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NEW PILOT PLANT TO ZAP MARINE INVADERS24 September 2003 A new pilot plant that could help solve the global problem of marine pests will be launched today in Townsville. CRC Reef researchers from James Cook University, working with a consortium of government and industry partners, are developing a pilot plant to sterilise ships’ ballast water. This technology will help prevent the global transport of marine species, and protect Australia’s marine environment. “With the increase in international shipping, marine pest invasions are a growing problem. Marine pests transported in ships’ ballast water are a major threat to coastal environments around the world. They can disrupt ecosystems by introducing diseases and competing with native species for food and habitat,” said Dr Phil Schneider, James Cook University research engineer working with CRC Reef. “Ships use ballast water for stability and seaworthiness when they are not carrying cargo at sea. A single ship can hold 70,000 tonnes of ballast water - enough to fill 32 Olympic swimming pools and contain thousands of tiny pests. The sheer volume of water makes disinfection an enormous challenge,” explained Dr Schneider, who leads the team designing the plant. “There is an urgent need for an effective and economic method to treat ships’ ballast water. We believe that the combination of filtration, ultraviolet light and sonic disintegration that we are testing in the pilot plant could provide sterilisation on the scale required by the shipping industry,” Dr Schneider said. “We’re tackling this problem using a multidisciplinary team of marine scientists and engineers, to develop workable solutions to this very important environmental problem.” The Australian Government prohibits vessels carrying ballast water from ports with a high risk of harbouring marine pests from dumping their ballast water in Australian ports. These ships must undertake ballast exchange in the open ocean. However, this method is not fully effective and exchange at sea can be dangerous. It is also expensive for the shipping industry, costing an estimated $23 million a year. “So far, preliminary trials of our pilot plant have been very successful. The plant has a 12-15 tonnes per hour throughput, which is impressive in terms of laboratory equipment, but only a drop in the ocean when you’re looking at the volume of ballast water carried by shipping. Our aim is to develop the pilot plant so that we can scale the technology to serve the world’s shipping fleet,” Dr Schneider said. The $675,000, three-year project is funded by a consortium of government and industry partners, including CRC Reef Research Centre, James Cook University, the Natural Heritage Trust, Ports Corporation of Queensland, Port of Townsville, Mackay Port Authority, Gladstone Port Authority, Amiad Australia, Pasminco Century Project, Modular Solution Technologies and the Great Barrier Reef Research Foundation. The pilot plant will be launched on 24 September at 11.30am at the Aquarium Complex, Marine and Aquaculture Research Facilities Unit, James Cook University, by Mr Peter Lindsay MP, Federal Member for Herbert, representing the Hon. Dr David Kemp, Minister for the Environment and Heritage. For more information: For more information on the project, click
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