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Old 17-07-2017, 19:38   #1
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What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

I'm trying to estimate our annual carbon footprint for the Marine Sanitation Device program here in the States to the nearest ton.

Loose (very loose) numbers:

Roughly 16 million US pleasure boats
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...ats-in-the-us/

Assumptions (can be improved)

- 25% (?) of the fleet is fitted with MSDs
- of that 25%, all boats are 2% (?) larger to include waste tanks
- the average holding tank is 10 gallons (?)
- the average holding tank is half full (?)
- a gallon of water is 8.34 pounds

So the MSD program weighs (maybe) 160,000,000 pounds?

Given those numbers (or more accurate numbers) how many gallons of additional fuel are burned each year by recreational boaters?

If this is all laid out in the original Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the reg please share the link.
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Old 17-07-2017, 22:04   #2
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Your assumptions are a bit off. The percentage of recreational boats under 20' has held pretty steady at 90% for at least a couple of decades. You're not likely to find even a portapotty on enough boats under 23'...so if your 16million number holds up (it actually dropped to just under 12 million in 2016), only about 8% of boats are likely to be dealing with sewage, which the CFR definition limits to "human body waste and the waste from toilets..." when applied to vessels. Only about 5% are 30' or larger.

Which means that fewer than 1.3 million boats are actually big enough to have any toilet facilities, even portapotties. You're unlikely to find toilets and holding tanks on enough boats <25' to be statistically significant. And you're forgetting about sailboats.

So while I don't have the capability to measure the carbon footprint attributable solely to onboard sewage management, it appears to me that your assumption is at least double the actual, if not higher.


In my 30 years in marine sanitation, I've never known of a single boat builder who's built a larger boat to accommodate adding a holding tank. Nor am I aware of any environmental impact statement from the EPA or any other agency that measures the carbon footprint from storing sewage onboard.

If you were hoping to find a new good reason why holding tanks are actually bad for the environment, this one doesn't appear to work...but I gotta admire your original thinking and effort!
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Old 17-07-2017, 22:16   #3
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Quote:
Originally Posted by SecondBase View Post

So the MSD program weighs (maybe) 160,000,000 pounds?

Given those numbers (or more accurate numbers) how many gallons of additional fuel are burned each year by recreational boaters?
So your point is that it would be better for the environment if boaters could just pump overboard and not have to lug around holding tanks with waste in them?
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Old 17-07-2017, 23:30   #4
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Quote:
Originally Posted by SecondBase View Post
I'm trying to estimate our annual carbon footprint for the Marine Sanitation Device program here in the States to the nearest ton.

Loose (very loose) numbers:

Roughly 16 million US pleasure boats
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...ats-in-the-us/

Assumptions (can be improved)

- 25% (?) of the fleet is fitted with MSDs
- of that 25%, all boats are 2% (?) larger to include waste tanks
- the average holding tank is 10 gallons (?)
- the average holding tank is half full (?)
- a gallon of water is 8.34 pounds

So the MSD program weighs (maybe) 160,000,000 pounds?

Given those numbers (or more accurate numbers) how many gallons of additional fuel are burned each year by recreational boaters?

If this is all laid out in the original Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the reg please share the link.
Reality: It's a rounding error in the big picture of sewage treatment and in most cases serves no purpose.

If we are going to play this game:
- You have to split out planing vs displacement boats. It will have negligible impact on a typical displacement boat but a full tank may impact a planing boat, though I know of no study to quantify it.
- I suspect you will find most boats under 28' even if they have a holding tank are usually empty or near empty as they tend to be weekend use and people either don't let you use it unless it's an emergency or empty it before each trip.

I get your underlying point that environmental regulations are often in conflict...no discharge vs increase fuel burnt carrying it around and there is no doubt it does increase fuel burn to some degree. I suspect you'll never get an accurate answer and even if you did, the eco-warriors typically don't want to debate factual data.
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Old 18-07-2017, 05:08   #5
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Okay, I'll play along...

Like Peggy said, it's probably more like 5% that have an MSD. No one ever designs a boat bigger to accommodate a holding tank. They design the hull and deck structure, the interior spaces, and then squeeze in things like water, fuel, and holding tanks wherever they can (taking away what would otherwise have been storage space).

My guess would be that the average holding tank is larger than 10 gallons. Maybe 15 or so, but that's a complete wild-ass guess. The average holding tank is very definitely NOT half full. As was mentioned, a lot of people keep them empty most of the time. So there are a whole bunch of them out there that are effectively empty, and a few that get near full over time, and then emptied. Wild guess on an average would be 5% full.

So my guess would be that your looking at something more like 5 million pounds, versus the 160 million that you came up with.

Then, like Peggy mentioned, you have to consider that a whole lot of those boats (and I would guess a majority of those that are actually carrying a meaningful amount of waste) are sailboats. That means that they aren't always burning fuel to move that waste. Some sailors motor a lot, others hardly at all. Guessing how many hours the average sailboat motors is something that I would not even attempt. Pick any number out of the air and it is about as likely to be right as it is to be wrong.

In the end, I think that your initial figures are off by many orders of magnitude. Moreover, like others have mentioned, I don't think it is possible to get any numbers that are realistic enough to make the argument that you seem to be trying to make.

Like Valhalla said, I do get your point, and I think there is a certain amount of validity to it. Still, this is something that I cannot see going anywhere useful, so my advice would be to give it up. Either that, or apply for a grant to spend several years digging deeply into this, in order to get some remotely useful numbers (good luck with that!).
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Old 18-07-2017, 05:50   #6
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Thanks Peghall and Valhalla to contributing to the thread. I reran the model on Peghall's numbers and (maybe) for the US MSD program we are collectively pushing around only 40,000,000 pounds of liquid.

Quote:
Originally Posted by fstbttms View Post
So your point is that it would be better for the environment if boaters could just pump overboard and not have to lug around holding tanks with waste in them?

Fast Bottoms, In my experience it is rare that someone asking a question about protecting the environment concludes with "so vote yes on raw sewage discharge".

My point is that doesn't look like the reg was fully thought out and it deserves that effort. If an EIS wasn't done up front then it should be done now to shore up the regulation.

Valhalla got at what I'm trying to say with "regulations in conflict". The trade offs need to be listed and compared. I suspect the overall policy remains pretty close to where it is now.

We probably need an environmental science PhD candidate's thesis to get a solid number on annual tons of carbon.

If we get that tonnage number then it is a fairly simple matter to set up a carbon offset starting with the FY2019 USCG operating budget--maybe on a schedule of pay "2 years for 1" until the MSD program becomes carbon neutral.

If the purpose of the regulation was to protect the environment then it should not harm the environment.
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Old 18-07-2017, 05:58   #7
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Quote:
Originally Posted by SecondBase View Post
I'm trying to estimate our annual carbon footprint for the Marine Sanitation Device program here in the States to the nearest ton.

Loose (very loose) numbers:

Roughly 16 million US pleasure boats
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...ats-in-the-us/

Assumptions (can be improved)

- 25% (?) of the fleet is fitted with MSDs
- of that 25%, all boats are 2% (?) larger to include waste tanks
- the average holding tank is 10 gallons (?)
- the average holding tank is half full (?)
- a gallon of water is 8.34 pounds

So the MSD program weighs (maybe) 160,000,000 pounds?

Given those numbers (or more accurate numbers) how many gallons of additional fuel are burned each year by recreational boaters?

If this is all laid out in the original Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the reg please share the link.
I actually think this is quite clever

It may force someone to think about the cost of hauling around all that sewage rather than discharging it in a place where it is utterly and totally harmless (more than a mile offshore, say).

Should be easy to show the harmless of discharge offshore.

And you've just come up with the argument for why it is not cost-free, including cost to the environment, to not discharge it.

Bravo! I like it.
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Old 18-07-2017, 06:32   #8
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What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Hmmm, interesting exercise. I suspect local effects are most important when it comes to the value and cost of hold tanks. Locally there can be huge impacts from sewage dumping, but I think that, in general, there is essentially no impact from cruisers.

But if you want to do a full-cycle analysis you should also include the environmental costs of the plastic for tanks and hoses, as well as the pump out infrastructure.

... it becomes rather complex.
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Old 18-07-2017, 06:38   #9
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Thanks Dockhead. And Denverdon we were probably writing at the same time-- appreciate your inputs as well.
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Old 18-07-2017, 06:53   #10
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike OReilly View Post
Hmmm, interesting exercise. I suspect local effects are most important when it comes to the value and cost of hold tanks. Locally there can be huge impacts from sewage dumping, but I think that, in general, there is essentially no impact from cruisers.

But if you want to do a full-cycle analysis you should also include the environmental costs of the plastic for tanks and hoses, as well as the pump out infrastructure.

... it becomes rather complex.
But consider that he may not be talking about the impact of having holding tanks at all, but rather driving around with them half full instead of dumping them.

In my opinion, every cruising boat should have a holding tank, whatever the regulations require, so that you can use the toilets without dumping close to people or in enclosed waters, close to shore, etc.

I think some people -- and some regulatory agencies -- take the attitude that we shouldn't discharge anywhere, period -- at least not within territorial waters. They don't care that this prohibits discharging in perfectly harmless places -- like miles offshore. They don't care because they just assume that there is no cost involved, other than to the convenience of a few boaters whom no one cares about.

What is brilliant about this is that it shows that there absolutely is a cost, to unnecessarily hauling around millions of tons of sewage. The more I think about this, the more I like it. Big thumbs up to the OP.
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Old 18-07-2017, 07:03   #11
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What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

So this has to do with fuel burn?
I'd say insignificant, pales by comparison to say a dirty prop and bottom, roughly analogous to having a passenger on board.
I understand the point of small things adding up, Boeing years ago during the Arab oil embargo spent $$$ on a study of how much fuel paint on a jet cost.
However I believe that most average boat owners of boats that have a decently large fuel burn, the usage of the boat is based on fuel, meaning that they are going to burn X number of $$ of fuel a month or each vacation, make a more fuel efficient boat, they will use it more and go further, not cut down on fuel consumption.
Then the wealthy don't care, for them fuel cost is insignificant
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Old 18-07-2017, 07:21   #12
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

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So this has to do with fuel burn?
I'd say insignificant, pales by comparison to say a dirty prop and bottom, roughly analogous to having a passenger on board.
I understand the point of small things adding up, Boeing years ago during the Arab oil embargo spent $$$ on a study of how much fuel paint on a jet cost.
However I believe that most average boat owners of boats that have a decently large fuel burn, the usage of the boat is based on fuel, meaning that they are going to burn X number of $$ of fuel a month or each vacation, make a more fuel efficient boat, they will use it more and go further, not cut down on fuel consumption.
Then the wealthy don't care, for them fuel cost is insignificant
The wealthy may not care (at least, in the minds of the non-wealthy ), but the PLANET cares. That's the OP's point.

Loaded weight affects the fuel burn a lot -- as a pilot you know this better than I do. I guess in calm weather it is almost proportionate to light ship displacement of the vessel, on average (obviously less if you are powering into a headwind). So for a 10 tonne vessel, 120 liters of sewage is more than 1% increase in mass, which would be a good 1% increase in fuel burn. It adds up when you're counting CO2 emissions.
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Old 18-07-2017, 07:30   #13
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Dockhead View Post
But consider that he may not be talking about the impact of having holding tanks at all, but rather driving around with them half full instead of dumping them.

In my opinion, every cruising boat should have a holding tank, whatever the regulations require, so that you can use the toilets without dumping close to people or in enclosed waters, close to shore, etc.

I think some people -- and some regulatory agencies -- take the attitude that we shouldn't discharge anywhere, period -- at least not within territorial waters. They don't care that this prohibits discharging in perfectly harmless places -- like miles offshore. They don't care because they just assume that there is no cost involved, other than to the convenience of a few boaters whom no one cares about.

What is brilliant about this is that it shows that there absolutely is a cost, to unnecessarily hauling around millions of tons of sewage. The more I think about this, the more I like it. Big thumbs up to the OP.

Fully agree regarding the need for some sort of holding capacity. That's why I think environmental impacts of cruiser sewage will only be a factor locally (in confined area that don't have good flow, and the like). In general, the eco-impact is negligible, but locally it can be huge.

I think if you want to do an eco-footprint analysis you need to take a life-cycle perspective. Otherwise you're just cherry-picking one point in the cycle, which doesn't seem that useful to me.

And just scribbling on the back of my proverbial envelope, I'd say the additional fuel burned for vessels likely to have any sort of tank would be smaller than the error bars. We're talking about a few kg on vessels that weigh in at the thousands of kg.

I'm not saying it's not interesting or useful, but ...
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Old 18-07-2017, 07:37   #14
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

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So your point is that it would be better for the environment if boaters could just pump overboard and not have to lug around holding tanks with waste in them?
IMO it could make a good case for more affordable, less power hungry treatment devices INSTEAD of holding tanks.
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Old 18-07-2017, 07:45   #15
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Re: What is the carbon footprint for the US MSD program?

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We're talking about a few kg on vessels that weigh in at the thousands of kg.

On a single hull it is definitely a rounding error and I agree that a few Kg either way is immaterial. Not worth discussing.

I would add that if the policy aggregate is pushing around say 40,000,000 pounds of liquid, year after year, that would certainly take a large motor and some amount of fossil fuel. Glad to hear more accurate inputs for the model.
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