Over 30% of all installed ballast water treatment systems fail Port State Control D-2 compliance inspections despite 95% of systems having successfully passed commissioning tests, reports Safety4sea.
PSC inspections
Information submitted by Global TestNet to the International Maritime Organization’s Marine Environment Protection Committee revealed that 29% to 44% of operational systems are failing to remove invasive species.
According to the findings, the most common reasons for non-compliance were contamination of the ballast water tank from mixing treated and untreated waters or improperly opening/closing valves; organism regrowth due to insufficient and infrequent cleaning of the ballast water tanks; and human error due to insufficient system knowledge, maintenance, and training.
Top ranked sources of failure
- Contamination inherent to presence of organisms in tanks (no cleaning of tanks at commissioning and regrowth).
- Contamination from mixing treated water with untreated water.
- BWMS not used in accordance with manufacturer instructions (including a lack of sufficient crew training).
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Source: Safety4sea
