_applied sciences_  
_Article_  
Development of the Artificial Intelligence and Optical Sensing Methods for Oil Pollution Monitoring of the Sea by Drones  
**[PERSON] 1,2,*, [PERSON] 1,2, [PERSON] 1, [PERSON] 1,2, [PERSON] 1**  
and [PERSON] 1  
1 Maritime State University Named after Adm. [PERSON]. [PERSON], Maritime Techno Park 1,  
690003 Vladivostok, Russia; [EMAIL_ADDRESS] (D.P. ); [EMAIL_ADDRESS] (D.K. ); [EMAIL_ADDRESS] (A.C.); [EMAIL_ADDRESS] (V.Y. ); [EMAIL_ADDRESS] (I.B.) 2 Laboratory of Analytical Laser Spectroscopy, Far Eastern Federal University, 690091 Vladivostok, Russia
*Correspondence: [EMAIL_ADDRESS]; Tel. : +7904-627-1230  
**Citation:** [PERSON], [PERSON]; [PERSON], [PERSON]; [PERSON], [PERSON]; [PERSON], [PERSON]; [PERSON], [PERSON]; [PERSON], [PERSON] Development of the Artificial Intelligence and Optical Sensing Methods for Oil Pollution Monitoring of the Sea by Drones. _Appl. Sci._**2021**, _11_, 3642. [[https://doi.org/10.3309/appr1083642](https://doi.org/10.3309/appr1083642)]([https://doi.org/10.3309/appr1083642](https://doi.org/10.3309/appr1083642))  
Academic Editor: [PERSON]  
Received: 30 March 2021  
Accepted: 16 April 2021  
Published: 18 April 2021  
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**Citation:**  
places of extraction and transportation of oil or oil products. The dimensions of the water areas that must be inspected in such cases, as a rule, do not exceed some kilometers. In the case of pollution on such a scale, it is necessary to register not only the presence of slicks on the sea surface from oil products but also the excess of permissible concentrations of dissolved oil products in seawater, which are contained in the bilge waters of vessels. According to the MARPOL Convention, the maximum permissible concentration of oil products in bilge waters is 15 ppm [3]. However, an oil slick is not formed on the water surface above the water discharge point in all cases when the concentration of dissolved oil products exceeds the value of 15 ppm. The formation of slick depends on the concentration of oil products in the bilge waters and the hydrological parameters of the seawater into which the discharge is made. Thus, monitoring tools should not only ensure the detection of slicks of oil products on the sea surface, determine their volume, and provide the ability to measure the concentration of dissolved oil products in the subsurface layer, but also determine the types of oil products in slicks or solutions to identify sources of pollution. All possible monitoring methods that exist to date [4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9; 10; 11], as well as the capabilities of drones that can be used as carriers of hardware and software monitoring systems, were analyzed, thus allowing the determination of methods used to develop a hardware and software monitoring framework for drones. The method of computer vision was used to monitor the slicks of oil products on the sea surface; thus, slicks were the objects of detection and classification. The method of laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) was developed to identify the types of oil products and to measure the concentration of the oil product solution. Thus, a combination of a passive optical monitoring method (computer vision) and an active laser-induced fluorescence spectroscopy method was used in this work. The first task was to adapt the computer vision method for monitoring oil slicks. The process of slick monitoring itself is divided into two stages. The first stage is detecting the slick on the sea surface. Appropriate datasets for computer vision learning were collected for detection. In the case of thin slicks formed by different types of fuel, it is important to determine with a high probability that this spot is oil pollution, i.e., that the observed slick is not a biogenic slick or is not caused by hydrophphysical processes in the ocean (internal waves, upwelling, etc.) [12; 13; 14; 15].