RPS and SWIRE Shows Quality Preparedness for Spill Response

RPS APASA is pleased to announce the continuation of its partnership with Swire Emergency Response Services (SERS) to deliver 24/7 modelling services to support response to marine oil and chemical spills.

The partnership offers the highest quality preparedness and response to unplanned spill incidents by combining RPS APASA’s expert trajectory and fate modelling and analysis with rapid mobilisation of key personnel and equipment by SERS.

RPS APASA’s 24/7 Response Modelling service provides critical situation awareness related to the future movement and direction of spills, where and when impact to shoreline is likely to occur and an optimal response strategy.

RPS APASA General Manager Murray Burling knows around the clock availability and rapid turn-around on forecasts and advice is critical to any response.

“Our partnership with SERS since 2014 means we can maintain our ‘one call activation’ that provides seamless engagement of the response team, including modellers, and direct delivery of critical information to those that need it without delay.”

To support this service, RPS APASA combines modelling software that has been proven over years of practical application to real emergency events, including OILMAP (for oil spills), CHEMMAP (chemical spills) and SARMAP (search and rescue or recovery), with the COASTMAP Environmental Data Server system that ensures multiple reliable metocean forecasts are always available for trajectory prediction.

RPS APASA services a wide range of emergency scenarios from spills of oil or chemicals onto the water surface through to complex subsea blowouts in deep water. All fate assessments consider the weathering and transformation based on the specific physical and chemical properties of the pollutant of concern, supported by a database of oil and chemical data properties. Outcomes are modelled using multiple sources of the best available metocean forecast data sets, with the degree of consensus providing important guidance on the safety factors that should be applied.

RPS APASA specialises in high-quality environmental modelling services to support offshore and coastal industries in Australia, South-East Asia and the South-Pacific region. For more than a decade, RPS APASA has been at the forefront of development and application of computer modelling and analysis tools for the assessment of impacts in marine and freshwater environments.

RPS APASA personnel are highly experienced with a blend of expertise in oceanography, environmental engineering, marine science and hydrodynamic modelling. In addition to providing desktop based studies for risk assessments and emergency response, RPS APASA also provides desktop or server based software solutions for oil and chemical spill modelling and metocean data delivery.