BY MICHAEL FISHER | NT
PANAJI: A high-level committee will soon implement the new Hazardous Waste Pollution 2nd Amendment Rules 2009 Regulation which will replace the 1989 Waste Oil Pollution Regulation that was not enforced.

The new waste oil pollution regulation is to monitor and control the disposal of hazardous waste oils from engines, generators and boilers of barges, cruise ships, off-shore casino vessels and other ships docking in Goa.
The new regulation will not spare even the Mormugao Port Trust (MPT) where huge container and cargo ships of over 30,000 dwt tonnes are docked.
The committee comprising officers of the Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB), Captain of Ports (CoP) and Goa Barge Owners Association (GBOA) has suggested some modification to the regulation.
“We will soon call a meeting with GSPCB, GBOA and ship manufacturers to put in
place a system (container) to collect waste and lube oils gathered in the engine room of ships and to be discharged systematically,” said Mr James Braganza, the Captain of Ports. The collected oils will be disposed off onto shore reception facilities decided by GSPCB and the Corporation of the City of Panaji (CCP), he said. It will be mandatory for all barges and ships plying the Goa rivers and inland waterways to install a waste oil collecting container that will be approved by the CoP, Mr  Braganza said.
“All engine ‘occupants’ will come under the GSPCB authorisation and they will be responsible for the waste oil handling, collection and transporting it to the shore,” said Dr Simon N de Sousa, chairman of GBOA, and added, “Authorised recyclers will be permitted to collect the hazardous and inflammable waste oil.”
He said the owners of ships and barges will have to take authorisation from GSPCB for using the discharge facilities on shore, free of charge. The receiving recyclers from out of the state would have to declare their state authorisation to get GSPCB authorisation for trans-boundary of the hazardous waste oil. Buckets and drums of waste oil are amassed in the engine and generator hold of ships where this hazardous oil is being disposed off will soon be monitored.
Stationed in the Mandovi river are six huge off-shore casino vessels, 11 cruise tourist boats and ships that come to dock. The modification in the regulations will have a clear understanding of management, handling and trans-boundary rules that came into effect in 1989, said a barge owner and it will apply to sewage and garbage dumping too.
The problem is not much with the fishing boats that go out in the sea and dump their waste, said a CoP official in Vasco, but more with the stationed ships and the ships that ply the Goa rivers.