Risk assessment of accidental oil release in a coastal region: the são paulo case study

ABSTRACT The Port of Santos is the most relevant port in the Southern Hemisphere and has been undergoing continuous expansion of its activities. This work aims to analyze globally the contexts related to the policy and actions of coastal protection against oil spill, as a contribution to the proposal of an integrated risk management tool for oil spills in the coastal zone. The methodology includes the bibliographic review and synthesis of the current state of knowledge, inventory of port activities and related environmental aspects, and the use of quantitative and qualitative methods to perform systemic risk assessment. Factors that contribute to risk are identified, the disaster paradigms (Hazard-Vulnerability-Risk) are assessed for five elements exposed to risk (Port activities; Mangrove; Surrounding communities; Tourist activity; Estuary, beaches and coastal dunes), and the global risk of oil spill in the coastal zone of Port of Santos was assessed. The global assessment of the risk revealed a medium risk (R = 0.69). In terms of distributed assessment considering separately the five elements, a low risk was found for Surrounding communities (0.42) and Estuary, beaches and coastal dunes (0.28), but the other three elements revealed high risk (1.0).