Tools for Oil Spill Response Waste Management and Logistic Support – Field Exercises Testing the RFID Technology and QR Codes

An oil spill reaching ashore may generate massive amounts of oiled waste as oil contaminates soil, vegetation and floating debris. The resulting volume of oiled waste may be multiple compared with the original volume of spilt oil. The Finnish authorities responsible for the oil spill response in nearshore waters have calculated that the target scenario, to which the national and regional contingency plans should respond, is an oil spill of 30 000 tonnes resulting in over 500 000 tonnes of oily wastes. Safe and efficient handling of that waste volume requires a thorough pre-planning. As the capacities of the waste disposal facilities are mainly measured up to the domestic wastes, temporary arrangements will be necessary. Further, in order to maximize the differentiated capacities of each available disposal plant, the wastes should be segregated. Segregation also decreases the costs related to the final disposal. In Finland, where the coastline is ragged and, in some places, difficult to access, the logistic chain of wastes may consist of several stages and transportation modes. The complexity of the transportation chain combined with the requirement of segregation will challenge the waste management during an incident. Therefore, contingency plans are developed to include also site-specific logistic plans with pre-defined transportation and storage points. In addition, easy-to-use segregation guidelines are produced using colour codes for different waste types together with the inserted Quick Response (QR) codes to provide segregation instructions. To keep track on the segregated waste units, the Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) technology might provide a useful option. This paper examines the usability of RFID tracking in oil spill response waste management. The observations are based on field exercises aiming to study the benefits of technology using RFID tags and RFID readers. The aim of the exercises was also to determine the quality and quantity of the data needed to be stored on tags in different transportation scenarios. In addition, this paper introduces the QR segregation guideline and its interoperability with the identification and tracking technology tested.