Internal Pollution Response Exercise - JNCC

Part of JNCC's role is to provide advice in relation to oil spill incidents and this is captured in the UK National Contingency Plan and the Maritime Coastguard Agency (MCA) Environment Group STOp Notice 1/14. JNCC are a core member of the Environment Group (EG) and this role is carried out by the Offshore Industries Advice (OIA) team based in Aberdeen (24/7 service via an on-call phone). Our role during an incident is to provide nature conservation advice in relation to immediate environmental sensitivities offshore (i.e. outwith 12nm) for seabirds, marine mammals and Marine Protected Areas. We work closely with the other members of the EG to discuss immediate and ongoing response plans (such as the appropriateness of dispersant application, or to identify priority areas for protection). If the pollution moves inshore we continue to support the EG as necessary, though the environmental advice provision would be led by the inshore nature conservation agency going forward. We have expertise in benthic habitats, marine mammals, ornithology, survey planning and data analysis and provide input to a number of response areas, including for example Premiam post-spill monitoring, Defra incident response, MCA media etc. We have experience in providing advice as part of regular spill response exercises and in real situations, however this real-time experience is limited to a degree, given the number of real events that have occurred in the UK and required sustained input and also in relation to general staff turnover as with any organisation. A particular issue with spill exercises is that the 'future' scenario (i.e. days, weeks, months after the initial spill/ incident) is never tested. JNCC would have a major role in on-going and longer-term post-spill monitoring and how such work could influence future advice provision and as such further training in relation to this aspect is required. The OIA team are in charge of responding to an incident (on behalf of JNCC), and the team has been through various levels of training and exercising. We have internal pollution response guidance, and a number of tools and checklists we use to help facilitate our response. However, OIA staff often have to liaise with other teams within JNCC who may not have the same level of understanding as to how the UK response set up is structured, or how incident response/ EG format works. Therefore we'd like to run a tailored internal exercise whereby a full EG is set up and simulated, with JNCC staff both observing and role playing. The exercise could run over two days, with day one simulating day one of an incident, and day two focusing on months down the line, stimulating discussions around post-spill impact assessment and monitoring. There should be facilitated, role played media involvement, injects to the scenario, and room for JNCC to discuss openly our involvement and likely stance/ advice. Please note the duration and times suggested for the course are negotiable.