Environmental Issues

• When ballast water transports plants or animals from one part of the world to another, the foreign organisms can compromise existing marine ecosystems, as in the case of the zebra mussel. Zebra mussels are from Russia, but entered U.S. rivers after being transported via ballast water. They have caused billions of dollars in damage by clogging the pipes of important industrial facilities. Invasive species like zebra mussels are difficult, if not impossible, to eliminate.
  
  

Chlorine Testing

• In 2009, scientists in Baltimore tested various methods for treating ballast water in vessels arriving in the Chesapeake Bay. The studies were designed to kill any organisms in ballast water before releasing the water into local rivers. Scientists used chlorine, a substance they believed was toxic enough to kill living things, but safe enough to remain in the ballast water as ships returned to the ocean.
  
  

Great Lakes Testing

• The Great Ships Initiative created a ballast water testing facility on the Great Lakes that uses ultraviolet light, filtration and deoxygenation as experimental methods of killing organisms in ballast water. The facility, the nation's first dedicated to testing ballast water in a freshwater environment, opened in 2007 and received nearly $1 million in federal funding in 2009 to continue its research efforts.
  
  

California Testing Guidelines

• In 2009 the U.S. Coast Guard proposed a new set of ballast water guidelines, but some individual states had developed their own guidelines for dealing with invasive species. In 2008, the California State Lands Commission produced a 74-page document with a standardized set of guidelines for testing ballast water in the state. The document requires ships to test ballast water for various organisms before releasing it.
  
  

International Guidelines

• Environmental agencies have attempted to develop solutions to the problems associated with ballast water. In 2004, the International Maritime Organization adopted a set of guidelines requiring all ships to implement a plan to manage ballast water. But the guidelines do not take effect until one year after 30 nations ratify them.
  
  As of December 2009, only 24 countries had done so.