Japan

/in Asia/by

A study for the Japanese Government Ministry of Land Infrastructure, Transport and Toursim (MLIT) titled “Report by the expert board for the environmental impact assessment of discharge water from Scrubbers” was published June 2018 (click here to view) and presented to IMO February 2019.

Slide 18 of the presentation, which can be viewed here summarises the study as follows:

  • Scrubbers enable to mitigate potential risks to human health by reducing harmful substances; not only SOx and PM, but also PAHs and other materials that would otherwise be emitted into the atmospheric air.
  • Japanese government assessed the potential risks to marine environment by discharged water from scrubber.
  • Japan concluded that the discharge water with chemical substances such as SOx, PAHs and heavy metals can NOT cause unacceptable effects either on the marine organisms or on the seawater quality around Japan.
  • Therefore, Japan is of the position that there would NOT be a scientific justification to prohibit the use of openlooped scrubber, as long as the IMO’s discharge criteria were met.