Un enforque euleriano-lagrangiano para el analysis de la dispersion de petroleo en el mar

In this paper a tridimensional approach for the analysis of oil dispersion in the sea due to oil spilling from a refinery is described. The evolution of the oil slick at the sea surface is simulated by solving the bidimensional mass balance equations on an Eulerian grid, while the droplet and the combustion residues into the water column is analyzed by a tridimensional Lagrangian scheme. The proposed Eulerian-Lagrangian scheme allows to quantify all the necessary information to evaluate environmental impact of an oil spill. The tridimensional Lagrangian approach does not suffer of consistency and stability problems, which affect Eulerian schemes. Further it allows to choose points of the water columns and at the sea bottom at which oil concentration must be quantified without being incorporated into any established spatial grid. The proposed scheme shows to be adeguate for the study of oil spilling, allowing the determination the extension and thickness of the oil slick on the sea surface and to quantify the oil deposited on the beach and on the sea bottom.