The issue of cruise ship wastewater is set to make what is perhaps its final appearance in the Legislature today.
House Bill 80, legislation aimed at changing water quality requirements for cruise ships and other large passenger vessels in Alaska waters, was held on its third reading until Feb. 19.
Last week the Alaska State Senate voted down five attempts to amend Governor Sean Parnell’s cruise ship wastewater bill. While voting in mostly lopsided opposition to all five amendments, Senators did not vote on the main body of legislation during Wednesday’s floor session.
Sen. Dennis Egan introduced an amendment that would allow cruise ships to continue to use a current Department of Environmental Conservation water quality exclusion which allows cruise ship the use of mixing zones to meet water quality criteria until the year 2020, according to the amendment. This extends for seven more years DEC’s exclusion of the 2006 citizens initiative requirement that cruise ship wastewater effluent meet water quality standards “at the point of discharge.”
Egan said he applauds the cruise industry for advancing its wastewater treatment as far as it has.
“There are ships today that are meeting water quality standards nine out of 10 times,” Egan said.
Cruise ships that have trouble meeting current criteria can already receive exclusions through 2015, Egan said.
“This amendment extends that to 2020,” Egan said. “It doesn’t kick any ship out of Alaska. It gives them a chance to update technology for five more years.”
Sen. Cathy Giessel R-Anchorage was the main spokesperson for the opposition to amending the governor’s bill during Senate deliberations on Feb. 13. She said there was no need to amend HB 80 as the Department of Environmental Conservation already enacts regulation that controls cruise ship effluent. And with a no-roll-back rule on water quality criteria ADEC will continue to ratchet up requirements for new and more effective treatment technology and practices, she said.
Giessel pointed to the preliminary report from a Science Advisory Panel created by the state Legislature in 2009. The panel met over a dozen times to discuss wastewater treatment technology and science and provide reports to the DEC wastewater division in 2013 and a final in 2015. In its preliminary report to the state the panel said it found no technology existing or on the horizon that could bring cruise ship discharge up to water quality standards in ammonia, copper, zinc, and nickel at the point of discharge.
The Senate voted down Egan’s amendment 10 to seven. Of the four other amendments introduced on Feb. 13 none received more than five affirmative votes. Sens. Gary Stevens R-Kodiak, Lyman Hoffman D-Bethel and Donald Olson D-Golovin were on excused absence.
House Bill 80 passed through House committees, a full vote of the house and the one Senate committee to which it was referred without amendments. If the Senate passes HB 80 today it moves on to the governor for final approval.
For more information on Gov. Parnell’s vessel wastewater legislation visit www.legis.state.ak.us and search of House Bill 80.
• Contact reporter Russell Stigall at 523-2276 or at russell.stigall@juneauempire.com.
Comments (27)
Add commentPerhaps they should fix the
Perhaps they should fix the city water before looking outside? Perhaps?
I mean ... when city water literally stains your dishes, etc. You know there's something wrong.
cruise ship born diseases
!!!!!!
????
?????
How about this option?
Allow the mixing zones, but only in specific locations established by ADEC. The ships can't just discharge whenever they see fit, they must travel to specific zones and stop there, where ADEC can monitor the zones to ensure compliance.
If the discharge zones aren't exactly where the cruise industry would like them to be, if stopping in those zones isn't convenient for them...tough. They always have the option of improving their technology so they meet end-of-pipe standards. Then they could avoid the whole discharge zone hassle.
Ship Mixing Zones
DEC will allow ships to discharge along their routes - Chatham Strait, Stephens Passage, Lynn Canal & Icy Straits - without any specific areas to dump in, such as donut holes. Unfortunately, these are major salmon passages and routes to natal rivers and streams.
A better solution is to re-deploy the worst, copper-ridden ships to anywhere else in the world that does not have natural salmon. Australia, the East Coast, Chile, Asia, anywhere but Alaska, BC and the Kamchatka Penninsula. It's that easy, but the cruise lines want control over solutions, and No Laws over laws that protect Alaska water quality and salmon. HB 80 does that job for them, and puts DEC firmly in the cruise pocket.
As Senator Egan noted, the fleet is meeting the standards with a few glaring exceptions - the copper-plumbed ships of the Princess fleet. All other ships are piped with plastic, but Princess has miles of copper on each ship that leach and create high levels of dissolved copper.
Re-deploy these copper-ships and the problem is solved. HB 80 exempts the whole fleet to accomodate the dirty Princess fleet of 6 ships. Ridiculous, but true.
Chip Thoma, Responsible Cruising In Alaska
Let's get ready for salmon
Let's get ready for salmon that tastes like tilapia.
Chip
My house has hundreds of feet of copper pipe, as do most of the houses in Southeast. Add them together and they far exceed the copper in a cruise ship. And they're leaching copper into our waste water plants 12 months out of the year, not just during cruise season.
So that leads to several obvious questions:
1. Is the level of copper emitted by our waste water plants or cruise ships actually a problem? I understand that research indicates that small amounts of copper are problematic for salmon, but are the amounts from ships and communities causing a significant problem? You and others keep raising the copper issue, but you haven't articulated the magnitude of the problem...only referred to 'studies'. You need to do more to educate/convince me on this issue.
2. How effectively do our municipal treatment systems eliminate copper? Why aren't you advocating for end-of-pipe standards for them as well? It's the same ocean that they're dumping into.
3. What about all of the other sources of copper out there? There are probably square miles of copper-based antifouling paint on the bottoms of the boats in Southeast. This is paint specifically designed to slough off into the water. How does this source of copper emissions compare to what the cruise ships are emitting?
I completely share your skepticism of the cruise industry, especially their buying of our politicians (most notably Governor Parnell), but this particular issue strikes me as being targeted at an industry rather than a problem (if the problem actually exists).
???
And why can they not keep all this contaminates in their holds and dispose of it when the ship gets to a facility that can handle the treatment.
So sorry if its an inconvience but it is their ahem crap---and chemicals processed on their vessel!
The customers are paying for and adventure .
feces pieces
I was fishing about 1.5 miles off Pt Widbey in Lynn Canal when a cruise ship went by headed north . The tide was ebbing and I waited until a tide rip went through my net, then pulled it and all of the knots in my net had feces pieces stuck to them . I reported it to the Coast Guard and they never got back to me.Will I be fined by the DEC for having an unsanitary work deck ?Will the ships discharge create dead zones on the ocean bottom ?
Stationary versus Mobile Mixing Zones
Mobile mixing zones cannot be tested, and over 450 ship trips will visit SE this year. Their discharges may be continual, or over the course of a few hours. The sole problem is dissolved copper - that is the only metal that affects all salmon. To avoid any conflict with salmon, ships may discharge in federal, offshore waters, into the JNU treatment plant and a stationary mixing zone that is monitored, or run clean ships like Royal/Celebrity that can either discharge in Alaska water or offshore. The choices and solutions are simple, but HB 80 is far more about cruise line control than the science, caution or reputation of pristine water and wild salmon. CT
ADF&G
I called a ADF&G commercial fisheries biologist and asked him why he did not testify on the cruise ship discharge bill and he said the Governor owns the phone he was talking on.
Chip
Please answer the questions I posed above and you will gain my support.
Chip, redirecting them to
Chip, redirecting them to Australia isnt a viable alternative. The copper would create a mess with the corals and inverts. They need to upgrade their vessels, plain and simple. Graw a set and tell them that we no longer allow copper pipe in the systems of vessels in the state of Alaska. As for the land based effluent, clean it up too. Anyone ever wonder how our waste water treatment plant got OK'd to dump into a salmon stream?
2014 , 2016 Vote out the reps
2014 , 2016
Vote out the reps that do not support our democratic process .
Doesn't it kind of freak you out!
Everything on the planet is being "treated" with psychotropic drugs, growth hormones and antibiotics? Since our water treatment facilites cannot filter this stuff out, it is now in the water everywhere....
A simple answer?
Lat58, good questions deserve a response! Who can one believe? I find the silence unbelievable; where's that truth to power chip?
disturbing but no surprise
The Alaska state senate just sold out the people's right to clean water to the cruise industry. Disgusting, but no surprise.
disturbing but no surprise
The Alaska state senate just sold out the people's right to clean water to the cruise industry. Disgusting, but no surprise.
I remember a few years back
I remember a few years back that they were crying we needed several million in upgrades to the waste water treatment plant. I never heard anthing more about that. Did they ever get the new incinerator? If not, when they do, perhaps they should get the newest technology as well. Why not upgrade when you replace?
These ships employ the best
These ships employ the best technology available so it’s refreshing to see the governor and legislature acknowledge how advanced their systems are and give them a permit that makes sense.
best technology available
Some of the ships employ the best technology available; others do not, and they have just been given a green light to continue using old technology instead of working to meet the standards which the people of Alaska voted on. A sad day.
what kind of pipes does Chips house have?
Copper?
Do the Juneau wastewater treatment plants work properly ?
Do they ever bypass the treatment process due to excess material / fluids?
Do the Alaska State Ferries pump their sewage ashore ?
If so, where?
If they don't..... do the ferries have properly working ,certified treatment plants ?
Goals
The regulatory environment, largely created by the initiative has resulted in years of uncertainty, litigation, and study after study only confirming what the State has already concluded.
UPDATE YOUR STORIES!
It passed.
oh the poor cruise industry
has our governor and legislators in their pocket, just like the oil companies. First it was the crap about how the cruise tax caused lower bookings, while completely discounting a recession as a possible cause. Now it is buying their way to pollute against the will of the electorate. Don't forget this was an initiative that passed with large support, but who cares, we are the legislature and the citizens will doesn't count.This is a sad day for Alaska.
Bill approving cruise ship pollution
The only reason folks spend the money to travel all the way to Alaska is that, currently, it is unique. Once the conservatives have killed the wolves, eliminated the brown bears and polluted the waters, why would anyone go there? They just keep dumbing it down to match the lower 48. Short term gains, long term destruction. Dumb.
Thank you
Thank you, Alaska Legislature. Thank you, Gov. Parnell. This is a great day for truth and common sense.