Should I be ashamed?

[onestepcsy37]

When I bought my boat in 2004 it had been lived on and cruised by a couple for ten years. It had NO holding tank.

I decided to put one in, just in case the fuzz wanted to inspect me. No macerator pump, just a deck hose for landside pumpout. Ten years on, I've NEVER USED IT. It's as clean as the day I installed it. I've also never been inspected.

But we cruise Florida/Bahamas where the waters are tidal or ocean. If I were cruising interior waters I would probably get pumped out.

[DefinitelyMe]

Unless you're planning on cruising in the States I'd have no qualms about taking it out. I took mine out and replaced it with a water tank">fresh water tank. If i'm in a location where i need it i have a bucket and a bit of sawdust as a temporary solution. I'm never in those places for long so this is not a problem.

[ryon]

Originally Posted by natraps116

... I think im taking out our 25 gallon holding tank and filling it with extra diesel lol

Yes, you should be ashamed. It's supposed to be a SAILboat!

[barnakiel]

I would hold on to this tank. Maybe one day you will stop for a longer stay in a place where there are pump out facilities. Then you would not have to run to that toilet booth mid night in the rain ...

And then gain think of anchorages. The ones where you can still see people swimming ...

Cheers,
b.

[micah719]

Could be worse........

[Dougtiff]

I have been using a Raritan "electro san now scan" for years even at sea, grinds it all up and kills the bacteria, i use it along with their electric toilet, great combo and the Ladys love it.

[Catnut]

We are cruising the Greek islands and use our holding tanks all the time. Usually we are anchored in bays or in small ports where we and the crews of the boats around us go swimming several times a day, off the back of the boats. It helps that the water temp is 28 - 30 deg C !
Also, we use our salt water tap in the galley to rinse our dishes before washing in fresh water. So don't want to be parked in sewage. There is not much of a tidal range here.

It is so easy to open the holding tanks on passage and then close them on entering an anchorage or harbour, that for us it's a no brainer.

When I sailed in the UK the boats I were on did not have holding tanks but we didn't go swimming off the back, unless by accident! The water was just too cold !

[TrentePieds]

There are surely TWO considerations here:

Firstly, the need to BE COMPLIANT. Once a rule or law is on the books, it's irrelevant what we, individually, may think of it, and if we choose the be out of compliance, then the risk of being "caught", and having to pay the prescribed penalty, is a risk that we must evaluate for ourselves as a simple cost/benefit analysis.

In the Straits of Juan de Fuca, I shouldn't care to be caught by any of the authorities. In the Straits of Georgia the penalties would be less severe,so I might be less punctilious. Our regs in this 'ere colony sez you can dump if you are more than a mile off shore except for clearly designated "no dump" areas, so it really isn't an issue. If you are in a "no dump" location and desperately need to pump/dump, a fifteen minute run will take you to where it is legal.

I have a "baggie" which is utterly useless as a holding tank, but does make me compliant. And a Y-valve just to jollify the US authorities with their propensity putting seals on things.

Secondly, there is the health issue. Many posters have touched on it. Swimming and dish washing are prolly not to be recommended in many of the popular anchorages around here. It certainly isn't in my home marina, where there was a formal E-coli warning issued this summer. But we shouldn't forget that it is not an occasional turd that does the damage ecologically speaking. It is inordinate concentrations of raw urban "black water" discharged by some cities such a Victoria, B.C., and the damage is done not so much by "contaminants" and pathogens as by the utter depletion of oxygen that follows from the decomposition of concentrated organic matter.

Commercial pump-outs along this shore were "out of order" for much of last summer and the mobile job outta False Creek charges an arm and a leg. Obviously they have to. To run a 12 mile return trip at 20 knots to pump out a 15 gallon poop-tank is hardly a sound commercial proposition!

So, laws or no laws, let's all just rely on common sense and exhibit the kind of consideration for others for which sailormen would like to be famous.

TrentePieds

[mserafi1]

976,452,778,078,333,009,431 fish do it. What's one more?

[Storspigg]

In Swedish waters we are not allowed to dump any toilet waste. Especially the Baltic sea is already quite poluted, mainly from agriculture, and also the west coast has lost the clean water it had 30 years ago. As a teacher of biology and environmental protection my pupils and I have followed the great decrease in marine life.

Thigs are improving slowly thanks to new environmental laws,

I am building a compost toilet at the moment, but most boat owners have put in holding tanks.



Now beeng retired I will go cruising full time without poluting our seas.

[PuttingDoctor]

If you're concerned about your discharge you could go purchase and install an ElectroScan unit to treat your waste prior to discharge. I like mine.

[Storspigg]

The ElectroScan kills germs and virus but probably nutrients from urine and excrements pass through the system. If I understand it correctly, also organic waste passes through and will cause bacterial grouth in the water.

[TrentePieds]

[QUOTE=Storspigg;1899707Thigs are improving slowly thanks to new environmental laws,

Now beeng retired I will go cruising full time without poluting our seas.[/QUOTE]

Vancouver's False Creek was, forty or fifty years ago, nothing less than an industrial sewer. All manner of contaminants, including heavy metals, abounded in the nast that constituted the bottom of the "creek" - which is NOT a creek (hence the name "False Creek"), but a small saltwater bay, an appendix to English Bay.

The surrounding areas in the centre of Vancouver have been "gentrified" (half a million bux for a 480 SqFt (48 M^2) condo apartment), and industry has been shown the door. Granville Island, that was the worst of the industrial offenders on "the creek", went artsy-fartsy beyond belief. Totally "green" - I'm glad to say :-)! The flushing action of the tides in "the Creek' is such that in the half century since industries were shut down and the discharge of pollutants stopped, fish have reestablished their habitats in "the creek" and harbour seals are quite happy to go a-hunting there.

Adjoining swimming beaches, a mile or two away on English Bay, are the joy of Vancouver's youth. Not for years have they been closed due to E-coli counts, because Vancouver, unlike Victoria, does a decent job of sewage treatment.

But I will give you that the flushing action of a 16 foot tidal range is rather better than that of the six inches or so I recall from my native Funen :-)

Hej på dig

TrentePieds

[valhalla360]

The quantities of waste involved are irrelevant in terms of nutrient loads and algea blooms.

The only issues would be if you were in a small cove and people were coming into contact with the water shortly after a release.

[Storspigg]

Thank you for your info, TreintePads! (Sorry if my spelling is wrong!)

I'm happy to read how things have improved in your waters. Sorry I can't say the same about Kalmarsund. Maybe marin life will be better in 10 to 20 years. I rhink organic cemicals such as phtalates are part of our problems together with nutrients.


All the best
Sven