engleski

Current practices in environmental impact assessment of drilling and gas exploitation activities in the Croatian part of the Adriatic Sea

Activities related to investigations and exploitation of hydrocarbons in the Adriatic Sea have a long tradition, based on activities of either Italian or Croatian, or Italian-Croatian companies. Those activities may have a significant negative impact on the quality of marine environment, especially in the Adriatic as enclosed and ecologically extremely sensitive area, therefore all drilling and exploitation activities being carried out within the scope of Croatian national jurisdiction have been harmonized with existing national and international standards. That in turn means that all companies have been required to perform relevant ecological risk assessment studies before initial investigative drilling activities, and results of those studies were then used as a base for issuing possible license and/or concession for exploitation. Furthermore, during the exploitation period companies have been required to perform strictly defined monitoring studies, respect the highest international standards related to waste management, use of the best available technology etc. Corresponding permits and monitoring programs have been issued and/or defined by related national authorities and/or Croatian Government Ministries, and numerous private companies and leading Croatian universities and public research institutes have been engaged in performing risk assessment studies or environmental monitoring activities. Most importantly, all available evidence clearly shows that activities specifically related to gas exploitation in the Adriatic have been successfully coordinated with positive national and international legislation, and performed analyses showed that exploitation activities did not have significant negative impact on the quality of marine environment. In this talk we will briefly present the most important insights obtained by environmental scientists from the University of Zagreb and the Ruđer Bošković Institute as leading national research institutions that were engaged in studies related to gas exploitation activities in the Adriatic. More specifically, we will (i) give an overview on types of studies performed ; (ii) highlight the most important insights obtained so far ; and finally, (iii) will provide critical comments and suggest some improvements of current monitoring practices.

investigation and exploitation of hydrocarbons; Adriatic; ecological risk assessment; environmental monitoring; University of Zagreb; Ruđer Bošković Institute

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