Learning from the Amoco Cadiz oil spill: damage valuation and court's ruling

Abstract

Bonnieux F., Rainelli P., 1993. Learning from the Amoco Cadiz oil spill: damage val uation and court's ruling. Industrial & Environmental Crisis Quarterly. This article presents a discussion of the different economic costs that result ed from the Amoco Cadiz's oil spill which damaged 200 miles of French coastline in 1978. This case is particularly interesting for several reasons : I) The Amoco Cadiz is the largest vessel spill in history, over five times the amount spilled by the Exxon Valdez in 1989, and is thus, a reference point. II) It reveals the difficulties for economists in evaluating natural damage costs since these costs are highly dependent on the assumptions made in order to calculate them, the models used and the scarcity of data available. III) Since the lawsuits were only settled recently (1992), this case allows for the first longitudinal study of the issues involved in the economic valu ation of a massive oil spill. The conclusion, based on previous discussions on the evaluation of the damages by the different parties involved (plaintiffs, defendant, first court and court of appeals), highlights a number of lessons for the damage assess ment of disasters.