Northwest Cruise Ships Moving in Right Direction
"Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me."
-- Albert Schweitzer, 1875-1965; theologian, musician and medical missionary
A thriving tourism industry
As you travel west through downtown Seattle, all of a sudden it hits you. "Wow, what is that? It's huge..." 29 stories, up to 4,000 passenger and crew, and over 900 feet long might be considered huge. We are at once in awe, possibly repulsed, and muse what it's like inside.
Alaska-bound cruise ship traffic has experienced explosive growth since 1998, spearheaded by Norwegian Cruise Line's commitment to the Port of Seattle to make Seattle its port for northbound cruises to Alaska. The Port followed suit by investing $54.5 million for infrastructure to accommodate Norwegian, Holland-America, Celebrity and Princess Lines. In 2003, 100 cruise ships had poured 400,000 people into Seattle and surrounding areas. In 2004, there will be 148 calls and over 550,000 passengers.
Postive and negative impacts
Generally, cruise ship traffic has been a positive economic development story -- an estimated $124 million in business revenues, $39 million in payroll and $3.8 million in taxes in 2003 alone -- but there is a darker underbelly as well: each week, a cruise ship will generate approximately 1 million gallons of graywater (from showers, laundry, salons, galley), 210,000 gallons of sewage and 35,000 gallons of oil contaminated water. Cruise ships basically create the waste equivalent of a small city. These effluents are typically treated by traditional type II marine sanitation devices (MSD) that many considered ineffective for protecting marine waters. In Alaska, most of the ships have or are going to install Advanced Wastewater Treatment Systems (AWTS). All ships home ported in Seattle have these systems.
The U.S. Coast Guard has primary oversight responsibility for regulating cruise ships to ensure they comply with both domestic law and international maritime conventions.
A promising step: Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)
The cruise ship industry has responded relatively well to the call for protection of local waters, as it previously developed best management practices for waste management. The most recent progress in cruise line environmental management is exemplified by the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed by the Northwest Cruise Ship Association, the Port of Seattle, and the Washington State Department of Ecology. The MOU was signed on April 20, 2004.
Continue reading this story from People for Puget Sound:
Northwest Cruise Ships Moving in Right Direction