OPEN ACCESS
Assessing the coastal Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) is very important for contingency planning for oil spills, especially for regions undergoing urban development. This study is an attempt to identify the sensitivity of the southeastern portion of the Gulf of Suez shoreline; a very promising area for economic development. Enhancing a methodology for calculating ESI in this work obtains more efficient results for environmental sensitivity assessment. This is accomplished by adding more detailed physical factors that may affect the ESI. The coastline is ranked according to factors controlling coastal resiliency to oil spills. These factors are categorized in three sets of data: 1) physical habitats of the coastline that determine the persistence of oil pollution and ease of cleaning and reclamation such as beach types, degree of exposure to waves, beach slope, wave directions and tidal flats (physical factors); 2) biological resources sensitive to oil (ecosystem factors); and 3) the types of human-use resources (socio-economic factors). Data used to determine these factors were collected from satellite images, field work and documentary information and were manipulated in a GIS environment using a geospatial arithmetic modeling to produce spatial environmental sensitivity maps of coastal shorelines. The studied shoreline of the southwestern Sinai coastal plain of Egypt has a wide range of sensitivity to oil spills ranges from very low to very high. The northern part of the shoreline is characterized by low sensitive beaches where the morphology and beach type play the dominant rule in reducing the sensitivity. It is composed mainly of high slope rocky beaches. The southern part is dominant by sandy tidal flat beaches and coral reefs communities that extend wider and shallower. This makes the southern beaches relatively more environmentally sensitive to oil spills.
Geospatial, GIS, Oil Spills, Environmental Sensitivity Index, Sinai Egypt, Coastal Plains
[1] Abou Zaid M. (2000). Overview of the status of Red Sea coral reefs in Egypt (unpublished report), p. 39.
[2] Alves T.M., Kokinou E., Zodiatis G., Lardner R., Panagiotakis C., Radhakrishnan H. (2015). Modelling of oil spills in confined maritime basins: The case for early response in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, Environmental Pollution, Vol: 206, pp. 390-399. DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2015.07.042
[3] El-Gamily H.I., Nasr S., El-Raey M. (2001). An assessment of natural and human-induced changes along Hurghada and Ras Abu Soma coastal area, Red Sea, Egypt, International Journal of Remote Sensing, Vol. 22, No. 15, pp. 2999–3014.
[4] El Sherbiny A.H., Sherif A.H., Hassan A.N. (2006). Model for environmental risk assessment of tourism project construction on the Egyptian Red Sea Coast, Journal of Environmental Engineering, Vol. 132, No. 10, pp. 1272-1281. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)0733-9372(2006)132:10(1272)
[5] Folk R.L., Ward W.C. (1957). Brazose river bar: A study on the significance of grain size parameters, Journal of Sedimentary Petrology, Vol. 27, pp. 3-26.
[6] Frihy O.E., Hassan A.N., El Sayed W.R., Iskander M.M., Sherif M.Y. (2006). A review of methods for constructing coastal recreational facilities in Egypt (Red Sea), Ecological Engineering, Vol. 27, pp. 1-12.
[7] Agudelo G., Diego L., Bernal N., Alberto R., Mojica I., Marcela D., Vargas G., María A., Erich G. (2015). Environmental sensitivity index for oil spills in marine and coastal areas in Colombia, Ciencia, Tecnología y Futuro, Vol. 6, No. 1, pp. 17-28.
[8] Gundlach E.R., Hayes M.O. (1978). Vulnerability of coastal environments to oil spill impacts, Marine Technology Society Journal, Vol. 12, pp. 18-27.
[9] Hanna R.G.M. (1995). An approach to evaluate the application of the vulnerability index for oil spills in tropical Red Sea environments, Spill Science and Technology Bulletin, Vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 171-186.
[10] Jackson C.A.L., Gawthorpe R.L., Sharp I.R. (2006). Style and sequence of deformation during extensional fault-propagation folding: Examples from the Hammam Faraun and El-Qaa fault blocks, Suez Rift, Egypt, Journal of Structural Geology, Vol. 28, pp. 519–535. DOI: 10.1016/j.jsg.2005.11.009
[11] Jensen J.R., Ramsey E.W., Holmes J.M., Michel J., Savitsky B., Davis B.A. (1990), Environmental sensitivity index (ESI) mapping for oil spills using remote sensing and geographic information system technology, In Intl. J. of Geographic Information Systems, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 181-201.
[12] Coral Reef Management Handbook (1984). Kenchington R.A. Hudson E.T., UNESCO, Paris, France.
[13] Khalil S. (1998). Tectonic evolution of the eastern margin of the Gulf of Suez, Egypt. PhD Thesis, Royal Holloway, University of London, p. 348.
[14] Environmental Sensitivity Index Guidelines Version 3 (2002). NOAA, Seattle, USA, 192.
[15] Yender, R., Michel, J., Shigenaka, G., & United States. (2010). Oil spills in coral reefs: Planning & response considerations. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Ocean Service, Office of Response and Restoration.
[16] NOAA, (2017). Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) Maps, from https://response.restoration.noaa.gov/maps-and-spatial-data/environmental-sensitivity-index-esi-maps.html, accessed on 21 Dec. 2017
[17] ITOPF (2012) Country Profiles. A Summary of Oil Spill Response Arrangements and Resources Worldwide, from http://www.itopf.com/fileadmin/data/Documents/Country_Profiles/profiles.pdf, accessed on 22 Dec. 2017
[18] Li Y., Brimicombe A.J., Ralphs M.P. (2000). Spatial data quality and sensitivity analysis in GIS and environmental modelling: The case of coastal oil spills, Computers, Environment and Urban Systems, Vol. 24, pp. 95-108. DOI: 10.1016/S0198-9715(99)00048-4
[19] Lindquist S.J. (1998). The Red Sea basin province- Sudr-Nubia and Maqna petroleum systems, U.S. Geological Survey Open File Report.
[20] Lotfy I.N. (2004). GIS-based Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) mapping for oil spills: Case study in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. MSc, Universiteit Gent Vrije Universiteit Brussel Belgium, p. 114
[21] McClay K.R., Nichols G.J., Khalil S., Darwish M., Bosworth W. (1998). Extensional tectonics and Sedimentation, eastern Gulf of Suez, Egypt. In: purser, B and Bosence., D.W.J. (eds), Sedimentation and tectonics of Rift Basins; Red Sea-Gulf of Aden, Chapman and Hall, London, pp. 223-238.
[22] Moe K.A., Skeie G.M., Brude O.W., LØvås S.M., NedrebØ M., Weslawsk M.J. (2000). The svalbard intertidal zone: A concept for the use of GIS in applied oil sensitivity, vulnerability and impact analyses, Spill Science & Technology Bulletin, Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 187-206. DOI: 10.1016/S1353-2561(00)00038-4
[23] Nasr P., Smith E. (2006). Simulation of oil spills near environmentally sensitive areas in Egyptian coastal waters, Water and Environment Journal, Vol. 20, pp. 11–18. DOI: 10.1111/j.1747-6593.2005.00013.x
[24] Pilcher N., Abou Zaid M. (2000). The status of coral reefs in Egypt, Townsville, QLD: Global coral reef monitoring network.
[25] Schiller H., Bernem V.C., Krasemann H. (2005). Automated classification of an environmental sensitivity index, Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, Vol. 110, pp. 1-3+291–299. DOI: 10.1007/s10661-005-8041-8
[26] Tirmizi S.T., Tirmizi S.R.U.H. (2017). GIS based risk assessment of oil and gas infrastructure in Sindh, Pakistan, Environmental and Earth Sciences Research Journal, Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 55-59. DOI: 10.18280/eesrj.040301
[27] Vanderstraete T., Goossens R., Ghabour T.K. (2004). Coral reef habitat mapping in the Red Sea (Hurghada, Egypt) based on remote sensing, EARSeL eProceedings 2/2004, pp 191-207
[28] Wahid A.M. (2008) GIS-based modeling of wind-transported sand on the Qaa plain beach, Southwestern Sinai, Egypt, Journal of Coastal Research, Vol. 24, No. 4, pp. 936–943. DOI: 10.2112/06-0733.1
[29] Wahid A., Madden M., Khalaf F., Fathy I. (2009). Land suitability scenarios for arid coastal plains using GIS modeling: Southwestern Sinai coastal plain, Egypt, Journal of Urban and Environmental Engineering (JUEE), Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 73-83. DOI: 10.4090/juee.2009.v3n2.073083
[30] Wahid A., Madden M., Khalaf F., Fathy I. (2016). Geospatial analysis for the determination of hydro-morphological characteristics and assessment of flash flood potentiality in arid coastal plains: A case in southwestern Sinai, Egypt, Earth Sci. Res. J., Vol. 20, No. 1, pp 1-9. DOI: 10.15446/esrj.v20n1.49624