A cruise ship pollutes as much as one million cars

his aircraft attempted to measure the rate of fine particles escaping from the thick black smoke emitted by a cruise ship. According to a recent English study, cruise ships that transport millions of tourists every year, release in the air as many fine particles as the world’s major metropolises, responsible for many respiratory health problems and even for cancers. The heavy fuel oil of the cruise ships is very polluting and has a sulphur content more than 3,500 times that of diesel cars, says Adrien Brunetti, health mission manager at FNE. FNE demands the establishment of a Mediterranean sulphur emission control area in the future, as is already the case in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel. Cruise operators claim that fine particles emissions have declined considerably in the last three years. The 2015 regulation change, which requires light fuel for stopovers for these ships, has decreased emission rates by 40%, according to Jean-François Suha, president of the cruise club of Marseille. Source: Gentside Voyage Copyright (c) PortSEurope. All Rights Reserved. 2017.