ShareThis
MARPOL Annex V, with its various prescriptions for the handling of garbage, has been in force since the beginning of this month, with all the responsibilities, liabilities and requirements that this means. Well-organised ship operators will have been onto this matter for ages and will have anticipated the requirements and briefed their crews accordingly, putting in place measures to better organise and control the various waste streams that are generated aboard their ships.
They will be unlikely to be embarrassed when inspectors board to check on the garbage management plans and respective record books, and to assess the awareness and level of compliance. These visitors will be looking to see a placard prominently placed to inform all on board about what can be discharged into the sea, and where. It is to be noted that International Maritime Organization (IMO) has helpfully made available such an informative placard, providing a simplified overview of the new provisions.
Like so many of the regulations that devolve upon the operation of ships in the 21st century, it is the Master of the ship who is given the prime responsibility of seeing that the provisions of MARPOL Annex V are implemented. It is pointed out that the burden of proof lies on the Master for preventing the throwing into the sea of anything that should not be so disposed of and for demonstrating that such an offence did not take place.
But is this always as clear as the regulations seem to suggest? Cargo residues, for instance, may be put overside with the ship en route and more than 12 miles from the nearest land, but only if such substances are not harmful to the marine environment. That seems clear enough, just as long as port and coastal states agree with the Master as to what is “harmful” and what is not. Similarly, cleaning agents contained in wash water will hopefully be benign and not harmful, but if a shoreside official in some wayport rules otherwise, where will this leave the Master?
As is normal in these matters, the burden for compliance seems to fall most heavily upon the ship, even though the responsibility for disposing of these wastes in a safe and environmentally sound manner is surely shared between the ship and port. For the ship, there is no escape from the burden of the regulations. It generates the wastes and must obey the regulations in every respect, ensuring that the wastes are retained on board if there is no means of landing them.
The port, on the other hand, retains the whip hand and the easy way out, when it can merely inform the ship that it is not permitted to land its wastes there because there are no suitable reception arrangements. It is able to make such pronouncements at the same time as its inspectors are busy aboard the ship checking the vessel’s compliance with Annex V. But whereas the ship and its Master can be subject to all manner of penalties if faults are found in its Annex V compliance arrangements, there is no equivalent penalties adhering to the port and its management for its failure to provide reasonable reception facilities. It is not that people operating ships are not 100% behind the changes. Everyone afloat knows that the sea is not a garbage dump and that waste disposal must be properly managed. It is just that sometimes they would like others to realise that this desirable result is a shared responsibility.
Source: BIMCO
Post to be found at:
http://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/News.aspx?ElementId=7bc6877d-cada-4288-abec-8ebd963534f0&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=daily
No comments:
Post a Comment