THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, December 12, 1994 TAG: 9412120061
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B7 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
LENGTH: Medium: 83 lines
In a process likened to ``ecologic roulette,'' globe-trotting ships are endangering the Chesapeake Bay by bringing exotic organisms into the bay, according to a new report.
The report by a panel of scientists, shipping agents and government officials warned that an accidental introduction of foreign fish or plants could harm native species and upset the bay's delicate ecological balance.
The report, submitted to the Chesapeake Bay Commission, calls for federal and international action to prevent a potential catastrophe.
Voluntary national guidelines on discharge of ballast water in coastal waters should be tried first, but if that doesn't work the U.S. Coast Guard should impose the regulations, the panel said.
The bay commission, which represents Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia, is due to act on the panel's recommendations in January.
Ann Pesiri Swanson, executive director of the commission, said introduction of foreign species could threaten an 11-year effort to restore the bay's environmental health.
``As we spend millions and millions of dollars and regulate people to improve water quality in the name of living resources,'' Swanson said, ``it would be a shame to have a new living resource introduced into the bay and upset the balance.''
Ballast water is believed to be the prime source for invasions of rivers, lakes and bays.
Shipping has been blamed for bringing the troublesome zebra mussel from Europe to the Great Lakes and for carrying fish-killing red tides from Japan to Australia. Ships pump water into below-deck tanks or cargo holds to ensure stability during an ocean voyage, and captains release ballast when approaching port.
A single large ship can carry millions of gallons.
Whatever is present in the water, including juvenile fish, eggs, plankton, bacteria and viruses, comes aboard in the ballast and is released when the ballast is pumped out.
The Chesapeake already has been invaded by other exotic species, such as the freshwater Asian clam and the underwater grass hydrilla. Some scientists even speculate that the devastating oyster parasite MSX, which suddenly appeared in the bay in the 1950s, was brought here in a ship's ballast.
Baltimore and Norfolk, among the busiest ports in the nation, are likely places for an invasion because of the vast quantities of ballast discharged by ships arriving from Europe, Asia and Latin America.
Together, the two ports receive 3.2 billion gallons of ballast water a year, a recent federal study determined. Norfolk ranks second nationally and Baltimore fifth in volume of ballast water received.
Scientists from the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, near Edgewater in Anne Arundel County, have found living organisms in more than 90 percent of the 70 vessels they have sampled.
Ships bound for the Great Lakes now are required by federal law to exchange their ballast at sea before entering coastal waters. Salty water kills many fish and plants picked up in freshwater ports.
One major Chesapeake fleet owner, the U.S. Navy, with about 100 vessels based in Norfolk, already has pledged to protect coastal waters worldwide through at-sea ballast exchange.
Effective Nov. 1, the Navy adopted a new environmental protection manual, which includes a requirement that whenever possible, any vessel that has taken on ballast water within 12 miles of a coastline must exchange that ballast at sea before re-entering coastal waters.
Exchanging ballast water does not kill all the hitchhiking organisms, so the ultimate answer may be treating with heat or chemicals or redesigning ships. But ballast exchange is the most effective response for now, said Swanson of the bay commission.
Maryland and Virginia, however, are legally powerless to require it because the U.S. Constitution does not allow states to regulate international or even interstate ship traffic. Only the federal government has that authority.
Congress has directed the Coast Guard to study the problem of shipborne aquatic invasions, but the only crackdown on ballast water has been in the Great Lakes.
Swanson said that state-by-state or even regional measures would be ineffective anyway. If ballast exchange is required for the Chesapeake but not other ports, organisms released by vessels in places like New York or Delaware Bay eventually would find their way here, she said. by CNB