Ships are designed to move safely through the water when they are filled with cargo. When empty, they fill their tanks with ballast water in order to weigh them down and so stabilize them as they cross the ocean. Before entering the port where they are to load up, they discharge the ballast water, whose weight will be replaced with freight. The water discharged is typically somewhat unclean, being contaminated with oil and possibly other wastes within the ballast tanks. Its discharge is therefore a source of water pollution. It should be noted, however, that segregated ballast tanks, which are required on newer tank vessels, reduce or eliminate the oily ballast problem. A similar source of pollution is bilge water; this is seepage which collects in the hold of a ship and must be discharged regularly. On oil tankers the bilge water is typically contaminated with oil which seeps out of the cargo tanks; thus this is also a source of oil pollution. Such discharges are referred to as “operational” pollution because they have long been considered a part of the normal operating procedures both of oil tankers and of other ships managing their fuel.
Ships are designed to move safely through the water when they are filled with cargo. When empty, they fill their tanks with ballast water in order to weigh them down and so stabilize them as they cross the ocean. Before entering the port where they are to load up, they discharge the ballast water, whose weight will be replaced with freight. The water discharged is typically somewhat unclean, being contaminated with oil and possibly other wastes within the ballast tanks. Its discharge is therefore a source of water pollution. It should be noted, however, that segregated ballast tanks, which are required on newer tank vessels, reduce or eliminate the oily ballast problem. A similar source of pollution is bilge water; this is seepage which collects in the hold of a ship and must be discharged regularly. On oil tankers the bilge water is typically contaminated with oil which seeps out of the cargo tanks; thus this is also a source of oil pollution. Such discharges are referred to as “operational” pollution because they have long been considered a part of the normal operating procedures both of oil tankers and of other ships managing their fuel.
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