Sewage Treatment on the QE2

[Rob Lightbody]

Can someone please explain how QE2's sewage system differs to that of a moderm cruise ship.

Thank you.

[skilly56]

Simple Rob
QE2 does not have a sewage TREATMENT system. She holds the raw product in the ballast tanks, then pumps it overboard when outside the local territorial limit, being 12 or 25 mile, still as raw sewage.
Nearly all ships built from the mid-seventies onwards have full sewage treatment systems on board, and nowadays the engineers are required to daily take and test samples of the discharge from these systems. The manufacturers blurb for the systems states the discharge must be 'drinkable' (definitely not for me).
At each and every port, the local environmental people can walk aboard and take samples, and if your system is discharging outside the prescribed criteria, look out!

The amount of time spent trying to make the sewage treatment systems work correctly can be incredible. You just get the system nicely 'balanced' organically when some clown goes and dumps some forbidden chemical cleaner down the toilet pans to clean them and kills all the hungry amoeba you have just spent 8 weeks cultivating.

No wonder engineers are going to shore jobs - if you want to be a sewage systems engineer, you can do that at the local treatment plant ashore.

Cheers
Skilly

[Rob Lightbody]

Amazing, i never knew this.

So, QE2 was exempt from having to treat sewage because she was old?  And no legislation ever required her to be retro-fitted with a sewage treatment plant?  Could this even have been done?

And - if she is to serve as an as-is hotel temporarily somewhere (the "cape town plan") - she'll need regularly emptied or connected to shoreside sewage systems?

[skilly56]

That's correct Rob, she didn't have to comply because she was so old. However, MARPOL 2010 (comes in to force tomorrow) has now banned her from operating in the Baltic, the North Sea, Mediterranean, US coastal waters, and some other 'sensitive' areas purely because of the sewage discharge problem - AND engine exhaust emissions.

As far as fitting sewage treatment plants - there is no space available in the engine rooms, they are already congested. You could remove three or four engines to make the room required, or alternatively, cut her in half and add a 15 metre section somewhere for all the required sewage tanks, compressors, pumps, treatment equipment, etc.

If all the people up top didn't eat and drink so much, it wouldn't be such a large problem!

Cheers
Skilly

[Isabelle Prondzynski]

That's an amazing thread! Thank you both -- both for the questions, and the answers.

I suppose this is a handicap that can be overcome in a stationary role -- but could it be a real problem getting her to a place where she can have a stationary role?

[Mauretania1907]

Possibly not, if she had just a running crew aboard, they would probably not fill the sewage tank and it could be pumped out. Mind you all the older cruise and passenger ships pumped out sewage while at sea. And having someone dump a chemical down on your hungry microbes would tick any engineer off!

[Twynkle]

That's correct Rob, she didn't have to comply because she was so old. However, MARPOL 2010 (comes in to force tomorrow) has now banned her from operating in the Baltic, the North Sea, Mediterranean, US coastal waters, and some other 'sensitive' areas purely because of the sewage discharge problem.

Hi Skilly -
MARPOL's definition of 'operating'.
Does this mean operating as passenger ship - e.g one that carries people who pay a fare on a journey?
Or - can 'operating' mean engines running both while moving as well as stationary?
Would travelling under tow without passengers be permitted?

I remember reading elsewhere that she needs fresh water supplies as 'the evaporators won't work without a propulsion load on the engines'...Would QE2 have the ability and capacity to generate this (fresh water) from sea water?
 

If all the people up top didn't eat and drink so much, it wouldn't be such a large problem!

Cheers
Skilly

OMW - would that all this had been known sooner...The midnight feasts, the 5 course dinners, the fantastic breakfasts - and that's before we've even got as far as Afternoon Teas....
I would have definitely paid not to eat, if I'd known that a waste disposal matter would preclude her from being at anchor, ever again!

Thanks, Skilly.
Not only do engineers have interesting work - it sounds pretty mucky as well!
Rosie

[Michael Gallagher]

Lengthy stays and overnights in ports also posed problems as they wanted to get her out and sailingh in order to discharge. Lengthy stays in port would require the tanks to be emptied while outside. And the reason for certain smells to take hold of Five and Four Decks at certain times was the result of the tanks being close to capacity!

[Peter Mugridge]

Skilly, just a thought but would there theoretically be enough room for such a treatment plant in the hold / former garage space without reducing stores capacity too much?

[Rob Lightbody]

Thanks guys.

So what I don't get is how on earth was QE2 ever going to carry on sailing past this MARPOL date?  Did Cunard have plans to do something?  The expense of adding a 15 foot section would obviously not have been considered!

[Peter Mugridge]

Rob - I have visions of a Heath Robinson arrangement with a processing plant in a barge welded to the hull...!!

Seriously, though, I had the matter of this MARPOL thing in mind when I asked the question in the post above yours, but also I'm now curious as to where such a plant could be squeezed in just out of interest.

I assume that the question of removing three engines to make room would be a non-starter.

[Rob Lightbody]

I assume that the question of removing three engines to make room would be a non-starter.

Yes - because for Lloyds-type reasons she has to have enough engines to 'make her go' in each engine room independently.

[Michael Gallagher]

Didn't I tell you we had plans to lengthen her while completely replacing the superstructure!

[Rob Lightbody]

Didn't I tell you we had plans to lengthen her while completely replacing the superstructure!

No   I suspect it would cost the same as qE3 has cost!

Myles gave me a great newspaper clipping from April 87.  It has an interview with Captain Portet in it.  He says that they all think QE2 will last a minimum of 20 years, but probably a lot longer because the ships they are building today are all 20 knots, whereas QE2 is 30 knots - UNLESS she is made obsolete - but he thinks this is unlikely because he says with confidence that nobody will build a big fast ship again.  Amazing how much the world has changed.  Speed is even less important, green issues are biting hard, and everybody wants a balcony.  Its topics like this one that make you realise how between 1987 and 2007 QE2 did, in many ways become very old very fast.  I bet 1987 Captain Portet would be gobsmacked to see Norwegian Epic...

[highlander0108]

This was the issue that was going to be most challenging to overcome, not the SOLAS regs, from what I was told while talking to a ships engineer while onboard in 2008.  All he said was that the plumibng system needed to be brought up to current standards and that was going to be a major undertaking.  I knew the system was primative since it was obvious the water used for flushing was taken directly from the water around the ship, hence the brown water in the toilets, no matter how many flushes, while in ports like Liverpool or New York.