Ballast Tanks
Ballast tanks within a ship hold are filled with seawater to provide stability when sailing and also during loading and unloading. Seawater is moved into various tanks in the ships hold in order to stabilize the ship. During loading and unloading anti heeling pumps can be used to move seawater to adjacent tanks as goods are loaded or unloaded from a ship.
We typically specify our vertical self-priming pumps for such applications to ensure ballast tanks can be emptied fully, and are suitably rated for multiple starts within an hour for short time periods.
Recently the Ballast Water Treatment Directive means additional systems are required to filter ballast water which can contain microorganisms picked up from one port and distributed at another port causing ecosystems to be altered with non-native species. Due to the systems being fitted causing additional pressure losses in systems current ballast water pumps may be undersized and require replacing or may require additional booster pumps.
