IMO working group conceives regulations for the protection of fuel tanks

摘要

With the setting up of a working group the IMO reacted to the necessity to increase the level of protection for fuel oil tanks against collision and grounding damage. The working group on the protection of oil fuel tanks provided a draft regulation for the MARPOL convention, which concerns itself with the constructional requirements of new buildings. The draft regulation was accepted at the 48th meeting of the IMO subcommittee "Ship Design and Equipment "in February 2005. The draft regulation was approved at MEPC 53 in July 2005. The draft regulation contains two alternatives, which both provide a comparable degree of protection. On the one hand the draft regulation contains descriptive requirements regarding the width of the double hulls similar to the requirement of MARPOL I/19 for cargo tanks, independently of their structural arrangement in the hull. On the other hand, alternative probabilities of oil outflow were introduced. The methodology is based on hypothetical oil outflow probabilities, as they are also prescribed in MARPOL I/[23] for the tank size limitation on tankers. The flexible arrangement of double skin should minimize the economic consequences of the increased space required in particular for container ships. The regulation facilitates safety requirements, without limiting an innovative design development of modern ships more than necessary.