Ballast Water Treatment Technology: Choosing the Best Options

摘要

It is now widely acknowledged that ballast water carried around the world in ships, to maintain safety and stability at sea, represents one of the major vectors for the translocation and potential establishment of non-indigenous organisms. Shipping moves over 80% of the world's commodities and transfers some 3-5 billion tonnes of ballast water internationally each year, with a similar volume of water transferred domestically within countries and regions. Shipping volumes are increasing dramatically as world trade grows. At any one time some 7,000 different species are being carried in ships' ballast tanks, and when discharged many of these organisms have the potential to create disastrous biological invasions with serious ecological, economic and public health consequences.