One Biosolids Story: Cruise Ship Effluent as Fertilizer In King County

What do you get when you process sewage to produce organically rich, useable by-products? The answer:  biosolids.  Here's one success story in the making:

From the State Environmental Research Center (SERC):

During a one-week trip, a typical cruise ship produces 50 tons of garbage, 1 million gallons of graywater (wastewater from sinks, showers, galleys, and laundry facilities), 210,000 gallons of sewage and 35,000 gallons of oil-contaminated water.  Between 1993 and 1998, there were 87 confirmed illegal discharges from cruise ships in state waters (81 cases involving oil; 6 involving garbage or plastic). An additional 17 “other alleged incidents” were referred to the countries where the cruise ships were registered. The industry paid more than $30 million in fines for violations and three cruise lines were placed on five-year felony probations.

Image taken by Grant Haller.

From a January article in the Seattle Post Intelligencer:

The [Port of Seattle Commission] staff estimated last year that the average cruise ship setting sail to Alaska from Seattle produced 28,000 gallons of sewage sludge during its weeklong voyage, meaning that Seattle's 150 Alaska-bound cruise ships produced 4.2 million gallons of sludge last year -- enough to fill six Olympic-size swimming pools.

more...King County has a program to reuse treated sludge as fertilizer spread on recovering forestlands and some nonfood farm crops. The port is planning to open a new $62 million cruise facility at Terminal 91 by 2009, tearing down the $18 million Terminal 30 building built in 2003 to convert that space into use by container ships. Environmentalists pushed the port to study what might be needed to offload the sludge before the new cruise terminal's construction progresses too far to be able to accommodate sludge trucks in the future.

While King County has been a leader in biofuels production and use, there is still a lot of controversy due to the potential toxic contents of biosolids. The EPA has published a good guide to the subject.

Comments

[timada42]

I think all these things are happening jus because we don’t know how to appreciate good things. Humans are not educated to respect nature. If an Alaska Cruise ship produced from Seattle 28,000 gallons of sewage sludge, that’s an obvious prove of human ignorance.

[timada42]

I think all these things are happening jus because we don’t know how to appreciate good things. Humans are not educated to respect nature. If an Alaska Cruise ship produced from Seattle 28,000 gallons of sewage sludge, that’s an obvious prove of human ignorance.

[timada42]

I think all these things are happening jus because we don’t know how to appreciate good things. Humans are not educated to respect nature. If an Alaska Cruise ship produced from Seattle 28,000 gallons of sewage sludge, that’s an obvious prove of human ignorance.

[timada42]

I think all these things are happening jus because we don’t know how to appreciate good things. Humans are not educated to respect nature. If an Alaska Cruise ship produced from Seattle 28,000 gallons of sewage sludge, that’s an obvious prove of human ignorance.

[David]

It's kind of horrifying to realize just how much garbage a single cruise ship can generate in a week! It's unfortunate the cruise lines are lobbying to have the 2006 environmental protection law due to go in effect later this year overturned. I believe Royal Caribbean has been taking the lead in trying to do more, even being able to burn bio-fuel on some ships.

[Sean B. Halliday]

First off, I have to say that I LOVE cruise ships.
I spent over 12 years working on them as a Scuba Instructor,
Shore Excursion Manager and an IT Officer.

For 2 years I also worked shoreside in Miami as a database IT guy.

During my years on ships, I have to stay that many things happened
and that life is definately stranger than fiction on cruise ships.

Many people have asked me to share the stories I have collected over
the years, so I am complying with their request.

My site is: www.cruiseshipstories.com

If you had any stories of your own to add, please
send them to me and I will be happy to add them.

Sean B. Halliday
www.cruiseshipstories.com