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The World's Largest Cruise Ship and Its Supersized Pollution Problem (theguardian.com)

Posted by msmash on from the big-polluting-machine dept.

An anonymous reader cites a report on the Guardian: When the gargantuan Harmony of the Seas slips out of Southampton docks on Sunday afternoon on its first commercial voyage, the 16-deck-high floating city will switch off its auxiliary engines, fire up its three giant diesels and head to the open sea. But while the 6,780 passengers and 2,100 crew on the largest cruise ship in the world wave goodbye to England, many people left behind in Southampton say they will be glad to see it go. They complain that air pollution from such nautical behemoths is getting worse every year as cruising becomes the fastest growing sector of the mass tourism industry and as ships get bigger and bigger. According to its owners, Royal Caribbean, each of the Harmony's three four-storey high 16-cylinder Wartsila engines will, at full power, burn 1,377 US gallons of fuel an hour, or about 96,000 gallons a day of some of the most polluting diesel fuel in the world.

10 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. I hate bad journalism like this... by Eloking · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I hate bad journalism like this...

    "It burn 96,000 gallons a day"!! Well no shit, it's the biggest ship of the world. If you want to impress me, tell how how much fuel per passager it burn and compare it to others cruise ship. And unless it's the most efficient ship in the world, I won't see a problem.

    --
    Elok
    1. Re:I hate bad journalism like this... by Eloking · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I hate bad journalism like this...

      "It burn 96,000 gallons a day"!! Well no shit, it's the biggest ship of the world. If you want to impress me, tell how how much fuel per passager it burn and compare it to others cruise ship. And unless it's the most efficient ship in the world, I won't see a problem.

      *unless it's the most "inefficient" ship in the world...

      --
      Elok
    2. Re:I hate bad journalism like this... by Kohath · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Advocacy journalism is almost always misleading -- because informing people isn't really the goal.

  2. Slave labor by johnsmithperson123 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That's not mentioning the fact that the entire staff is likely undocumented/imported, paid low wages (absurdly so), often addicted to drugs etc. Plus the whole sexual assault thing. And changing the flag to, say, Liberia. The cruise industry disgusts me.

    1. Re:Slave labor by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's not mentioning the fact that the entire staff is likely undocumented/imported, paid low wages (absurdly so), often addicted to drugs etc.

      Last cruise we went on, the provided a breakdown of staffing. They knew where everyone on board came from. And at least the ones we met with (my wife enjoys interaction with the staff) a lot of students who wre saving for college. The pay isn't very high, but it is clean, and the expenses are very low. So no complaints there.

      There aren't many Americans. I did have some retired colleagues who were escorts for ladies on board. They were paid similar wages, but enjoyed the hell out of the cruises. Good meals, pleasant company, and it was like Saturday evening out with a date every day of thte week.

      Your version of Cruise lines is completely bizzare and I haven't seen any of that stuff you say is likely.

      Although full disclosure - I haven't - nor will I - be on a Carnival Cruise.

      --
      The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
  3. Easy Solution by Greyfox · · Score: 3, Insightful

    There's an easy solution for that! Clean Atomic Energy! But then everyone'd be like "Waaaah! Waaaah! There's a floating nuclear reactor down on the dock!" Honestly, there's just no pleasing some people.

    --

    I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

  4. Re:Exactly my though (Legal limitations ?) by ColdWetDog · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Given the negative cachet that nuclear power has these days, using a reactor to power a cruise ship would be a PR nightmare. Might as well just paint a huge sign on the hull that says "Radiation! Stay Away!".

    --
    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  5. Re: Finally by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The Costa Concordia is a good example of a reason why not. I also suspect nuclear is notably more expensive to operate - more specialized crew training, evacuation/rescue considerations, nuclear engineers on board to operate the system, etc. Might be a more tempting target for terrorists. Can a ship with nuclear access the same ports as those that don't (i.e., do some ports/countries that cruise ships dock prohibit nuclear)? Then there's the general stigma attached to nuclear; will anyone actually want to be on a boat with a nuclear reactor? I think there are plenty of reasons a private, for-profit company isn't using nuclear.

  6. Re:Thorium: Less experience ? by saloomy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The real cost of a petrochemical navy is absurdly higher than a nuclear one. Just check out:

    1. The cost of ensuring its supply (through wars)

    2. The fluctuation in real cost of fuel prices over the lifespan of the engine

    3. The environmental cost and irrecoverable damage to the planet

    4. The increase in respiratory illnesses incident rate vs the relatively nonexistent incident rate related to nuclear energy. More on this:
    Nuclear power, when compared with just about every other fuel on earth, has a vastly lower injury, death, and sickness rating, even with Fukushima, Chernobyl, and 3-Mile. The safety is what makes the cost astronomical, not the science. Nuclear power is the fuel of the sun, the earth, and the source of all of life's energy. Even solar power has a higher deaths per gigawatt than nuclear. This an educational problem, not a practical, economical, or scientific one.

    Its too bad the first experience humans had with nuclear power was via WMD, and not civilian applications. We would be living in a very different world today if we first commercialized the technology before we blew up Japan with it.

  7. Re:Bad, but not because of the amount or fuel type by Pentium100 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Isn't it like this for any entertainment?

    Don't go for a drive, save fuel. Don't play games or watch TV, save electricity. And so on.

    While you can skip the "cruise" part and, say, drive or fly to the various destinations, it would not be the same, because now the "going to" the destinations part is less fun than it would be on a cruise ship.