What Shipowners Truly Want?

• DHI business development and project manager Gitte Ingelise Petersen explained some of the misconceptions.
• DHI is a Danish-based firm which has a 50-year track record in developing and implementing solutions that meet real-life challenges in water environments worldwide.
• The webinar was sponsored by Ecochlor, DHI and Headway.

Different ballast water treatment systems have different design constraints, which can significantly affect how effective the system is as reported by Riviera.

No guaranteed approval

One of the first lessons learnt by shipowners now operating ballast water treatment systems (BWMS) on new buildings, or recently retrofitted systems on older ships, is that IMO and/or US Coast Guard (USCG) type approval is not guaranteed 100% performance.

DHI business development and project manager Gitte Ingelise Petersen explained some of the misconceptions.

DHI is a Danish-based firm which has a 50-year track record in developing and implementing solutions that meet real-life challenges in water environments worldwide.

This includes being an approved independent laboratory (IL) for the testing of ballast water treatment systems (BWTS).

The webinar was sponsored by Ecochlor, DHI and Headway.

Ms Petersen explained that the core issue as to why a type-approved BWMS fails to meet expectations in real life is that before the introduction of the D-2 standard, there was no rule on system design limitations and monitoring testing.

Operational parameters 

Ms Petersen referred to paragraph USCG Ballast Water FAQs 18.3, which states: “What operational parameters must be considered for type approval testing?

The manufacturer must identify any operational parameters or design limitations (e.g., minimum UV transmittance or intensity, water temperature, etc.)

These manufacturer claims will be taken into consideration by the IL during test plan development.”

Ms Petersen said that shipowners must look closely at the system design limitations listed on the certificates and be aware of the limitations inherent in testing.

A more complex issue is the relationship between system design limitations, filter or no filter, TRO consumption and the quality of water in different ports and harbours.

Company’s advantages 

The table “System Design Limitation for BWMS with or without filter” shows the results of an examination of the limitations set out in USCG certifications by DHI.

The table shows the difference between filter and non-filter (BWMS 1).

Ms Petersen noted several conclusions: one is that the main reason for a filter in an EC or any chemical treatment BWMS is to filter out organisms larger than 50 mu.

There is a risk that these will not be killed.

Ms Petersen highlighted Spoorhaven in Amsterdam and the Port of Melbourne in Australia as examples.

She also noted that measuring the “Ambient Oxygen Demand” during type-approval testing will provide useful information for shipowners and a reliable description of the SDL and Ambient Oxygen Demand is essential for the selection of a BWMS.

Picking up on the theme of challenging water, Headway’s, director of strategy and development department, Kechao Lu, said that the company’s OceanGuard had four main advantages: one is that the OceanGuard system is already installed on over 1,000 ships and a considerable body of knowledge has accumulated about operations in challenging waters.

The second advantage named by Mr Lu is that the Headway BWMS is approved across the range, for flow rates of 50 m3 to 4000 m3.

“The third advantage is ultra-low power consumption, even in freshwater,” said Mr Lu.

“This is very good for retrofit installations where the available power may be limited.”

The fourth advantage is that even during the pandemic, Headway has been able to deliver systems with lead times of just one month. 

Power consumption 

“Referring to the topic of the webinar,” said Ecochlor’s vice president of sales & marketing, Panos Smyroglou, “what shipowners want, what they need, is filter-less.”

Other factors include lower Capex and installation costs and time.

The new Ecochlor systems without a filter, and the older systems, had already addressed one particular concern of shipowners – power consumption.

Regarding turbidity, he said the Ecochlor chemical process is not consumed by suspended sediment, which means it is not impacted by turbidity.

It has been in place longer than most BWMS have been in use and needs to be updated in light of practical experience.

Issue of challenging water

Mr Wilkins was also keen that there was a collaboration from all stakeholders in BWMS to tackle to recognise the issue of challenging water.

He noted that INTERTANKO has data from its members on the subject.

“We have been surveying our members since April 2021 and we have over 450 reports from 174 different ports around the world,” he said.

He noted that BWMS stakeholders and IMO have been working on ballast water treatment regulation for 20 years and it seems that only now is challenging water being recognised as an issue.

It is hoped that this issue and the other issues that are likely to arise in the run-up to the introduction of the D-2 standard on 8 September 2024, and beyond, are properly addressed and resolved at the forthcoming MEPCs.

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Source: Riviera

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