Royal Caribbean to upgrade wastewater systems

[Jason]

MIAMI - Royal Caribbean International cruise lines will add equipment to its ships that will better clean sewage and waste water before it's dumped in the ocean, officials said Wednesday.

The new equipment will clean the up to 24,000 gallons of sewage or "blackwater" and 265,000 gallons of "graywater" dumped daily from the cruise ships' laundries, showers, sinks and dishwashers.

Although the company is committed to revamping its fleet with the new technology, a spokeswoman said it won't be done until the systems are proven economically and environmentally feasible.

The announcement came a month after the nonprofit advocacy organization Oceana and other groups called for the cruise line to clean up its sewage and wastewater to protect marine habitats and human health. At the time, the company accused the groups of "grandstanding."

"We are confident today this technology economically and environmentally can treat graywater and blackwater to levels of purity equivalent to Alaska wastewater standards," Royal Caribbean chairman and chief executive Richard Fain wrote in a letter Tuesday to Oceana officials.

After state and federal laws were passed setting stricter standards for cruise ships in Alaska in 2000 and 2001, many ships installed more advanced wastewater treatment systems that enabled them to meet them, said Michael Crye, president of the International Council of Cruise Lines.

Oceana officials said Wednesday that Royal Caribbean's decision was "a precedent-setting move."

"Our hope all along has been that if we have Royal Caribbean do this the others will follow their lead," spokesman Sam Haswell said.

Crye said that ICCL, which represents 15 of the world's leading cruise lines, has made a commitment to do widescale installation on ships. No time frame has been set.

Royal Caribbean now has such systems on three of its 29 vessels. The advanced systems use ultrafiltration or reverse osmosis to reduce pollutants. They will eventually be added to the other 26 ships and any new ships brought into the fleet.

Royal Caribbean spokeswoman Lynn Martenstein said Wednesday the company is currently negotiating for four installations, three of which should occur this year.

Martenstein could not give a time frame for when the rest of the ships would be outfitted.

"This is very much a work in progress," she said. "The commitment is there, both as a company and as an industry."

Fain wrote that the installations would take place during the ships' normal dry docking, which is every two years.

Royal Caribbean says it has improved its environmental practices since 1999, when it paid $27 million after acknowledging it had polluted repeatedly and lied to the Coast Guard about it.

(Associated Press)

[GottaCruz]

I'm very glad to read that changes are really being made to reduce the pollutants that are dumped into the oceans. I really hope that all cruise lines follow through with this. We really need this to happen to protect marine life and the health of all of us. This is really important.

[prop]

When we were on Monarch a few weeks back I was watching a local San Diego news broadcast onboard, a news story of the protest directed towards RCCL was taking place. Twas a strange feeling hanging out in my stateroom watching the protest. Hope RCCL follows through with the plan and hope other lines do the same. :cool: