• The USCG later provided clarification about these type-approval applications.
Two more applications for US Coast Guard type-approval have been announced by the USCG’s Marine Safety Center (MSC), yet two others that pre-date this pair have not yet been acknowledged by the MSC.
A message posted yesterday (4 April) on the USCG’s online blog reported that the MSC “has received its 11th and 12th applications” for ballast water management system type-approval. It named them as the BallastAce system, manufactured by JFE Engineering Corp, whose application it received on 29 March, and Panasia’s GloEn-Patrol system, whose application it received on 30 March.
Yet on 29 March, Wärtsilä announced it had submitted an application for its Aquarius EC BWMS. Although its announcement did not give the date when its application was made, since its statement was issued at 1000 Europe Standard Time (0900 GMT) on that date, its application must have been submitted no later than the afternoon of 28 March in the US.
Wärtsilä Marine Solutions’ sales director for Ballast Water Management Systems, Craig Patrick, told BWTT today that the company has a submission receipt “from last week” for its application and has asked the USCG for clarity about the situation.
BWTT is aware of an even earlier submission that was made on about 12-14 March by a company that has not yet made its application public. BWTT has alerted that company to this latest USCG statement.
BWTT has also contacted the USCG, drawing its attention to these two omissions – which would seem to have actually been the 11th and 12th applications, making these latest additions the 13th and 14th – and asking why they have not yet been acknowledged.
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