STATISTICAL EVALUATION OF THE AREA ESTIMATION OF AN OIL SPILL DISPERSION MODEL

摘要

Computer models have proved to be useful tools to assess complex processes in environmental sciences. One type of application are oil spills, where models are used to provide insight into the processes interfering with the dispersion of the spill and to predict the final area covered with oil; information indispensable for many policy applications. An oil spill model is here presented, based on the general transport equations. Existing expressions for applicable dispersion processes were analyzed, evaluated and taken into account into the basic model scheme. The model proved to be useful for the prediction of final area covered with oil. However, practical application of the proposed model needs a careful evaluation, including sensitivity studies and assessment of model validity in relation with observed data. Statistical evaluation of oil spill models has not received a lot of attention until now; appropriate model evaluation and validation techniques applied in other areas of environmental modeling will be applied to the presented oil spill model. The purpose of this paper is to describe and apply the methods developed for model evaluation, including evaluation results.