Hmmm, I received this link and wondering if others have seen it? Perhaps our council (although there are two reps who sit on the Regional Board) cannot do much, but the Regional District can put forth a complaint and monitor these ships. We lack so much here vs the east coast (ie disaster response that is adequate; emergency response (ie the sinking of the BC Ferry by Hartley Bay that continues to sit with all it’s fuel and the fuel from the vehicles) etc).
I guess the Cruise Ships’ sewage bill is nothing like the hotel business owners here! At least PR is making the papers, wonder what PR Tourism thinks of that?
Not only do we dump our crap into the ocean, i believe our lovely capital city Victoria still dumps its waste directly into the ocean. I hope i am wrong. Fish food i guess heh…
Unless something changed in the last couple of years roja Victoria still dumps it’s waste directly into the ocean… Halifax I think has started to treat some of their’s finally I believe, but not all… You can see it floating sometimes right off the dock there as you eat lunch above… A group there did a test where they poured red dye down a sink and they went and watched it come out into the harbour…
The cruise ship thing does not surprise and it was likely part of the atraction to the companies of going to Alaska in the first place, it’s a huge cost saving.
I find it interesting that US regulates and we don’t…
Yeah good fish food, and right back into the food chain… recycling at it’s finest
“Beautiful BC: The best place on earth”… why is something not being done?
To clarify the comments about Victoria: A recent Times-Colonist backgrounder states that the provincial government ordered Victoria (in 2006) to stop dumping its sewage directly into the Juan de Fuca strait. As of 2010, the city is investigating options regarding sewage treatment systems which meet the criteria of the provincial order. These changes take time, in terms of both finance and method.
Regarding the cruise ships, I would think that an international marine regulation would be in place. What the regulations are, I don’t know. I wonder if the dumpage occurs in the offshore waters of other sovereign states, or whether they reserve the pleasure for Canadian waters? What happens in the Mediterranean, where cruise ships are a daily visitor to many ports? I have no information on this, but suspect it is a concern not restricted to the Canadian Pacific waters. We do, however, live next to an important, beautiful, and increasingly fragile marine ecosystem, which makes the issue very tangible for us.