About US

Our Mission

The partnership between Mouawad Consulting, Boll & Kirch, bestUV, KraftPowercon and Lower Lakes Towing underscores a shared commitment to innovation, sustainability, and the advancement of maritime practices. This collaboration aims to drive significant progress in overcoming technical challenges related to BWMS, ensuring a more environmentally responsible maritime industry within the GLSLR region.

Why it matters?

Ballast water, essential for the safe operation of marine vessels, can unintentionally introduce invasive species into new environments, threatening local ecosystems, economies, and biodiversity. Recognizing the complex challenges and unique conditions of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River region such as cooler temperatures and heavy sedimentation rates, the project seeks to pioneer solutions that safeguard these precious waterways and beyond.

Project Objectives

Phase 1

Objectives and Goals

Objective:

Systematically collecting and periodically reporting comprehensive data on the use of in-service BWMS in a variety of seasonal conditions and water qualities on the GLSLR.

Goals:

  1. BWMS operation success/failure, reliability, ease of operation, maintenance issues
  2. Biological efficacy of the BWMS, such as changes in organism concentrations from uptake to discharge for typical BWMS operations and/or in response to challenging water quality
  3. The impacts of BWMS operations on vessel or port operations such as on berthing time

Phase 2

Objectives and Goals

Objective:

Work systematically through the data gathered to identify the most common problems observed, with the aim to improve the efficacy of the type approved BWMS without interfering with their existing type approval.

Goals:

  1. Develop a solution that can enhance and optimize how installed type approved BWMS work and their ability to tackle the water to be treated.
  2. Study how technology combinations can improve the ability of the BWMS to meet the D-2 standard in various challenging conditions.

Phase 3

Objectives and Goals

Objective:

Install and test the devices developed in Phase 2 onboard one or more vessels with existing BWMS operating in the GLSLR region.

Goals:

  1. Develop a scientifically and unbiased set of data comparing observations and biological samplings of the same BWMS before and after installation of one or several enhancement devices.
  2. Independent assessment of those enhancement devices by a group of naval architects and marine engineers, as well as the ship owners themselves through our partner in this group Lower Lakes Towing Ltd.

Phase 4

Objectives and Goals

Objective:

Document throughout the three phases all the work that was done, including analysis reports, raw anonymized data and any other documentation.

Goals:

  1. Develop approaches to mitigate risks when BWMS reach design operational limitations or have difficulty meeting operational demands in challenging water conditions (e.g. contingency measures and recovery measures)
  2. Identifying knowledge/training gaps, compiling best practices and/or developing training initiatives for vessel crew related to installation, operation and/or maintenance of common types of BWMS for vessels operating in the GLSLR.