New global standards on sulphur content in marine fuels have led to an increasing number of ships installing exhaust gas cleaning systems, also known as scrubbers, to reduce air emissions of sulphur oxides. Ships equipped with a scrubber can continue to use heavy fuel oil, resulting in significant discharge of acidified water containing several contaminants, such as heavy metals, persistent organic pollutants (POPs; mainly polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons), and nitrogen compounds.The simplest and most common type of scrubber system, the open-loop scrubber, directly discharges the contaminated water in to the sea. The use of scrubber systems by ships is an emerging global problem and an additional pressure on the marine environment. The substances found in scrubber discharge water can cause acute effects on marine biota and may have further impacts, through bioaccumulation, acidification, and eutrophication, on the structure and functioning of marine ecosystems.The number of ships with installed scrubber systems is increasing, but legislation on scrubber discharge is lagging, inconsistent between countries, and often insufficient to protect the environment. ICES recommends the use of cleaner low-sulphur fuels, such as marine gas oil, to eliminate scrubber use and associated impacts on the marine environment.Until this is possible, ICES proposes a set of measures to mitigate scrubber impacts
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RBINS Staff Publications 2020
An almost complete plastron, as well as several peripherals and a costal plate of a turtle from the middle Eocene of Saint-Gilles, is presented here. Although this turtle specimen was donated to the Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique (Brussels, Belgium) more than a century ago, it remained undescribed. Its study allows us to recognize the second pleurodiran in the Belgian fossil record, where, until now, the Eocene Neochelys was the only one known. The Belgian material of Neochelys is known in lower Eocene (early Ypresian) levels, but the new pleurodiran specimen comes from the middle Eocene (early Lutetian). It is the first partial articulate shell of a pleurodiran turtle recognized in Belgium, and the only member of this clade recognized in this country at specific level. The new specimen is a representative of the so-called Erymnochelys group, this lineage being known in Africa from the Upper Cretaceous to the present but in Europe only during the Eocene. It represents the first specimen of Eocenochelus eremberti identified outside its type locality, the French region of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (Yvelines, Île-de-France), where only one specimen was found. The plastron of the Belgian individual corresponds to the most complete for this species. Its analysis allows us not only to broaden the range of paleobiogeographical distribution of Eocenochelus eremberti but also to improve the knowledge about the anatomy and variability of this taxon.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2017
