Get ready now

Bjørn Flåm and Charles Anderson, of Skuld take a look at the impending Ballast Water Management Convention

The use of water as ballast has been an important feature of safe and efficient shipping for more than a century. It provides stability, reduces stress on the hull, improves propulsion when little or no cargo is on board, and increases manoeuvrability. However, using ballast water involves introducing millions of tonnes of water collected in distant marine habitats into others, where the organisms carried in the transported water may cause serious harm. Marine species have always dispersed through the currents and on floating debris, but the natural barriers created by land masses, salinity and depth have limited this phenomenon. That has changed, however, as fast, large ships carrying water as ballast surmount the natural barriers. The worst-affected areas are those where large volumes of bulk cargoes are loaded, such as Australia, Brazil, Canada, India and the US.