Today@Dal

The Canadian Press, August 20.

Dalhousie University is working on a system to test the cleanliness of ballast water, the only such facility in Canada, just as new regulations could be introduced that would govern what ships could discharge at ports around the world.

The Aquatron laboratory is scheduled to conduct its first tests of ballast water at the Halifax school later this month.

“We have to imitate a ship taking on ballast and then we hold the water so that represents transit of the ship going somewhere,” said John Batt, the manager of the research facility. “Then we test the water on a de-ballast.”

Batt said water will be pumped through a control system and a ballast water management system separately. The results will then be compared and the tests will be repeated with different salt water levels.

“This is a huge need the industry has,” Batt said. “A huge portion of Eastern Canada’s revenue and GDP comes from the fishing industry and that’s potentially at threat.”

Read the rest of this article at Macleans.