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When it comes to marine filtration, the first scene that appears in people’s is usually the sea or seawater. But marine filtration is more than seawater. A crucial resource on this planet is seawater. Large amounts of seawater are needed to generate fresh water for drinking and irrigation in locations with a lack of fresh water, just as ships sailing on the ocean need a lot of it for ballast water to keep the ship balanced.

Marine filtration is not only about the seawater, but also the transported seawater. The ballast water is a kind of transportation of water. The cargo ships load the seawater from one place and discharge it at another port. The seawater traveled with the cargo ship in ballast tanks.

This is the point many people will be indifferent about, the filtration before the discharge of the ballast water. People are familiar that we can not drink seawater directly, because it contains large quantities of salt and contaminants. But why do we need filtration for ballast water? it is just the seawater discharge into seawater.

With the development of the environmental protection concept and the perfection of the law, we are constrained to filter the ballast water before emission. It is universally recognized that ballast water can damage the equipment and harm the local ecosystem.

Brother Filtration has years of filtration experience, and designs and manufactures all kinds of filter products. More than that, we provide better filtration solutions for our clients. In marine filtration, we have various suitable filter elements. You can learn more about ballast water in its introduction.

Why do we need filtration for the water in cruise ships or cargo ships?

Every time they leave the port, people working in the shipping business have a lot of responsibilities. First and foremost, they are accountable for performing their tasks, moving cargo, and delivering items to customers around the world. The accomplishment of this duty, which necessitates that every component of every ship is in flawless functioning order, is crucial.

The environmental impact of shipping businesses’ transport vessels is the second factor to be taken into account. Global shipping routes have connected people on a scale never before possible, but they have also put the world’s various ecosystems in danger. This is because the microorganisms in the ship’s ballast water can contaminate or overrun a new region’s marine environment, resulting in immeasurable harm to the area.

The International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships’ Ballast Water and Sediments was enacted by the International Marine Organization (IMO) in 2004 in response to these ecological threats. This Convention imposed demands on the shipping sector to cleanse its ballast water in an effort to stop the spread of exotic aquatic species.

Eliminating invasive marine species is the goal of ballast water treatment. Ballast water is “one of the principal avenues for the introduction of non-indigenous marine species,” according to the USDA.

Ships that discharge ballast water at new ports of call run the risk of introducing foreign species, such as small fish and microbes, into the local water supply. The European Maritime Safety Agency attributes invasive marine species to microbial exposure, lower habitat quality, and other dangers that might ultimately impair fishing and even protected species in the area. These actions can have a range of negative repercussions.

How to realize ballast water treatment?

Utilize chemicals to do disinfect

Biocides are frequently used in ballast water treatment systems in the disinfection stage. In BWMS, biocides are often used to inactivate microorganisms in the ballast water by using chlorine as an oxidizing disinfectant.

The main disadvantage of biocides, which are employed in roughly half of all systems, is that the water treatment process may still require neutralization or detoxification before deballasting is complete.

UV disinfection

UV lamps are used in some ballast water treatment systems. The ultraviolet radiation damages the organisms’ DNA and renders them non-viable, or unable to reproduce, as the ballast water travels past chambers containing the lamps.

As a result, the threat of microorganisms flourishing in the water is effectively eliminated, and they are also kept from burdening the ecology where they are released. However, UV can be impacted by waters with low TSS (total suspended solids), and the effectiveness of the filtering system that comes before the treatment is crucial to its performance.

Heat treatment

As the name implies, heat treatment entails heating ballast water to a temperature that kills all aquatic life. This procedure can be carried out in one of two ways: by heating the ballast water in their tanks or by passing the water via the ship’s engines (effectively turning it into cooling water). The ballast water will be cleaned and made fit for release using a heat treatment process, however, this might take a while and the heat can exacerbate corrosion in the ballast water tanks.

Deoxygenation

Deoxygenation, like biocides, renders all living things in the ballast water inert. In order to suffocate the organisms, the ballast water treatment system injects an inert gas (such as nitrogen) into the tank or the ballast flow. The tanks must be sealed against ambient oxygen throughout this procedure, which can take two to four days and may or may not be effective. Short transits should not undergo deoxygenation.

Ultrasonic treatment

High-energy ultrasound is used in ultrasonic therapy, also known as cavitation treatment, to kill organisms in ballast water. In the end, the ultrasound’s tremendous pressure destroys the cell walls of organisms, killing them. Because it requires no maintenance and uses no chemicals, ultrasonic treatment is a popular option; nevertheless, research shows that this ballast water treatment system performs best when used in conjunction with other treatment techniques like ultraviolet light or biocides.

Almost all ballast water treatment systems combine a water filter with an additional technique, like the ones mentioned above. In the ballast water treatment system, the appropriate water filter serves a number of useful and economical functions. First of all, it is a useful method of removing material that might be ingested at turbulent ports and, if removed improperly, can accumulate in the ballast tanks. A filter can also get rid of a lot of the germs we’ve already talked about. This decreases the time and effort required to treat the organisms that pass through the filter before the water they are in may be stored onboard or disposed of.

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