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COAST GUARD AND NAVIGATION SUBCOMMITTEE 

 MAY 11, 1993 



Mr. Chairman, my name is John T. Estes and I am President, International Council of Cruise 

 Lines (ICCL). I am here on behalf of the ICCL, an international industry association 

 representing 20 cruise lines comprising over 90 percent of the cruise industry worldwide. 



Mr. Chairman, we welcome your invitation to appear here today and greatly appreciate the 

 opportunity to describe this industry's interest in issues relating to the marine environment. We 

 wish to emphasize three points: 



* First, this industry is extremely environmentally conscious and constantly striving 

 to improve its performance. This is not an easy task and from time-to-time there 

 are occasions when company policies are disregarded by crew members or 

 passengers, but our effort is to eliminate those indiscretions. We welcome the 

 vigorous enforcement of all environmental laws affecting the total marine 

 environment. 



* Second, our industry is regulated, as you know, under an established body of 

 international conventions which include environmental supervision by agencies of 

 the United States and our flag states. 



* Finally, every member of our industry is committed to continued improvement 

 in environmental performance and to implementing programs and practices to 

 conduct our operations in a safe and environmentally sound manner. 



Last year, as you may know, we carried over 4,000,000 passengers on our ships and we 

 employed onboard our vessels over 36,000 employees from dozens of countries. The technical 

 and operational difficulties associated with shipboard waste management on large megaliners is 

 complicated by the sheer volume of passengers we carry and the cultural disparity of our crew 

 members. Nevertheless, we hope this testimony will provide you some appreciation of the task 

 confronting us, the determination which we have to succeed, and the programs that are in place 

 to accomplish this objective. 



Mr. Chairman, to set the stage permit me to walk you through a state-of-the-art waste disposal 

 process one could see on today's modern cruise ships. You will note that this process consists 

 of recycling, incineration, compaction, sorting, sanitation, and packaging methods. We start in 

 the galley where food is prepared. Here is where the packaging and scraps are separated for 

 disposal. Some ships use distinctively marked trash cans, placing glass and metal in one, paper 

 and plastic in another. Food scraps are washed down the drains through pulpers. The waste 

 food, as a slurry, is fed into a separator where the fresh water is squeezed out and the now 

 thicker slurry is sent to the incinerator where it is consumed, or it can be sent to a holding tank 

 for safe and permissible discharge at sea. I should note here that Annex V of MARPOL 73/78 

 (the International Maritime Organization Convention and implementing regulations governing 

 disposal of ship generated waste) permits discharge of a specific range of processed waste into 

 the sea. Many of our members do not, however, discharge at sea, opting instead for port 

 reception facilities. To continue our explanation, the trash cans are taken to the garbage room 

 where the glass and aluminum are sorted then each is crushed separately, bagged, and stored for 

 recycling in port where possible. The paper and plastic is fed through a shredder and then into 

 the incinerator. The incinerator ash is either sent to a silo for discharge at sea, or held in 

 containers to be taken to a landfill. Medical waste from the ship hospital is handled separately 

 and specially disposed of through an authorized company or agency on land. 



When the passenger leaves the cabin in the morning, the room steward removes the refuse and 

 sorts it into metals, glass, and bumables. He will take this to the garbage room where it is 

 handled in the same manner as that which comes from the galley. 



Our business is transporting and entertaining passengers. We must be sure that our passengers 

 also understand the seriousness of protecting the environment. Announcements appear in the 

 daily ship newsletters, which are delivered to every cabin, cautioning against throwing trash 

 overboard (see Appendix "A" as an example). Reminders are also repeated at informal 



