Ballast Water Management: Hot topics at MEPC 67

Published Aug 25, 2014 7:13 PM by The Maritime Executive

Op-Ed by Jad Mouawad, Consultant

As the ratification of the Ballast Water Management Convention by enough countries to bring it into force seems imminent, the topics on the agenda for the next IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee meeting (MEPC 67) in October seem to be competing for attention as all parties try to push forward their agendas prior to "D-day".

The deadline for submission of papers to MEPC is over, and there is a total of 23 documents on the table for discussion. As in other meetings, type approvals, basic and final approval applications and reports from the work of the GESAMP (Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection) Ballast Water Working Group constitute the majority of the submissions with 15 papers.

The remaining eight papers are the ones that represent the bulk of the work though, and they can be grouped into four categories:

1. Exemptions and exceptions based on risk analysis. Will Denmark manage to convince the MEPC about the special application of the convention to ferries?
2. Amendments of guidelines G8 for type approval. Will we see a new set of guidelines and a new spree of type approval testing?
3. Port state control, how will the sampling and control merge to constitute a predictable control regime?
4. Application of treatment during stripping operations. Is it important enough to debate it that much?

How will the meeting run down?

Given the variety and complexity of the topics put on the table, it will be interesting to see how the chairman of the ballast water management review group will try to deal with all topics in the short window when work can actually be done given the divergent opinions on the issues.

Jad Mouawad will be providing a discussion of each of the items above over the coming weeks, bringing some background on where the different interested parties stand and the likelihood of outcomes. He aims to help the industry by providing more predictability on upcoming regulations.