BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY
Senator Wieckowski, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular
Bill No: AB 1312
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|Author: |O'Donnell |
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|Version: |4/15/2015 |Hearing |7/1/2015 |
| | |Date: | |
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|Urgency: |No |Fiscal: |Yes |
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|Consultant:|Laurie Harris |
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SUBJECT: Ballast water management.
ANALYSIS:
Existing law:
Under the Marine Invasive Species Act (Public Resources Code
§71200 et seq.), which applies to all vessels carrying, or
capable of carrying, ballast water into California's coastal
waters, except as specified:
1) Declares the purpose of the Act to eliminate the discharge of
nonindigenous species into the waters of the state based on
best available technology economically achievable and applies
to ballast water and associated sediments taken on a vessel,
including biofouling (the attachment of marine organisms to a
ship's hull, anchors, etc.).
2) Requires the person in charge of a vessel carrying ballast
water in California waters to take steps to minimize the
uptake and release of nonindigenous species, including
maintaining a ballast water management plan for the vessel.
3) Allows the person in charge of a vessel, while taking all
feasible measures to minimize the discharge of nonindigenous
species, to forgo a ballast water management practice if it
would threaten the safety and stability of the vessel or
safety of the crew and passengers.
4) Requires the State Lands Commission ("Commission") to adopt
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regulations governing ballast water management practices for
vessels arriving at a California port from a port within the
Pacific Coast Region on or before January 1, 2005.
5) Requires the Commission, in consultation with the United
States Coast Guard (USCG), to adopt regulations governing the
evaluation and approval of shipboard experimental ballast
water treatment systems, while allowing for the owner or
operator of a vessel to have an experimental system, approved
by the Commission by January 1, 2016, be deemed in compliance
with future treatment standards for up to 5 years from when
the interim standards are established.
6) Requires that the person in charge of a vessel carrying, or
capable of carrying, ballast water visiting a California port
provide electronic or written information, as specified, upon
the vessel's departure from its port of call.
7) Requires that the Commission, on or before January 1, 2008,
adopt regulations for interim performance standards for the
discharge of ballast water by 2016 or 2018, as specified by
vessel weights, and to meet the final performance standard of
zero detectable living organisms for all vessels by 2020.
8) Requires the Commission, in coordination with the USCG, take
samples of ballast water and sediment from at least 25% of
arriving vessels to ensure compliance with ballast water
requirements.
9) Allows the Commission to require vessels operating in
violation of this Act to depart the waters of the state and
exchange, treat, or otherwise manage the ballast water at a
location determined by the commission.
This bill:
1) Defines "port" as a port or place where a vessel is, was, or
will be anchored, moored, or transferring cargo.
2) Repeals obsolete reporting and management practice provisions
(Public Resources Code §§71204.2, 71204.5, and 71210.5) and
makes technical changes for statutory consistency.
3) Requires the Commission to adopt regulations governing
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ballast water management practices for vessels arriving at a
California port from a port outside of the Pacific Coast
Region, as specified, and requires the person in charge of a
vessel to comply with the adopted regulations.
4) For a vessel owner or operator who applies to install an
experimental ballast water treatment system, changes the date
of application approval by the commission from January 1,
2016 to 2020, after which the system is deemed in compliance
with any interim treatment standards for up to five years, as
specified.
5) Changes the reporting requirement, for the person in charge
of a vessel carrying, or capable of carrying, ballast water
that visits California, from the time of departure to at
least 24 hours before the vessel arrives at the California
port, or prior to departure if the voyage is less than 24
hours in total.
6) Changes the interim ballast water discharge performance
standards compliance date from a phase-in schedule by weight
to one that applies to all new vessels on first arrival in
California if constructed on or after January 1, 2020, or as
of the first scheduled drydocking on or after January 1,
2020, for all other vessels.
7) Changes the compliance date of the final performance standard
for the discharge of ballast water of zero detectable living
organisms from 2020 to January 1, 2030.
8) As part of the sampling of 25% of vessels that the Commission
is required to conduct in coordination with the USCG,
includes collecting samples of biofouling, in addition to
ballast water and sediment, as well as requiring that the
Commission inspect the samples, in addition to collecting
them.
9) Expands the Commission's authority to require vessels in
violation of the Act to manage biofouling, in addition to
ballast water, at a specified location outside of the waters
of the state.
Background
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1) Nonindigenous Species and Introduction Vectors.
According to the Commission's 2015 Biennial Report on the
California Marine Invasive Species Program, "nonindigenous
species" (NIS) include those organisms that are intentionally
or unintentionally transported by human activities to new
environments, posing threats to human health, the
environment, and the economy. Due to the often unsuccessful
and costly nature of eradication efforts, prevention is the
best way to address them.
Though NIS can be transported in a variety of ways, for
aquatic organisms, shipping is the primary mechanism of
movement by people. Shipping contributes to an estimated
79.5% of established NIS introductions in North America and
74.1% worldwide. In 2005, an estimated 42% of threatened or
endangered species were listed in part due to negative
interactions with these nonindigenous species. In San
Francisco Bay, since 2000, approximately $27.5 million has
been spent to control the invasive Atlantic cordgrass and
monitor impacts on native species.
NIS introductions happen in two main ways. First, organisms
may be picked up in ballast water, which is used to maintain
a ship's stability at sea, at one port and released at
another. Second, organisms may attach to the external parts
of the ship, called "biofouling."
Over 7,000 species of aquatic organisms are estimated to move
through ballast water across the world each day, according to
the Commission's 2014 Assessment of the Efficacy,
Availability, and Environmental Impacts of Ballast Water
Treatment Technologies for Use in California Waters report.
Furthermore, every discharge of ballast water can potentially
release more than 21.2 million individual free-floating
organisms into the environment.
2) Public Health Impacts of Nonindigenous Species.
According to the Commission's 2015 report, vessels and port
areas have been connected to the spread of epidemic human
cholera, as from the transport of the Vibrio cholerae
bacteria from Latin America to Alabama in 1991, leading to
the closure of nearly all the Mobile Bay oyster beds that
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summer and fall.
Other microbes found in ships include human intestinal
parasites, such as Giardia and Cryptosporidium, the pathogens
causing paralytic shellfish poisoning, and bacterial
indicators of fecal contamination, including E. coli.
3) Ballast Water Management in California.
The best way to prevent NIS spread in ballast water is
through retention. However, when there are operational or
safety concerns, a vessel may not be able to retain ballast
water. The Commission reports that in the first half of 2014
alone, more than 6.9 million metric tons of ballast water was
discharged in California, and the amount of water discharged
in the state continues to rise.
In 2006, the Legislature enacted the Coastal Ecosystems
Protection Act to prevent the introduction and establishment
of aquatic species through ballast water, in part by
requiring the Commission to implement performance standards
for the discharge of ballast water and regularly review
ballast water treatment technologies. If technologies are
not available to meet California's standards, the Commission
must provide an assessment to the Legislature at least 18
months prior to the implementation dates for the performance
standards.
Currently, California's standards are much more stringent
than those set by the International Maritime Organization
(IMO) and USCG ballast water standards. The state's
standards allow for smaller concentrations of organisms as
well as limit the discharge of total living bacteria and
viruses.
4) Recent Ballast Water Treatment Technology Assessment Reports.
In 2013, the Commission reported that there were no available
ballast water treatment technologies that could meet
California's performance standards. This led to a delay of
the performance standards implementation by two years.
In 2014, a follow-up report by the Commission was conducted
to review availability of treatment technologies ahead of the
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2016 implementation deadline for performance standards for
existing vessels with a ballast water capacity of 1500-5000
metric tons and all newly built vessels. The report included
both shipboard and shore-based ballast water treatment
technologies. The Commission found that no shore-based
treatment facilities exist in the United States currently,
and no ship-based treatment methods meet California's
standards.
With a lack of acceptable treatment technologies, the current
methods for vessels to comply with California's standards
while in California waters include retaining all ballast
water onboard or discharging ballast water at an approved
location or facility, neither of which is ideal for the
approximately 15% of vessels that reportedly release ballast
water in California's waters each year.
5) Difficulties in Meeting California's Standards.
The Commission's 2014 report notes that some of the
difficulties in finding a shipboard testing method include:
current testing methods for shipboard treatment systems are
not performed under operational conditions; there is no one
system that can meet the California standards for all
organism sizes; and there are not widely accepted testing
protocols for living bacteria and virus concentrations in
ballast water.
The report further argues that, "Because of the differences
between the IMO/USCG standards and the California performance
standards and the requirement for vessels to use treatment
systems that are 'type approved' to the IMO/USCG standards,
there is no incentive for treatment technology developers to
assess the ability of systems to meet the California
standards."
Comments
1) Purpose of Bill.
According to the author, "The state's interim performance
standards must be changed to reflect the lack of available
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treatment technologies. AB 1312 delays implementation of
California's ballast water interim performance standards
until 2020, and final standards until 2030, to enable further
research and development of treatment technologies that can
meet California's standards. This delay also provides the
California State Lands Commission with time to adopt
compliance assessment regulations that will give the shipping
industry guidance on how to conform to these regulations."
2) Ongoing Implementation Delays and Impacts.
Previous reports from the Commission to the Legislature have
been conducted in 2007, 2009, 2010, and 2013. Findings have
led to the delay of implementation dates for interim and
final performance standards in 2008 and 2013. From the
originally proposed dates to those in the current bill, these
represent delays of 11 years for the interim performance
standards and 10 years for the final performance standards.
The Commission notes that the lack of options available for
the shipping industry is an obstacle to implementing the
current standards. They report currently funding a study on
the feasibility of shore-based ballast water treatment in
California, managed by the Delta Stewardship Council, with a
final report anticipated in late 2015, as well as engagement
in developing sampling tools and protocols to assess
shipboard treatment systems.
Without amending the current statute, some vessels will
become non-compliant when the interim performance standards
are scheduled for implementation as of January 1, 2016, and
there are no current technologies available to them in time
to reach compliance.
However, are repeated delays of performance standards
providing a disincentive for developing the technologies that
are needed to meet the standards that have been set? By
continuing to delay the implementation of these standards and
not developing the testing methodologies and technologies
necessary to meet them, the environment, public health, and
economy of the state are being put at risk.
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Related/Prior Legislation
SB 814 (Committee on Natural Resources and Water, Chapter 472,
Statutes of 2013) delayed implementation of ballast water
performance standards for vessels that carry or are capable of
carrying, ballast water into the state by 2-6 years, as
specified for the ship's construction date and ballast water
capacity.
SB 935 (Committee on Environmental Quality, Chapter 550,
Statutes of 2012) delayed the date for which the Commission had
to approve a vessel operator's application to install an
experimental ballast water treatment from January 2008 to
January 2016.
AB 248 (Lowenthal, Chapter 317, Statutes of 2009) required the
person in charge of a vessel to maintain and submit specified
information relating to the vessel's ballast water treatment
system to the Commission.
SB 1781 (Committee on Environmental Quality, Chapter 696,
Statutes of 2008) delayed the implementation of ballast water
performance standards for new vessels with ballast water
capacity of less than 5,000 metric tons from January 1, 2009 to
January 1, 2010.
SB 497 (Simitian, Chapter 292, Statutes of 2006) enacted the
Coastal Ecosystems Protection Act, which established interim and
final performance standards for detectable organisms in ballast
water discharge for large commercial ships with the purpose of
eliminating invasive species into state waters.
AB 433 (Nation, Chapter 491, Statutes of 2003) cited the Ballast
Water Management for Control of Nonindigenous Species Law as the
Marine Invasive Species Act, consolidating and revising various
requirements for ballast water management practices to minimize
the release of nonindigenous species.
SOURCE: California State Lands Commission
SUPPORT:
California Association of Port Authorities (CAPA)
California Chamber of Commerce
Cruise Lines International Association, Inc.
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Maersk Line / Maersk Agency USA
Pacific Merchant Shipping Association (PMSA)
OPPOSITION:
None received
ARGUMENTS IN
SUPPORT: According to the sponsor, "Ballast water discharge
and vessel biofouling of commercial ships are significant
vectors for the introduction of invasive species in coastal
environments. Once established, invasive species can devastate
native aquatic life and cost hundreds of millions of dollars, if
not more, to control. Attempts to eradicate species after they
have become established are often unsuccessful and
cost-prohibitive; therefore, prevention of species introductions
is the most effective approach to addressing invasive species.
"In August 2014, the Commission approved a report assessing the
availability of treatment technologies to meet California's
performance standards for ballast water discharge. The report
found that there are currently no viable options to meet all of
California's discharge standards.
"Approximately 15% of large vessels arriving at California ports
must discharge ballast water for operational or safety purposes.
No shore-based treatment facilities exist or are in development
in the United States, and shipboard treatment systems have not
demonstrated the ability to meet the California performance
standards.
"AB 1312 delays implementation of California's ballast water
performance standards until 2020 to enable further research and
development of treatment technologies that can meet California's
standards. The delay also gives the Commission time to adopt
compliance assessment regulations that will give the shipping
industry guidance on how compliance will be assessed."
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