Effects of oil slick properties on the dispersion of floating oil into the sea. Final report, September 1976-July 1978

The salient physical effect causing initial dispersion of oil into the sea is breaking waves. Subsequent behavior of the dispersed oil, including droplet trajectories and droplets rejoining the slick are strongly influenced by oceanic turbulence caused by breaking waves and other sources as well. All the aspects of dispersion are related to oil slick properties, the most important being physical and chemical properties of the oil as well as the slick thickness distribution. This report does not give a way of making a quantitative prediction of the extent of dispersion of an oil slick of prescribed properties inasmuch as there is not yet sufficient knowledge to do this. Rather, the report deals with the fundamentals of the dispersing processes and reports the results of a group of laboratory experiments relating to them. These results can ultimately be used in a model for predicting dispersion and also lead to some immediate conclusions. One of them is that the most important slick property influencing dispersion by breaking waves is the oil slick thickness. Thick slicks are much more resistant to dispersion than thin slicks.