Ever since Croatia has been hosting numerous cruise ships along the coast, the public has been wary of them, constantly repeating the idea that they are incredible polluters, letting their wastewaters out in the Adriatic.

Whenever anything related to those cruise ships is shared on Facebook, for instance, most comments will focus exactly on this aspect of their presence.

Žarko Koboević Ph.D., associate professor at the Department of Nautical studies of the University of Dubrovnik has been researching pollution of the seawater with the wastewaters from these vessels.

His research has given somewhat different results: cruise ships absolutely do not pollute the coastal seawaters, meaning the part of the sea where people swim, where yachts hang around, where any type of activities are being undertaken. Kristina Filičić spoke to him for Slobodna Dalmacija.

Professor Koboević says that current events, such as the situation when a cruise ship near Zlatni rat in Bol was suspected of releasing its wastewater, require more detailed research, similar to what he did four years ago for his doctoral thesis.

He performed research and sampled the water for a full 14 months at 8 popular swimming locations - and all of that research has shown that the cruise ships do not contribute to the pollution of the sea in those areas. The main reason is that the modern cruise ships have new technology which converts faecal wastewater into two components - clean water and gases that are released into the atmosphere, so basically - there is no "dirty" wastewater to be released at all.

All of the water released from the cruise ships is carefully monitored for a number of parameters, and the released water from a cruise ship is usually cleaner than what we consider perfectly clean sea-water on our favourite beaches. Those ships that don't have such modern technology for wastewater management are not allowed to release their wastewater within 12 nautical miles from the closest land, which is far enough that no consequences can be observed.

None of what we explained in the previous paragraphs applies to the small boats in the national traffic - day-trip boats, yachts, sailboats, and other small vessels, and most of them are usually right next to the land. Where do they empty their wastewater tanks filled with unprocessed waste?

They are not monitored at all, and their tanks need to be emptied, so where are they doing that? In the sea, of course, and almost none of them would even consider going 12 miles from the coast, or going to have their tanks professionally emptied in the ports, where they would have to pay for the service.

Additionally, prof. Koboević that Croatian laws don't really regulate the field in a significant way, so there's no way that any fines would be introduced. If you're a yacht owner, and it isn't quite clear what you are or are not allowed to do, and there are no fines anyway, why shouldn't you just do what you think is best?

One of his ideas to mitigate the situation is to include the emptying of the tanks included in the price of admission to the marinas and ports. That would make many yacht owners use that service, so there would be less wastewater to be released in the sea. There is no need to come up with any new ideas, just to copy other countries that already have better regulations.

His final idea is a bit extreme - he says that one of the solutions would be that the tanks on smaller vessels would need to be welded shut, so they can only be emptied in ports. While that would probably be the solution, I'm not sure how exactly that would be done.

Dubrovnik and its air are being poisoned by cruise ships and the harmful emissions they pump out into the atmosphere. One study reveals the horrifying truth of the reality of this extremely damaging branch of tourism, and just how much disease is being caused by these gigantic ships all over Europe.

As Morski writes on the 5th of July, 2019, the "Transportation and Enviroment" Association, along with the support of numerous similar environmental foundations, including the European Commission (EC), conducted extensive research on air pollution in European destinations in ports which accept cruise ships in 2017. The study also presents the results of research from Croatia's top destination - Dubrovnik, and the situation appears to be very troubling.

The authors of the study made sure to showcase the the observed pollution levels in Dubrovnik in figures and tables, so as to make them as clear as possible. In the study, the release of harmful particles of sulfur and nitrogen oxide was compared with that produced by the number of registered vehicles present at cruising destinations.

According to the data, 27,173 vehicles were registered in Dubrovnik at that time. During 2017, in the port of Gruž, forty such massive vessels sailed in while taking round trips, spending a total of 2,791 hours moored, and during that time, 2,523 kilograms of contaminated particles were discharged into Dubrovnik's air.

During that same time, the aforementioned 27,173 vehicles registered in the Dubrovnik area released 11,561 kilograms of exhaust gases into the air. Translated into basic percentages: 20.1 percent of the air pollution in Dubrovnik comes directly from cruise ships, according to a report from Dubrovniknet.

When considering the release of harmful compounds such as sulfur and nitrogen oxides, the data for Dubrovnik is as follows: During those 2,791 hours of cruise ships being moored in Gruž, cruise ships released a massive 140,259 kilograms of nitrogen oxide into the air, while 27,173 registered vehicles during that same year released 100,174 kilograms of the same harmful compound.

The situation isn't ideal when it comes to sulfur oxide either. During their stay, cruise ships released 6,344 kilograms of sulfur oxide into Dubrovnik's air, and passenger cars released 331 kilograms of the same compound during that time.

The main purpose of the study is to analyse air pollution caused by cruise ships in European seas. The results show that the carnivals owned by Carnival alone released an extremely worrying ten times more sulfur dioxide into the air in European waters alone. This substance is known to cause disease. The countries this was recorded in range from Spain, Italy and Greece, to France and Norway. Among the main cruise ports, Barcelona, ​​Palma de Mallorca and Venice are the most polluted.

The analysis also reveals that even in Sulfur Emmission Control Areas (SECAs), where airborne pollution is strictly controlled, these ships and their environmental damage are also present. In Denmark, for example, whose coasts are entirely within SECA, cruise ships released eighteen times more sulfur oxide in 2017 than 2.5 million registered vehicles per annum did.

This is a damning reflection on the effectiveness of the fuel quality directive on road traffic and the total failure to implement the same standards at sea, the study concludes.

You can read One Corporation to Pollute Them All in English language and familiarise yourself with the horrors of the cruise ship industry by clicking here.

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