Oil spill response planning with consideration of physicochemical evolution of the oil slick: A multiobjective optimization approach

This paper addresses the optimal planning of oil spill response operations under economic and responsive criteria, with consideration of oil weathering process. The economic criterion is measured by total cost, while the measure of responsiveness is the time span of the entire response operations. A bi-criterion, multiperiod mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) model is developed that simultaneously predicts the optimal time trajectories of oil volume and slick area, transportation profile, response resource utilization levels, cleanup schedule, and coastal protection plan. The MILP model integrates with the prediction of an oil weathering model that accounts for oil physicochemical properties, spilled amount, hydrodynamics, and weather conditions. The multi-objective optimization model is solved with the epsilon-constraint method and produces a Pareto optimal curve that reveals how the optimal total cost and response operations change under different specifications of responsiveness. We present two illustrative examples for oil spill incidents in the Gulf of Mexico and New England. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.