single major incident. The catastrophic events resulting in record spills are recalled by ITOPF in its report: ATLANTIC EMPRESS (1979), 287 thousand tons spilled; CASTILLO DE BELLVER (1983), 252 thousand tons spilled; ABT SUMMER (1991), 260 thousand tons spilled and SANCHI (2018), 113 thousand tons spilled.

Baltic Roulette

Incidents related to ship and drilling platform disasters and spills of crude oil and chemicals from ships should be viewed from a different perspective today than a year ago. Previous violations of critical infrastructure treated as individual incidents may turn into deliberate acts of terrorism. They may also be an element of the Cold War. Record-breaking transshipments of crude oil and fuels in the terminals of Gdańsk (40 million tons) and Gdynia (3 million tons) are encouraging, but they are also information that a record number of tankers has appeared in the Gulf of Gdańsk. Their number will increase by LNG tankers, which will soon be docking at the FSRU terminal.

The Baltic Sea is also a critical area due to the high position of Russian ports in the export of oil using ships operating within the shadow fleets and the grey fleet. Total exports of oil products through the Baltic ports of Primorsk, Vysotsk, St. Petersburg and Ust-Luga fell by 9% in 2024 compared to the previous year and amounted to 61.96 million tons, according to data reported by Reuters. It can be expected that at least about 10% of the vessels carrying oil from Russia are in poor technical condition.

An incident similar to the one in the Black Sea is not difficult. Recently, a Russian tanker drifted in the western Baltic Sea, and two Russian tankers broke up near the Kerch Strait in the Black Sea. The only question is when a tanker will appear in the Baltic Sea that will shoot like a bullet in Russian roulette? It is no longer a matter of chance. It is a matter of time and place of the disaster.