EU bans single-hull tankers from carrying heavy fuel

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- European Union nations agreed Friday to ban single-hull tankers carrying heavy fuel in their waters, an effort to prevent disasters like the devastating oil spill off the coast of Spain.

The ban will come into force next month as part of a package of measures rushed through by EU transport ministers after the Prestige oil tanker cracked, spilling millions of gallons of fuel oil onto Spain's Atlantic beaches. It then broke into two pieces and sank.

"We want to avoid these ecological bombs being able to sail in our waters," said EU Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio.

Under the agreement, the 15 EU nations will also enact a total ban on single-hulled vessels over 15 years old. That ban is likely to come into force in 2010, de Palacio said.

The EU plans to set up "safety zones" that would keep out dangerous ships and introduce a $1 billion fund to help areas stricken by oil slicks.

The EU also declared its ports immediately off limits to 66 ships listed as particularly dangerous.

It's not known how effective that will be. A Spanish research institute, Home of the Employed Foundation, said more than 50 blacklisted cargo ships have entered Spanish ports over the past 10 days despite pledges to keep them out.

De Palacio brushed aside fears from the Netherlands that the ban on single-hulled vessels could jeopardize fuel supplies, saying 50 percent of tankers worldwide already had double hulls and that the percentage was growing.

Heavy fuels represent just 7 percent of oil carried by tankers, she said.

The ministers also issued a warning to skippers and shipping companies.

"Any person who has caused or contributed to a pollution incident through grossly negligent behavior should be subject to appropriate sanctions," they said in a statement.

EU environmental commissioner Margot Wallstrom, visiting the affected northwestern coastline, offered Friday to send foreign experts to the area.

"I would like the Spanish government to accept a team of experts to look at the effects both in the mid- and the long-term of the accident, and we also offer to make an environmental study," Wallstrom told reporters after visiting a bird rescue center.

"What has happened is a criminal act and the guilty ones should assume their responsibility, those who pollute should have to pay," she said.

The Prestige spill has tarred some 180 beaches on Spain's Atlantic coast. Thousands of birds an unknown number of fish and shellfish have been killed. The spill is also threatening the Portuguese and French coastlines.

Fishermen on France's west coast loaded oil nets and other equipment onto their boats Friday and headed out to sea to help clean up slicks spilled by the Prestige.

France has been keeping close watch on several small oil patches drifting along northern Spain toward the French coast, and officials are dispatching ships to scoop the refuse from the sea.

The Bahamas-flagged Prestige leaked oil from Nov. 13, when its hull ruptured in a storm of the coast of Spain's scenic Galicia region. On Nov. 19, it broke in half and sank.

The Spanish government estimates it has lost 4.5 million gallons of the 20 million gallons in its hull.