Marine Log - August 2008 - (Page 2) August 2008 Vol. 113 No. 8 John R. Snyder Editor ISSN 08970491 MARINELOG USPS 576-910 PRESIDENT Arthur J. McGinnis, Jr. amcginnis@sbpub.com jsnyder@sbpub.com editorial PUBLISHER & EDITOR John R. Snyder SENIOR EDITORIAL CONSULTANT Nicholas Blenkey nblenkey@sbpub.com ASSISTANT EDITOR Shirley Del Valle sdelvalle@sbpub.com nkitchen@msn.com wbeber@comcast.net psexton@sbpub-chicago.com wwilliams@sbpub.com pdesiere@sbpub.com More heartburn for vessel operators CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Nigel Kitchen CONTRIBUTING EDITOR William B. Ebersold MARKETING DIRECTOR Peter Sexton CREATIVE DIRECTOR Wendy Williams ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR Phil Desiere H eartburn must be a daily occurrence for ship operators. Still digesting a healthy helping of TWIC, the latest cause of dyspepsia for vessel operators is the regulation of vessel discharges under the Clean Water Act. Since the Clean Water Act was enacted some 35 years ago, these pollutants incidental to the normal operation of a vessel had been exempt from the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Now that’s about to change. Starting September 30, 2008, commercial vessel operators of vessels that are greater than 79 feet in length will need to apply to the EPA for Vessel General Permits (VGPs). Fishing vessels and commercial vessels under 79 feet in length will be exempted from the permit process for two years. The proposed VGPs will cover a laundry list of 28 potential vessel discharge streams. Besides ballast water, the discharge streams covered under the VGP will include everything from deck wash runoff to underwater ship husbandry, which are the materials created during the inspection, maintenance, cleaning, and repairing of a vessel’s hull. For each discharge type, the permit will establish specific effluent limits depending upon what’s in the effluent and the Best Management Practices designed to decrease the amount of potential pollutants entering the waste stream. Vessel operators will have to comply with all of these effluent limits. To show compliance, operators will have to conduct routine self-inspection and monitoring and document all of this in the ship’s logbook. What got the ball rolling was a lawsuit filed by environmentalists in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in 2003. Environmentalists were concerned about the effects of ballast water discharges, which can contain invasive species, oil, paint chips, sediment, toxins, etc. The suit was filed because the EPA had denied a petition four years earlier requesting that the agency repeal its regulation regarding the exemption of certain pollutants, including ballast water, from the permitting process in the NPDES. The petition asserted that vessels should be considered as “point source discharges” requiring NPDES permits. In March 2005, the court determined that the EPA had exceeded its authority under the Clean Water Act and granted summary judgement to the plaintiffs. Court decisions in subsequent appeals, including one handed down last month on July 23, upheld the earlier court’s decision. Operators planning to attend Marine Log’s Global Greenship Conference next month in Washington, D.C., will get to hear Kathy Metcalf, Esq., the Director for Legislative Matters, the Chamber of Shipping of America, discuss, “The legislative and legal spotlight on vessels discharges,” during a luncheon address on Sept. 17. Hopefully, you won’t get indigestion. jsnyder@sbpub.com ART PRODUCTION MANAGER Todd Blanchard tblanchard@sbpub.com DESIGNER Nicole Fredrickson PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Mary Conyers-Brown NATIONAL SALES DIRECTOR Roland Espinosa nfredrickson@sbpub.com mbrown@sbpub.com respinosa@sbpub.com INTERNATIONAL SALES MANAGER Donna Edwards dedwards@sbpub.com SALES REPRESENTATIVE -KOREA Young-Seoh Chinn SALES MANAGER Jeff Sutley CLASSIFIED SALES Diane Okon CONFERENCE DIRECTOR Jane Poterala CONFERENCE COORDINATOR Michelle M. Zolkos CONFERENCE ASSISTANT Latima Meynard jesmedia@unitel.co.kr jsutley@sbpub.com dokon@sbpub-chicago.com jpoterala@sbpub.com mzolkos@sbpub.com lmeynard@sbpub.com A SIMMONS-BOARDMAN PUBLICATION EDITORIAL AND BUSINESS OFFICES 345 Hudson Street New York, N.Y. 10014 TEL: (212) 620-7200 FAX: (212) 633-1165 website: www.marinelog.com e-mail: marinelog@sbpub.com CIRCULATION & SUBSCRIPTIONS: Call toll free (800) 895-4389, Monday-Friday 9 am—5 pm EST. 2 MARINE LOG AUGUST 2008 www.marinelog.com http://www.marinelog.com http://www.marinelog.com http://www.abb.com http://www.marinelog.com
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