Global Environmental Baseline & Monitoring Survey GEMS - Over a Decade of Results Oriented, Monitoring and Assessing the Oil Industry Impacts on the Deep Offshore Environment Case Study: Block 17- Girassol field

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present TOTAL E&P Angola (subsidiary of TOTAL in Angola, hereafter mentioned as "Affiliate") last environmental monitoring campaign. The document presents the strategy and summarizes the results of indicators which are used to follow up cumulative impacts on deep water environment. The campaign was performed between 1998 and 2015, and different laboratories were used. The impact of field operations proved to be rather low or negligible, and acceptable on the long term. Since February 1998, when the first environmental baseline study (EBS) was performed (in Block 17: Girassol) to describe the initial state of the environment, the Affiliate has been conducting regular offshore monitoring campaigns with the aim of characterizing the water column, and marine sediments around existing installations and developing fields. These surveys are not limited to Block 17, but also extend to other Affiliate offshore blocks in Angola. In March 2015, the Affiliate’s most demanding Global Environmental Baseline & Monitoring Survey (GEMS) was completed, which covered six different offshore blocks, with a work scope ranging between EBS and EMoS (environmental monitoring survey), comprising 226 sampling stations for sediment and benthic macrofauna, 26 for seawater, 17 for phytoplankton and 8 for foraminifera. Another specificity of this latest GEMS was the scientific vessel that was shared among Operators through a joint agreement, of course with some legal and operational constraints considering the socio-geographic context of the project. Technically, besides the Affiliate’s required guidelines and rules, the parameters to be tested also had to meet recent regulations from the Ministry of Petroleum. Physico-chemical and biological data obtained over the past 17 years have been used as indicators of environment quality, and its regular monitoring allows assessment of the sensitivity of the marine environment to petroleum activities.