Characterization of fish hold effluent discharged from commercial fishing vessels into harbor waters

Fish hold effluent and the effluent produced from the cleaning of fish holds may contain organic material resulting from the degradation of seafood and cleaning products (e.g., soaps and detergents). This effluent is often discharged by vessels into near shore waters and, therefore, could have the potential to contribute to water pollution in bays and estuaries. We characterized effluent from commercial fishing vessels with holds containing refrigerated seawater, ice slurry, or chipped ice. Concentrations of trace heavy metals, wet chemistry parameters, and nutrients in effluent were compared to screening benchmarks to determine if there is a reasonable potential for effluent discharge to contribute to nonattainment of water quality standards. Most analytes (67%) exceeded their benchmark concentration and, therefore, may have the potential to pose risk to human health or the environment if discharges are in significant quantities or there are many vessels discharging in the same areas.

Effects of changing hydraulic and organic loading rates on pollutant reduction in bark, charcoal and sand filters treating greywater

Greywater flows and concentrations vary greatly, thus evaluation and prediction of the response of on-site treatment filters to variable loading regimes is challenging. The performance of 0.6 m × 0.2 m (height × diameter) filters of bark, activated charcoal and sand in reduction of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD5), chemical oxygen demand (COD), total nitrogen (Tot-N) and total phosphorus (Tot-P) under variable loading regimes was investigated and modelled. During seven runs, the filters were fed with synthetic greywater at hydraulic loading rates (HLR) of 32-128 L m(-2) day(-1) and organic loading rates (OLR) of 13-76 g BOD5 m(-2) day(-1). Based on the changes in HLR and OLR, the reduction in pollutants was modelled using multiple linear regression. The models showed that increasing the HLR from 32 to 128 L m(-2) day(-1) decreased COD reduction in the bark filters from 74 to 40%, but increased COD reduction in the charcoal and sand filters from 76 to 90% and 65 to 83%, respectively. Moreover, the models showed that increasing the OLR from 13 to 76 g BOD5 m(-2) day(-1) enhanced the pollutant reduction in all filters except for Tot-P in the bark filters, which decreased slightly from 81 to 73%. Decreasing the HLR from 128 to 32 L m(-2) day(-1) enhanced the pollutant reduction in all filters, but decreasing the OLR from 76 to 14 g BOD5 m(-2) day(-1) detached biofilm and decreased the Tot-N and Tot-P reduction in the bark and sand filters. Overall, the bark filters had the capacity to treat high OLR, while the charcoal filters had the capacity to treat high HLR and high OLR. Both bark and charcoal filters had higher capacity than sand filters in dealing with high and variable loads. Bark seems to be an attractive substitute for sand filters in settings short in water and its effluent would be valuable for irrigation, while charcoal filters should be an attractive alternative for settings both rich and short in water supply and when environmental eutrophication has to be considered.