Incinerator for Garbage

[lorenzo b]

I realize most sailboats don't have the room, but do some of you trawler owners incinerate your garbage at sea. I'm thinking of welding up a nice sized barbecue that could double as a fire pit to burn off the day's trash, maybe even light up some used oil etc. if I'm in that special mood. I hate the thought of storing endless bags of trash or tossing it.
How do you handle this chore?

[s/v 'Faith']

lorenzo,

It sounds like a good idea, make sure you have wind over the bow or everything you own will smell like burning garbage.

Oh, and another thing..... don't do this anywhere but well offshore, and hopefully no where up wind of me.

Never in the anchorage... lets see now we have the noisy wind generator... and the Chinese imitation Honda wheezing away. Next is the charter moorings catamaran anchored too close with the kids screaming... then the ski boat with the bazooka tubes pumping out bass... AND the Trawler guy is over there burning his plastic sacks and used motor oil...

Yea, if you use this please do so only off shore.

[gosstyla]

A few years ago ECIS, a subsidiary of Eberspacher, WC line of incinerator toilets were being advertised as being available for marine use. They looked interesting but don't believe they ever came out with a marine version.

Their incinerator seems designed primarily for use with liquid waste so doubt it would also work with solid materials.

Also, in US, I believe the EPA has tightened up on incineration discharge rules.

[unbusted67]

Originally Posted by gosstyla

A few years ago ECIS, a subsidiary of Eberspacher, WC line of incinerator toilets were being advertised as being available for marine use. They looked interesting but don't believe they ever came out with a marine version.

Their incinerator seems designed primarily for use with liquid waste so doubt it would also work with solid materials.

Also, in US, I believe the EPA has tightened up on incineration discharge rules.

Yeah, I'm not sure about this one, you may want to check my facts, but isn't this ragingly bad for the environment? I understand the occasional dropped coffee cup or not getting the most optimal mileage in your car, we are all human, but burning waste like plastics and oil is really pretty bad, better to recycle your used oil and plastics when you get onshore, as inconvenient as it may be.

[lorenzo b]

Seems to me it's really hard to say what's the best way to get rid of garbage and certainly no one's volunteering to say what they do with theirs. In my life I've seen thousands of boats docking after a day at sea and rarely have I seen anyone offload any trash. Will the trash compost any faster or better on land then at sea?
I can understand being reticent about admitting that you throw your trash overboard, but it seems to me that that's what everyone does. Am I missing something here?

[Chief Engineer]

Yeah............burning your trash at sea............getting rid of your used motor oil..........nothing bad is gonna happen there

[iiii]

When we were on a passage "off soundings", in at least 500 foot of depth, we would poke cans full of wholes and dump them overboard. Paper waste we kept on the boat and disposed of them after landfall.
Not sure this is the best way too do it but it is what we usually do.

[unbusted67]

The idea is to recycle the waste that you bring back ashore so that it doesn't have to decompose anywhere. Oil can be re-refined and plastics can be made back into plastics, the same for glass. Not to bring politics into it too much but a great way to get ourselves away from all of the conflict that is going on in the Middle East (and one that is often overlooked) is to stop consuming so much plastic because as you know plastic is made from petroleum a large percentage of which we get from over there.

I can not speak for what other boaters do, we live in a marina with recycling and it's not very hard to get your marina to recycle. All you have to do is ask the manager to get receptacles. After a long day people here usually bring there waste in and dump it into the bins, the city then comes and grabs it and takes it to the recycling center.

The commercial charter fishing center next door just stopped allowing people to bring plastic bottles along on their charters. Instead they have people use bubblers and glasses that can be washed. There are about 100 fishing boats with 50 people going out at a time. That's potentially 5,000 plastic containers that aren't getting tossed into the Southern California waters. Pretty sweet, considering this is where we sail.

As for throwing garbage over board it is illegal in most places.. Please see Annex V of the Marpol treaty, the applicable core of which can be viewed in the attached file.

I will look into the ramifications of burning plastics and oil for you and get back to you about it. Good luck.

[s/v 'Faith']

Originally Posted by lorenzo b

Seems to me it's really hard to say what's the best way to get rid of garbage and certainly no one's volunteering to say what they do with theirs. In my life I've seen thousands of boats docking after a day at sea and rarely have I seen anyone offload any trash. Will the trash compost any faster or better on land then at sea?
I can understand being reticent about admitting that you throw your trash overboard, but it seems to me that that's what everyone does. Am I missing something here?

I bet that trash makes up at least 50% of all cargo transported by dingy. I will sink the occasional can off shore, but stow and dispose of all plastics. I bet more folks sink metal then will admit it, but doubt there are many that throw anything else (if that) overboard.

[aspiringsailor]

The US Navy drops their trash at sea, why cant everyone else

[LtBrett]

Originally Posted by aspiringsailor

The US Navy drops their trash at sea, why cant everyone else

The US Navy follows Marpol. They compact and retain all plastics onboard and have oil water separators for oily waste. Waste oil is retained. Food, paper, and other degradable waste is dumped per Marpol.

Brett

[Reality Check]

Many locations have no eco-friendly methods of disposing of trash... even that locally produced. I have not run across any islands in the Caribbean with much in the way of recycling ability. I know the BVI looked into it but found the cost to collect/ sort then export was not within the governments ability. They burn what they can at the incinerator between Nanny Cay and West End which is almost always visible.

Better options in how things are packaged by manufactures and how they are shipped is what we need, and is most obvious when you get away from the larger countries such as the US and much of Europe.

I do agree that burning oil at sea would not appear to be a good environmental process to consider.

[aspiringsailor]

Originally Posted by LtBrett

The US Navy follows Marpol. They compact and retain all plastics onboard and have oil water separators for oily waste. Waste oil is retained. Food, paper, and other degradable waste is dumped per Marpol.

Brett

all the navy guys i have spoken with (some family some friends) say they had certain times to dump their trash and during timeframes dumped whatever they wanted overboard. probably not supposed to, but thats what they all said everybody did.

[lorenzo b]

Quote I do agree that burning oil at sea would not appear to be a good environmental process to consider.

What do suppose powers 95% of the ships at sea?
How do you feel about burning oil on land?
What do you suppose heats New England in the winter?
I apologize for being a wise ass, but it does seem to me to be a serious disconnect between what we think we're doing to help the environment and what actually happens.

[Gene :^)]

I have the space available as well and have thought of the building the same thing, however I would add a blower for a higher burn temp to really incinerate. I would not use it for food prep (the clean BBQ is for that).

I agree that plastic should ALWAYS be compacted, stored, and brought back to land for recycling. Burning it releases toxic chemicals into the air. NEVER put plastic into the water.

Metal and Glass should be recycled on land as well, simply to save our resources.

I have heard somewhere that food, paper, and cloth are considered "bad" for the sea, which lead me to the incinerator idea to begin with. I still need to do more research.

I am considering filtering used motor oil to .5 or 1 micron with a GCF and then adding it to my fuel tanks to be diluted with several hundred gallons of diesel.