Ballast water management that adapts to climate changes and reduces harmful bio-invasions in marine eco-systems

The shipping ballast water is defined as water taken on board a ship to control trim, cargo, draught, stability and stress of the ship. Alien bio-organisms in ballast water have a range of ecological impacts, for instance reducing native bio-diversity, altering habitat and potentially the overall food-webs and eco-systems.

Economic impacts include reductions in fisheries production and algae blooms harmful for fish farms, tourism and human health. Due to the rising temperatures of the Oceans, organisms that prefer a warm climate may take roots in marine ecosystems that were previously too cold for them. In addition, future changes of temperature, storm patterns and sea-currents may also change shipping routes and ballast water management practices.

Based on methods like stock taking, trend tracking and scenario modeling the paper aims to evaluate possible ecological and economic impacts in marine ecosystem of changed factors in the shipping sector, for instance change of number, size, and design of vessels as well as treatment technologies of ballast water.

New areas for shipping due to climate changes are also included. Our study would contribute to improve decision support tools, usable in shipping management and in development of international regulations for shipping with special focus on reducing the impacts in marine ecosystem. It can help to identify needs for change of regulations and shipping management procedures necessary to prevent even more harmful bio-invasions in the future.