case & cause ecological NO
“guarantees”
pier vs. buoy
how an spm buoy works
figures re: bourgas
figures re: strandzha
economic NO
health demands NO
support for the referendum
how to help
about us
FORUM PETITION
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| The Bourgas Lake is among the sites in the region most threatened by a possible malfunction of the planned pipeline. Adequate assessment of the environmental risk remains one of the unsolved problems in the project “Bourgas-Alexandroupolis.” Photo: Evgeni Dinev. |
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| SPM buoy near Kochin-India. The method is appropriate in open sea with sufficient water circulation, more than 30 kilometres away from the shore, and in places where the sea is at least 200 m deep. The Black Sea is a closed, shallow aquarium. The SME buoy is supposed to be positioned only 7 kilometres away from Bourgas, at depth less than 40 m. |
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| The diagram above shows an SPM buoy. This method is used mainly in Angola, Indonesia, South Africa, Nigeria and Venezuela. Never before in the world has an SPM buoy been used: 1) in such a close proximity to the shore; 2) right next to 1 or 3 more SPM buoys—as the Bourgas-Alexandroupolis plan suggests. |
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| For a long time now Bourgas has had to deal with other improvident geopolitical decisions: Rossenovo, an industrial port right next to the Bourgas beach & Neftochim, the biggest oil refinery on the Balkans, which continues to pollute the air of the city and its suburbs. To counterweigh the impact of those two sites, Bourgas has been developing a strategy for “Green Bourgas.” No green strategy can stop an oil spill from a tanker or a buoy. |
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| 2002 NW Spain – Prestige. This is what 64 000-ton oil spill more than 100 kilometres away from the shore turns the beaches into. The disaster scene is the Atlantic ocean. For the strong currents, only a portion of the spilled oil has ended up on the beach. This would not be the case in Bourgas. |
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| Prestige, NW Spain 17.11.2002. Due to a storm one of the oil reservoirs punctures. Four day after the accident, the tail of spilled petrol is over 100 km long. 100 million tons per year are planned to pass through the gulf of Bourgas. |
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| A 2004 photo. More than a year after the Prestige tragedy of 2002, the sea still washes ashore dead birds with agglutinated feathers. 5 to 10 thousand tons of oil keep floating on the water surface and polluting the shores of Spain. |
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| Prestige north-western Spain 2002. 08.02.2003—almost three months after the spill of 64 000 tons of petrol in the open sea, the entire west coast of France is in danger. What would such a spill do to a shallow and closed gulf such as Bourgas? |
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| Picture from 2004: more than a year after the Prestige tragedy from 2002. The sea still washes ashore dead birds with agglutinated feathers. 5 to 10 thousand tons of oil keep floating on the water surface and reaching the shores of Spain. |
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| Prestige NW Spain 2002. The city of La Coruna has been fully evacuated because of the great risk of fires resulting from the spill. A much smaller spill would be enough to cause the evacuation of Bourgas. |
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| The UN informs that the beaches of Lebanon take part of a 10 000-ton spill resulting from the Iraq bombing in 2006. To this day the beaches remain unusable. |
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| In 1989 the tanker Exxon spills 10.8 million gallons of crude oil near the shores of Alaska. This not only harms the local wildlife, but also causes a drastic decrease in the inflow of tourists to the entire state in the next five years. |
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| Only a 5% outflow of tourists would result in losses from tourism three times larger than Bulgaria’s total gain from the Bourgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline. No spill is needed; the bad publicity from tankers pouring petrol opposite the beaches will do the trick. |
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| The oil pipeline project on the island of Sakhalin (Russia) dates back from 1998. It was started by Shell, Mizui and Mitsubishi. Without contractually-agreed upon outside environmental and quality control—as in the case of Bourgas (but not Alexandroupolis!)—this is how the pipeline track currently looks. |
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| Pipeline on the island of Sakhalin. From 1998 to this day oil spills from pipelines directly into the soil have been frequent. Such spills are especially dangerous for underground water sources—of which there are many on the planned pipeline track. In Bulgaria the track will cross 3 rivers. |
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| Amoco Cadiz, France 1978. A storm in the English channel leads to a malfunction in the tanker’s steering mechanism. The tanker crashes into cliffs 5.5 kilometers away from the shore. It breaks into two and spills all its cargo of 1.6 million barrels of oil. Considering the Bourgas gulf conditions, even a smaller spill would lead to a similar disaster. |
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| you can visit version 2 of bgbui - with recent developments - here. We are working on its translation. |
| THE CASE On January 11. 2008 representatives of the key energy companies from Bulgaria, Russia and Greece sealed the agreement for establishing an international project company for constructing and operating the oil pipeline Bourgas-Alexandroupolis. According to the agreement, every day 700 000 barrels of petrol will pass through Bourgas and its gulf: or 400 to 700 ships a year with carrying capacity of 150 000 to 300 000 tons. The idea is to reach the capacity of 100 million tons per year—capacity surpassing that of the largest international crude oil port in Rotterdam. The reasons circulated in favour of the project revolve around 1) the ecological safety of the Bosphorus, the relieved traffic across it, 2) the geopolitical advantage accorded to Bulgaria by the new infrastructures and the increases global need of export Russian oil, and finally, 3) the regional economic growth – both income and jobs – which the pipeline, its associated facilities and their construction, and the concentration of major roads will supposedly initiate for Bourgas and all areas along the pipeline route. THE CAUSE
On Feb 17th 2008 the citizens of Bourgas and its administrative region will hold a referendum for/against the project Bourgas-Alexandroupolis as proposed in the tri-lateral agreement. We will be answering the question “Do you agree with the construction of oil pipeline Bourgas-Alexandroupolis with all proposed for the territory of Bourgas and the administrative area infrastructures and facilities?” We, the authors of this site, and we, the people for whom someone somewhere did not think, will need all the help we can get to turn what is advertised to us by the Bulgarian government as SOUND economic/political thinking into thinking about SUSTAINABLE economic development. We do not imagine that everything will end with the referendum. But we will need all the help we can get to achieve our end: which is all about decency, dignity, the people and the children. In what we do – including this site - we want above all to persuade as many people as possible TO VOTE. The Referendum is a unique chance to project our voices and to demand that projects of such scale and impact be negotiated openly, with all pertinent to our lives information in broad light. We then mobilise against the SPM buoy infrastructure in particular – in Bulgarian [b`ui]. A strong NO at the referendum will give us at the least bargaining power regarding the implementation of the project. And who knows, with a little luck and help, it may even stop the project.  |
| THE ECOLOGICAL OBJECTION 1/ ECOLOGICAL GUARANTEES & EVALUATION
An evaluation of the environmental impact of the project is currently missing. The tri-lateral agreement fails to provide protection of the Black sea from human or natural accidents. It remain unclear who and how will finance the emergency fund that the agreement mentions. There is no mention either of a guarantee fund or of any compensations in case of an accident. The bearer of responsibility in case of emergencies also remains unclear. 2/ PIER VS. BUOY And so Bourgas is to surpass port Rotterdam in traffic of crude oil. But without a pier. The transmission from the tankers to the pipeline itself will be done with SPM (single point mooring) technology – or mono-buoy. This is the cheaper, but also the riskier alternative. In the world there are 2 main ways to load & unload crude oil: fixed pier and SMP buoy. Fixed pier: this is the conventional method for unloading of tankers. The tanker is set immobile in enclosed pool, which it is possible to guard against large spills. This is a system for prevention, and it is the preferred method near coasts and populations. Most importantly – in setting a contrast to what is proposed for Bourgas – it is preferred and ecologically, as well as operationally preferred method for shallow bays and pools with slow circulation of water. A fixed pier is what experts – both marine and ecological – have argued for for the Bourgas end of Burgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline. The geographic and climatic conditions in the Bay of Bourgas and the Black Sea as a whole dictate a pier to be the sane, longsighted and safe option. SPM Buoy: the so-called off-shore terminal is the method preferred and suitable for deep seas and far from populations and coasts. It is the way to proceed when it impossible to build and maintain closed aquatoria and protected pier. Most often it is used in oil extraction – at depths of 150-200m , and distance from the shore of 50 to 200 km. It is thus primarily used in Venezuela, Angola, the Persian Gulf, Indonesia, South Africa, West Africa, Nigeria, and so on. Not a single country in the list famous for prioritising its ecology and its society higher, or at least as high as, the economic gain of big companies. Buoys in Europe there are few, in Spain and Italy, with low capacity (not more than 5 milion tons a year) and as supporting infrastructure toward a conventional pier. The tri-lateral agreement on the Bourgas-Alexandroupolis pipeline project envisions for Bourgas not a port. Not even a buoy. It envisions 4 buoys, 2 km away from each other, 7 km away from the Bourgas coast (one of the busiest summer beaches on the southern Bulgarian coast) – that is, 2 km away from the coast of Sozopol or Pomorie (both busy cultural centres, and international tourist destinations; one a world heritage town). The depth is not more than 30 m from the seabed. While a buoy also functions as a reservoir, in any one day, 7 km away from the tourists and one of the most beautiful and busiest cities in Bulgaria, there will certainly be at least 2 tankers and 1 000 000 tons of crude oil. There is not a single case in the world of 2 or more buoys in operation in proximity with each other, in view of the dynamics of the process and the risks of collision. There is not a case in the world of a buoy in operation in a shallow closed pool with minimal circulation, against a tourism-sensitive coast. For comparison, Holland has 200 ports and not a single buoy. 3/ HOW A BUOY WORKS The transmission by SPM happens as follows. The tanker reaches the buoy (technologically-equipped floating platform weighing 70-80 tons) and pumps an average of 10 000 tons of petrol per hour to the buoy. The buoy then pumps them down toward an underwater pipeline, which leads to the ground facilities, and from then on to the actual transit pipe to Alexandroupolis. This crude oil transfer is done through 250-310-meter-long floating hose strings. New hose strings lead to the petrol pipeline on the seabed. A tow-ship pulls the tanker in the opposite direction from the buoy, to prevent collisions. The hoses float with the ship, bend with the currents and waves. The buoy too floats with the tanker and the currents, being attached to the bottom of the sea by 4 anchors. The tanker is temporarily moored (for the duration of the loading-unloading process – typically 24 h) by being attacked to the buoy by a fibre mooring line with chain sections. This is also a flexible, dynamic connection. The hoses are made of special material, yet they remain the only barrier between thousands of tons of petrol and the water. Connecting and disconnecting the hoses between tanker and buoy happens by hand. The underwater hoses are especially dangerous: they move very close to the seabed and may rupture. The complete mobility of the arrangement, the abundance of joints between detachable segments, the human element, water turmoils, a sudden storm )as they happen in the Black Sea), closeness to the seabed—all those make an oil spill inevitable. Even without and errors or problems, the technology and method presuppose as normal operational spills – those of connecting and disconnecting the hoses. According to global statistics the amount of petrol operationally released by tankers equals the amount of petrol released due to major tanker accidents, and it is five times less than the amount operationally released by non-tanker petrol facilities such as pipes, reservoirs and floating hoses. 4/ FIGURES OF CONCERN RE: BOURGAS IN VIEW OF THE AGREEMENT 1 ton of chemically untreated crude oil, which has been washed ashore connects with sand and other miniscule objects to produce 10 tons of oil-penetrated substance. Cleaning one barrel of petrol in open sea, costs anywhere between 10 thousand and 250 thousand dollars. The damage is much bigger and more expensive if the oil is washed ashore. From all seas, The Black Sea is poorest in biodiversity. The water currents are weak. The bay is closed and shallow. That makes it virtually impossible for any spill to disperse. In the course of two days, at most, any spill will end up on the shore. Expert recommendations by members of the Black Sea Administration Committee from 1997 insist that a stationary petrol terminal of the Rotterdam type be built as the safest and most environmentally-friendly way for Bourgas and the region. Instead, the pipeline agreement plans 2 or 4 single point mooring buoys. That means that up to 1 million tons of crude oil will be stored in somewhere in the gulf at any given point in time: only 7 km away from the beaches of Bourgas. In case of malfunction of any sort, the mono-buoy technology presupposes an immediate spill of at least 200-300 tons of petrol directly in the sea. In case of a larger spill, Bourgas will be evacuated in a matter of hours – for risk of fire. Just like the Bosphorus, whose ecology maybe (though unlikely – for it is doubtful that the traffic of tankers decrease) the pipeline will save, Bourgas too lies in a highly seismic region. In the world there exists no other SPM buoy positioned in closed shallow gulf with slow water circulation, in a tourist-sensitive area. Holland, for example, has 200 stationary petrol piers and not a single SPM buoy. 5/ FIGURES OF CONCERN RE: STRANDZHA MOUNTAIN 155 km of the pipeline route are in Bulgaria. To lay the pipeline, it is necessary to clear a stretch 130 m wide along the entire 155 km length of the pipeline. No vegetation will survive. It has been made clear that the route – while still kept in secret – will pass beside reservations and across protected from construction territories in Nature 2000 (regulation toward sustainable development). Such areas are home to the endangered species of Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos), as well as to the only surviving in Europe pheasant de colchide (Phasianus colchicus L). Large scale cutting of woods starts erosion and, soon, further loss of habitat. For underground water pools – of which there are many in the suggested route area – even the smallest spill may be fatal. The route crosses 3 rivers. |
| THE ECONOMIC OBJECTION
The agreed profit of 30-35 million dollars per year that Bulgaria will receive from the project neither compensates for the losses of the economy, nor matches the risks that the citizens of the region are expected to take. A possible oil spill will drastically harm the tourism sector of the region. Even without an actual spill the bad publicity from tankers unloading petrol less than two miles away from some of the most popular beaches in the region will cause a dramatic decrease in the inflow of tourists to the Southern Black sea coast of Bulgaria. If the outflow of tourists amounts to just 5% of the approximate number for 2007, every year the southern Black Sea coast will loose three times more money than what Bulgaria will gain from the Bourgas-Alexandroupolis project. The number of jobs lost in tourism will exceed threefold the 1000 new jobs that according to the Bulgarian government the pipeline will create. Most of those 1000 promised jobs will be related to the construction of the pipeline and will be closed after the construction is over (less than a year after starting it). After the installation of the facilities the project creates no substantial employment in the region. No new jobs are planned to be created in the local Neftochim oil refinery. The investment in real estate on the Southern Black Sea coast of Bulgaria already exceeds 3 000 000 000 Euro. If as a result of the pipeline construction, the properties lose 10% of their value, it would take the project Bourgas-Alexandroupolis 10 years to compensate for the losses, provided that ALL oil transit income is directed completely to the Southern Black Sea coast. Only the corporate taxes that the refinery of Neftochim pays per year are several times more than Bulgaria’s annual profit from the deal. From the pipeline Bulgaria will benefit a total of 70 Euro-cents — the price includes all transit and port fees. Unlike Rotterdam — a port whose traffic Bourgas is expected to surpass in five years – the fees in Bourgas are set to diminish after the fourth tanker per firm/per year. The fees for oil traffic through buoy (not through the port, or pier) go to Sofia and do not stay in the local economy. From port fees alone the port of Rotterdam gains 70 Euro-cents per ton, which yearly amounts to 70 000 000 Euro, which go in the local economy. Again, as a whole Bulgaria gains 35 million dollars per year, out of which close to nothing remains in the Bourgas economy. The smallest of our problems is that fishing will literally die out. |
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HEALTH – FOR THE PEOPLE, THE CHILDREN, THE TOURISTS Continuous contact with crude oil causes skin itching, edema and burns. Crude oil is toxic. The toxic effect is enhanced by simultaneous or subsequent to contact exposure to ultraviolet sun rays. Epidemiological research shows increased risk of types of cancer not only for workers who are regularly exposed to crude oil, but also for children with moderate contact. |
| SUPPORT FOR THE REFERENDUM 1/ South East Europe Development Watch public announcement from Feb 12, 2008 read here 2/ Friends of the Earth Europe public announcement from Feb 13, 2008 read here 3/ The CEE Bankwatch Network's http://www.bankwatch.org/ public announcement from Feb 14, 2008 read here 4/ Ýêîëîãè÷åñêàÿ Âàõòà ïî Ñåâåðíîìó Êàâêàçó – ÐÓÑÈß http://ewnc.livejournal.com/ public announcement from Feb 15, 2008 read here |
| REFERENDUM + HOW CAN YOU HELP THE DATE IS 17 FEB 08!! IF YOU ARE A VOTING CITIZEN: Regardless of whether you are for or against the oil pipeline as such, do vote! We cannot afford to waste a rare change to protect out voices and our future. Do consider: what do we, the citizens of Bourgas, gain from the current terms of the agreement for Bourgas-Alexandroupolis? IF YOU ARE AN ENVIRONMENTALIST: Come and observe the fairness of the vote. Write about us. Write to environmental groups you know. Write to the Bulgarian media. IF YOU ARE A CONCERNED READER: Our fight will likely not end with the referendum. Please email this site to all your Bulgarian friends. Alert them about the petition demanding from the government disclosure on the environmental risks prior to construction. Email this site to all ecological organizations you may be in touch with. Alert media about our fight. IF YOU ARE A JOURNALIST: What goes on in Bourgas is worth talking about: in the context of global environmental crisis, in the context of the European Union and the role of its constituents & governments, in the context of corruption, of diasporas, of tourism. In the eye of international media Bourgas has become but invisible, clothed in rhetoric of geopolitical advantages, lower prices for oil, or saving the Bosphorus. But we are in a highly seismic zone as well, and yes, we are HERE. IF YOU FOUGHT another version of the same fight elsewhere in the world: Share you experience! Write to us: info@bgbui.com |
| PETITION Text of the petition open to all Bulgarian citizens and addressed to the Bulgarian Parliament: Dear Mr. Pirinski, Dear Mr. Bakalov, Dear members of Parliament, We, the undersigned citizens of Bourgas and Bulgaria, insist that all terms, conditions and committtments, which Bulgaria has made with respect to the construction and operation of the oil pipeline Bourgas-Alexandroupolis, be made public. We also insist that in the construction and operation of the pipeline be used only technologies that make the pollution with oil and petroleum products of Bourgas and its surroundings (incl. the Bourgas bay) impossible. As concrete measures we expect that the Bulgarian parliament: 1. Issue a decree that obligates the Members of Cabinet to make public all conditions and commitments that Bulgaria has made with respect to the construction and operation of the oil pipeline Bourgas-Alexandroupolis. 2. Issue a decree that obligates the Minister of Environment to prepare and make public, no later than two months prior to the beginning of pipeline construction, a report regarding the technologies used as well as the compatibility of those technologies with the European environmental laws. SIGN THE PETITION HERE * where: "Òðèòå èìåíà" = your full name "Ãðàä" = your city "Äúðæàâà" = your country "Êîìåíòàð" = your comment |
| ABOUT US
We started as a group of 4 friends –from Bourgas and Stara Zagora. We were amazed at how little information was available regarding the conditions of the agreement Bourgas-Aleksandroupolis both in media and in government sites. We were amazed at the levels of (low) awareness about the Referendum. And we started an information campaign about the conditions envisioned by the agreement for Bourgas and the region. We now work as part of the Citizens Initiative Committee for Saving the Bourgas Bay and the Black Sea, with Chair Manuk Manukian. e-mail: info@bgbui.com |
| The referendum is over. Now what? |
+4 computers, much time, nerves, medicines and beer.
many thanks to Sava Georgiev for helping with making of this web page.
