Characterization and delineation of oil-in-water at the Scott Inlet seeps through robotic autonomous underwater vehicle technology

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Increased risks of oil spills associated with the offshore oil and gas as well as shipping operations in the northern Atlantic and Arctic oceans of Canada call for advanced technologies for subsurface data collection. Autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) technology is proposed in this project to help understand oil plume behavior and improve the efficiency of Canada's oil spill response. High-resolution subsurface data provided by AUVs has proven to be more suitable for searching and delineating patchy oil plumes compared with other traditional survey methods. This project aims to address gaps in current AUV technology by considering the realistic behaviour of oil in water and the time-critical nature of disaster response. The project will develop an innovative underwater data collection strategy for AUVs, based on an adaptive sampling approach. Using this approach, an AUV autonomously modifies its mission in real-time based on features of the plumes detected by on-board sensors, resulting in a path concentrated nearby or within the plume and in information-rich areas identified by the sensors. To date, AUV and oil sensing technologies specific to the characteristics of underwater oil spills are still under development. Only a few experiments were done in real oil spill conditions; most in laboratory and mesoscale experiments or with oil proxies, which significantly limits the ability to understand and capture the complexity found in the field. Hence, another key feature of our project is to test our oil detection methods in real oil-in-water ocean environments through field trials near Baffin Island where oil is naturally present in the water. Our project, in partnership with Canadian AUV operators and manufacturers, will result in a substantial step forward in delineation of subsurface oil plumes using AUVs, providing a significant improvement in Canada's oil spill response and underwater artificial intelligence capacity, as well as enhanced knowledge of marine oil contaminants and monitoring.