Ballast Water Management MEPC 67 Outcome

The IMO Committee on Protection of the Marine Environment (MEPC) held its 67^th Session from Monday 13 through Friday 17 October 2014 in IMO Headquarters in London.

 Among the many issues discussed by the Committee, developments on the Ballast Water Management were on the agenda. IMO MEPC 67 concluded the following:

Harmful Aquatic Organisms in Ballast Water

Turkey presented their instrument of accession to the BWM Convention bringing the number of Contacting States to 43, though the total gross world tonnage is still 2.45% short of that necessary for ratification.  Basic approval of BWM systems making use of Active Substances was given to ElysisGuard and in addition, final approval was granted to MARIONMATE, BlueZone and KURITA.  Of interest, the total number of type approved BWMs is now 51.  Sampling performed during stripping operations was discussed thoroughly and deemed to be inadvisable hence it was agreed that there is no need to develop guidance on how to do so.

Report of the Ballast Water Review Group

In considering the report submitted by RG1, the Committee:

1. adopted a draft MEPC resolution on Guidelines for port State control inspection for compliance with the BWM Convention.  Importantly, the thorny issue of SAMPLING when moving from ‘indicative’ to ‘detailed’ analysis is dealt with in para 2.4.1 of the Guidelines which states  that: “PSCO should carry out an indicative analysis first.  However, the time required to conduct the indicative analysis should not unduly delay the operations, movement or departure of the ship.  If the result of the indicative analysis for the D-2 standard exceeds the D-2 standard by a threshold specific to the validated indicative analysis method being used as set out in the ‘Guidance on ballast water sampling and analysis for trial use in accordance with the BWM Convention and Guidelines (G2) (BWM.2/Circ.42), a detailed analysis can be carried out.”
2. agreed to keep the Guidelines for port State control under the BWM Convention under review following the prescribed trial period associated with the guidance in BWM.2/Circ.42;
3. endorsed a plan of action for reviewing Guidelines (G8);
4. established a correspondence group for the review of Guidelines (G8) that will report to MEPC 68;
5. approved an official meeting of the correspondence group during PPR2 with appropriate technical experts in attendance;
6. relaxed the correspondence group report deadline to 6 March 2015 (9 weeks before MEPC 68);
7. adopted a draft MEPC resolution on Measures to be taken to facilitate entry into force of the BWM Convention.  Important provisions in the associated draft MEPC Resolution agrees that the existing Guidelines (G8) should continue to be applied until they are revised following the review, and that shipowners who have installed type-approved BWM systems prior to the application of the revised Guidelines (G8), should not be penalised. Port States also agree to refrain from applying criminal sanctions or detaining the ship, based on sampling during the trial period; and
8. endorsed the plan (and Terms of Reference) for a study on the implementation of the ballast water performance standard described in regulation D-2 of the BWM Convention.  The Secretariat was invited to initiate the study  for which a draft report is to be submitted by 1 August 2015.

Source: InterManager

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