Mongla Port Authority Chairman Habibur Rahman has said Kandari 10 will start spraying the oil neutraliser after acquiring the permission of the Environment Ministry.
The work will start whenever the ministry gives its order, the official told the Dhaka Tribune on Friday morning.
An expert team had sprayed Spark Scent, a powdered substance, to neutralise the oil on Thursday.
However, Divisional Forest Officer of the Sundarbans east zone Amir Hossain Chowdhury contradicted his own statement by once confirming the matter of spraying and later claiming that nothing like spray happened.
Chairman Habibur said: “A chemist will arrive here from Khulna. He will send a report to the ministry after examining the water.”
The locals have started working manually to collect the furnace oil from the surface of the water.
One Ripon Hawlader has collected 400 litres of oil from Joymonir Gol area till the morning.
Meanwhile, the contractors of Padma Oil Company have opened the depot to buy the oil.
The sunken oil tanker was rescued from Shela River in the Sundarbans, 55 hours after it capsized with more than 350,000 litres of furnace oil on Thursday.
The vessel with over 3,50,000 litres of furnace oil capsized in Shela River Tuesday morning. The oil spread along 80 kilometres of the Shela River seriously threatening the delicate ecology which is also home to the Royal Bengal Tiger.
The Shela River is known as a sanctuary for sweet-water Irawaddy and brackish-water Ganges dolphins, which are likely to be the first victims of the oil spill.