Issues

Reauthorization of NISA should include establishing a mandatory national ballast water management program that reflects the current state of technology and does not focus exclusively on ballast water exchange.  It should create a process by which new technology can be developed, tested in an onboard operationally realistic environment, and ultimately accepted as an alternative compliance method where justified by test results.  Mandatory requirements for all ships calling in US ports should include the approval by the appropriate flag state of a ballast water management plan, adequate record keeping to ensure the provisions of the plan have been met and documentation that required training of the crew has occurred.  Required ballast water management should include minimization of the uptake and discharge of ballast water posing aquatic nuisance species transfer threats and may include ballast water exchange where a vessel is properly fitted to conduct such an exchange in a safe manner with due regard to crew safety, weather and vessel characteristics.  Additionally, the creation of alternative exchange zones in appropriate locations in US coastal waters should be examined, although recent studies suggest that such zones could not be created in sufficiently near proximity to ports of entry to preclude the necessity of significant vessel diversions.

Implicit in NISA 96 is the recognition that research and demonstration projects are the lodestone to development of a comprehensive and environmentally protective national ballast water management program.  Unfortunately, the development and operational testing of various technologies have been drastically retarded by the failure of the United States to promulgate a performance based ballast water management standard.  Reauthorization of NISA should specifically mandate that the US Coast Guard, in conjunction with other federal and state agencies, promulgate such a standard as soon as possible.  The standard must be based on the measured effectiveness of ballast water exchange relative to removal or kill of organisms and not to the currently promulgated volumetric exchange efficiency.  While it is laudable that the Aquatic Nuisance Species Task Force’s Shipping and Ballast Water Committee has been hard at work on the preparation of such a standard, it is noteworthy that no such standard has yet been proposed and therefore few existing technologies have been tested in an operational scenario since there is no benchmark with which to compare their effectiveness relative to exchange. 

Reauthorization of NISA must also mandate the creation of a process by which new technologies can be reviewed and ultimately approved as an alternative ballast water management technology after proper testing in accordance with the above noted performance standard and test protocol.  It is reasonable to direct such a mandate to the US Coast Guard and other federal agencies with jurisdiction over maritime safety and the marine environment.  Critical components of this process must necessarily include the creation of specific technology verification protocols, the format and content of the proposal in which a new technology is proposed for consideration, prior test data which establishes a probability that effectiveness in a limited test environment will be transferable to an operational environment, and a test period during which the technology will be temporarily deemed compliant with national requirements.  This latter provision, removing concern for compliance with existing requirements, is critical to provide an incentive for technology developers and vessel owners to commit financially to installation of promising new technologies aboard their ships.  The program should also encourage public-private partnerships to evaluate and verify the effectiveness of ballast water management technologies and practices and could involve, among other things, the use of privately owned and/or US Maritime Administration ships as demonstration platforms.  While there are a number of ballast water demonstration projects underway, there is presently no coordinated effort to evaluate and validate ballast water management technologies and practices at the national level.  Therefore, there is a tremendous need for the US Coast Guard to take the lead in ensuring such efforts will lead to nationally approved practices rather than diverse state-by-state practices and programs.

The current lack of a mandatory national program has compelled some states to embark upon, and in some cases, complete their legislative process.  In particular, California, Washington and Maryland have finalized state legislation addressing aquatic nuisance species and more specifically ballast water management requirements.  A significant number of other states, including Oregon, New York, and Michigan, have proposed legislation which is likely to be enacted in the near future.  A review of these enacted and proposed pieces of legislation produce a patchwork quilt of varying requirements among the states.  Some states have simply adopted the voluntary federal program while others have created new and, in some cases, unreachable criteria for ballast water discharges which would require 100% removal of all organisms from discharged ballast water.  The implications of such requirements on the commercial viability of a state’s port industry and imposition of barriers to entry for vessels ordinarily calling in those ports are significant and justify serious consideration of preemptive language in the NISA reauthorization process.