Regulations for the Prevention of Pollution by Oil
Entry into force
2nd October 1983
Principal issues addressed
I. Frequency & procedure for mandatory survey
II. Requirement for International Oil Pollution Prevention Certificate
III. Requirement for record keeping: Oil record book (Part I: Machinery space operation, Part II: Cargo space operation)
IV. SOPEP
V. Criteria for oil residue tanks
VI. Criteria for oil filtering equipment
Machinery Space Discharge
Any discharge of oil or oily mixtures from ships of 400 gross tonnage and above into the sea of shall be prohibited
Discharge of oily mixture is acceptable when certain conditions are fulfilled
Machinery space discharge(outside special areas)
Discharges from machinery spaces,outside special areas,need to fulfill the following criteria:
I. the ship is proceeding en route
II. the oily mixture is processed through an oil filtering equipment meeting the requirements (laid down in Regulation 14) & approved by the administration: Capable of ensuring that the oil content of the effluent without dilution does not exceed 15 ppm(parts per million)
III. the oily mixture does not originate from cargo pump-room bilges on oil tankers
IV. and the oily mixture,in case of oil tankers,is not mixed with oil cargo residues.
Machinery Space Discharge(inside special areas)
All 4 discharge criteria mentioned above for discharge outside special areas must be met
In addition,the following requirement to be complied with:
filtering equipment must be capable of automatically shutting down discharge overboard & triggering alarm whenever oil content of the effluent exceeds 15 parts per million(Regulation 14.7)
Annex I : Special Areas
I. the North West European waters (North sea,Irish sea,Celtic sea,English Channel,portion of the northeast Atlantic near Ireland)
II. the Baltic Sea area
III. the Black Sea area
IV. the Red Sea area
V. the Mediterranean Sea area
VI. the Gulfs area
VII. the Gulf of Aden
VIII. the Oman area of the Arabian Sea
IX. the Southern South African waters
X. within the Antarctic area,any discharge into the sea of oil and oily mixtures from any ship is forbidden
Annex I – Discharge from tankers cargo areas(incl. pump room)
Following discharge criteria to be met:
- Within the special areas or outside of the special areas but within 50 nm from the nearest land –
- Any discharge is forbidden with the exception of clean and segregated ballast
- Outside the special area & more than 50 nm from the nearest land
- Any discharge is forbidden with the exception of clean and segregated ballast
Further for discharge following conditions to be fulfilled:
I. the tanker is proceeding en route
II. the rate of discharge does not exceed 30 litres/nm
III. the total quantity of oil discharged into the sea does not exceed 1/30,000 of the total quantity of the particular cargo of which the residue formed a part
IV. the tanker has in operation an oil discharge monitoring and control system and a slop tank arrangement (regulations 29 and 31)
Double hull for Tankers
MARPOL was amended In 1992 to make double hull mandatory for tankers.
- Double hull is mandatory for –
- tankers of 5000 dwt and more,ordered after 6 July 1993
- A series of deadlines set in a number of revisions for phasing out existing single hull tankers
- by 2008 all single-hull tankers were phased out
–the end.