Despite having forbidden –on August 10th, 2020 through Provision DISFC-2020-15-APN-DPMA#PNA– the discharge of washing waters from the scrubbers to waters of national jurisdiction, today the Argentine Directorate for Environmental Protection suspends this restriction.
The cause of this suspension is the quarantine established in the country due to the health emergency triggered by coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (aka COVID-19). Since one of the main objects of the quarantine is isolating and protecting those who are more vulnerable and mitigating virus’ dissemination through the reduction of public transport services, it is not possible to take the expertise personnel to the ports in order to monitor and record the discharge of washing waters of scrubbers or the use of equivalent technologies.
That is why the director of Environmental Protection decided to suspend the applicability of the provision that forbided the use of scrubbers on open loop from national vessels or those of foreign registers to waters of national jurisdiction -maritime and river.
