Regulations on Gray Water Dumping

[RonaldJJames]

I'm considering installing a composting head (Airhead or Naturehead) and eliminating all the nastiness and complications of holding tanks, plumbing, unblocking, pumpouts etc.

And I'm wondering what the regs are regarding gray water, (in our case shower and sink discharge). If we eliminated a holding tank, we would need to need to discharge our gray water overboard.

Is this legal?
Is this considered socially acceptable?

Thanks

[osirissail]

- - In the USA - gray water - sinks and showers are considered legal to plumb directly overboard. I don't know of any manufactured vessel that routes gray water to a holding tank. Normally your sinks go directly to a thru-hull right below the sink. I have been in aggressively patrolled "No-discharge" anchorages and the "ranger" was only interested in the plumbing from the MSD to the holding tank via a lockable 3-way valve to avoid over-board discharge. And the valve had to have provisions for a padlock - which I thought rather silly as I have the key. But that's bureaucracy . . .
- - ** But do not remove your holding tanks! You may find that the composting head does not work as expected or that you have to sell the boat in which case you will need to re-install the original style MSD and plumbing.

[MarkJ]

I don't think there are any regulations anywhere. Everyone lets it out wherever.

I don't let oily washing up water out when people are swimming.

[lorenzo b]

recently had a USCGA safety inspection and it seems that type 1 and 2 MSD's must have a CG compliance placard attached