Mikko
Eskola
Director
R&D and Innovation
SmartPipe System Oy
Finland
Modern cruise ships today are complex engineering masterpieces that require a high level of skill to keep them running safely and maneuvering in the middle of the ever-tightening international regulatory boundaries. When the regulations tighten this means that the industry is forced to develop improved technologies that comply accordingly.
In
improving environmental efficiency, the focus during the past years has been in
fuel and energy efficiency applications. No under sight should be made to the waste
and technical maintenance side either. The size of new ships constantly tends
to grow thus simultaneously adding to the total amount of waste being produced.
It is not to be forgotten that the human waste producing aspect is always
present no matter how much technology advances.
The complexity of operating a constantly moving platform on a global itinerary,
with multinational crew, organizing supply logistics, solving crewing
challenges and yet trying to keep all operation foremost safe but also
financially viable is an extremely complex equation. The consequences of eventual
non-compliance are not only limited to fines but can seriously damage the
company´s public image and reputation, resulting in loss of revenue.
The quota between tight hygiene requirements versus the usage of different types of chemicals has long been the under sighted area in this equation. Chemical products are indeed needed for maintaining a clean, hygienic, and safe operation all around. These include cleaning, disinfection, dishwashing, and personal hygiene products as well as laundry detergents to mention a few. There are also many technical maintenance products that are needed to keep the onboard systems running efficiently. A single ship may have tens and tens of different heavy chemicals in use at any given moment.
Chemical suppliers often like to mention that their products are the most environmentally friendly solutions around and wastewater treatment system manufacturers tend to claim that their systems are 100% capable of handling different types of waste from human feces to wash waters from different areas of the ship. This market driven tendence is problematic itself but the new regulations banning the so-called Green Washing are very much welcome.
Once observing the waste streams from the different onboard sources no one can fully explain how the chemicals interact in their different combinations and concentrations once they enter the wastewater treatment system downstream. Added to this equation the onboard pipelines themselves collect deposits. If the onboard system is not fully able to handle these waste streams as designed, they get discharged in their current state to the oceans. The total volume can easily be well over 100 cubic meters of gray water daily discharged from one single cruise ship.
Years back our company SmartPipe developed and patented a solution to treat onboard pipe runs. In this approach single dosing units were installed along the onboard pipelines pumping a treatment chemical to the pipe keeping it clear of eventual deposits. At a later stage we started looking into replacing all chemicals with bacterial solutions. In this approach the safe food grade bacteria in the product simply consume any organic deposits in the pipe. The bacteria are the very same type which is being used in wastewater treatment systems this way only enhancing the end water treatment result.
The results
were promising, but installing tens of units around the ship was a complex
solution and the next step was to look at doing things more efficiently. In
this setup the dosing system itself will through different sensors monitor the
condition of the pipeline and make decisions based on the actual need. This way
we can solve the ever-persistent problem of overdosing of products and save
operative costs to the shipping line as well.
However, innovation advanced and we further looked at the root causes that load the systems. In an onboard environment the single most loading component to the wastewater treatment systems is galley originated fats oils and grease that together with alkaline cleaning products get washed to the pipeline. To solve this, we developed a process where 95% of the oils in the galley wastewater are recovered with a small unit that collects the oil from the water before it ever even enters pipe. This way we can eliminate the core problem at source and complete the process by a minimal amount of bacterial treatment product consuming whatever deposit is left after the recovery process.
Innovation is driven by not being completely happy with the current solution. This is the state of mind in which new things evolve. It is a long route ahead of us but with small steps we slowly improve the situation so that also future generations can enjoy the marine environment and it´s pristine waters.