Ballast Water Management 3rd Edition: Understanding the regulation and the various treatment technologies

Updated to MEPC 62 (July 2011) Every day on literally every ship at sea, as well as the cargo, millions of marine organisms are also being transported having been taken onboard when ships load ballast water. The World Wildlife Fund has estimated that, every hour, about 7.5 M litres of ballast water are released into US waters alone, and 10 Bn litres of ballast water a year are transferred round the world. In February 2004, the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships’ Ballast Water and Sediments was adopted, this book represents an up-to-date guide of the treatment types and details all the systems with Basic or Final approval from IMO or Type Approval.

Understanding the issues with Ballast Water Treatment systems today, can be summed up as:

Shipowners face a difficult process in choosing a Ballast Water Treatment system, as there are no clear guidelines about which system operates best for their needs

The global market for ballast water treatment systems will be worth hundreds of millions of dollars, running easily into billions of dollars over the next few years (do the maths on 47,000 ships over 500 gt!), shipowners need to make sure that they understand the systems they are purchasing

There are many emerging ballast water treatment technologies that have recently received, or will soon receive, type approval certificates

Many vessels will require retrofitting in the near future - will it be the case that those owners that wait too long will be caught in a seller’s market?

We now have Standard D1, which includes sequential mid-ocean de-ballasting and re-ballasting or flow-through ballasting, but these two methods are, at best, estimated to be only 90% effective. Ballast pumps run for 3-4 days at a time lead to increased fuel consumption, wear and tear on equipment and increased air emissions. The nature of ballast water exchange can result in increased hull stresses and stability problems and there will always be clingage and sediment in the ballast tanks

The next stage, depending on the size of ship, will be when Standard D2 comes into force, which will require the treatment of ballast water typically in systems using a combination of filters, hydrocylones, cavitation, centrifuges, chemicals, UV radiation and deoxygenation with inert gas, ozone, hydrogen peroxide etc.