Is this "Ruining the World"?
Photo © 2010 Aaron Saunders
There's an interesting article on AOL's Travel News page that asks the question: Are Cruises Ruining the World?
Come again?
The article points squarely to the monstrous Oasis of the Seas and notes how many provisions need to be loaded onto the ship - as well as how many tonnes of sewage are produced, grey water from sinks and showers, and hazardous wastes etc, and makes the case that cruise ships are simply an unsustainable part of our society.
These facts and figures come once again from the environmental "grassroots" group Friends of the Earth, who have successfully provided misleading, one-sided figures to journalists from major publications who salivate over them.
Curiously absent are any facts pertaining to the onboard waste treatment systems, which have the ability to purify waste water into a form of water that would be safe to be ingested by humans. Would you want to? Probably not, but pumping "safe" water over the side of the ship - or using it to cool machinery spaces - is light years ahead of the practice of ships not so long ago, when waste was routinely pumped by the gallon over the side of the ship. Think of the number of transatlantic liners one hundred years ago - that fleet vastly outnumbered today's cruise fleet.
Now imagine all of them, some carrying in excess of five thousand passengers thanks to tightly-packed steerage quarters, pumping all of their raw, untreated refuse into the ocean.
Nor is there any mention of the shoreside power hookups like that available at Canada Place in Vancouver. By plugging into the power at the pier, the ship can shut down her diesel engines, thus reducing pollution and greenhouse gas emissions.
Also missing is any talk of the ships incinerators, or how the heat produced by burning their waste materials is used to heat not only the ship, but the boilers that provide hot water to the sinks and showers onboard.
What the article does mention is that the city of Charleston, South Carolina is up in arms over the decision by Miami-based Carnival Cruise Lines to base their Carnival Fantasy in the city. Rather than embracing the potential tourism dollars that both the vessel and its passengers and crew stand to bring to Charleston, the South Carolina State Ports Authority (SCSPA) - in an unusual act of biting the hand that feeds them - has chosen to support activists complaining about everything from the potential pollution from the ship, to the fact that its nine-hour turnaround will obliterate their historic skyline.
In short, they'd rather the ship hauled anchor and left.
The ports of Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco, and Los Angeles might raise their eyebrows at such comments, given that the last few years have seen them loose cruise traffic left, right, and centre due in large part to the economy and the Alaska State Head Tax.
The article - and quotes from the SCSPA's Project Manager - read like a doom-and-gloom list of all the horrible things the cruise industry is doing to their fair city, with the most bizarre being a comment that tourists will actually avoid the city when a cruise ship is in town. Two cruise ships, to be exact: Charleston isn't exactly Ft. Lauderdale in terms of departures.
It is curious that one relatively small, low-passenger count cruise ship has caused so much ire from the Port Authority (again, based on pressure from "activists"), when tankers and bulk carrier ships - just as large as the Carnival Fantasy and not nearly as stringently regulated - pass through their waters every day.
Perhaps the Friends of the Earth forgot what happened to the Exxon Valdez in 1989.
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