ESTABLISHING THE POSSIBILITY OF EXCLUDING CERTAIN STAGES IN THE TECHNOLOGICAL PROCESS OF WATER BALLAST DECONTAMINATION AND TREATMENT

The installation for the purification and disinfection of ballast water of ships was designed at the Danube Institute of the National University ‘Odesa Maritime Academy’ and received two patents: for an invention and a utility model. In the initial version, the plant had the following modules: a self-unloading filter, an ultraviolet emitter, an electrohydroshock unit, an ozone generator, and a natrium hypochlorite dosing unit. A decision was made to create a laboratory unit, where the following modules were removed: the electrohydraulic shock unit and the discharge filter, which was replaced with a fine filter. Subsequently, various scientific studies were carried out at the laboratory facility at the first stage to clean and disinfect river and reservoir water and groundwater. The planned active work at the institute's facility began with the winning of the Ukraine-Turkey grant, which involved joint work with Turkish scientists from the State Technological University of Istanbul. The study of ballast water from ships was carried out using residual ballast taken in the waters of the Black, Mediterranean, Aegean and Marmara Seas. After ballast water treatment at the Institute's laboratory facility, samples of treated and untreated water were transferred to a certified laboratory according to the international standard in Odesa. All laboratory results showed positive data well below the requirements of the D-2 regulations, which prompted the Institute's researchers to conduct experiments with the exclusion of certain stages of ballast water treatment. For this purpose, the modules were switched off one by one: UV, ozone generator, calcium hypochlorite dosing unit, and the results of laboratory tests showed that the plant can treat and disinfect ballast water with one of the main modules in accordance with international requirements.