The environmental impact of shipping is a key topic for the industry over the next decade. Not only in design and operation, the whole lifecycle of a vessel must be considered, including its final recycling and the disposal of hazardous material. To broaden their knowledge of new regulations and sustainable recycling a group of marine experts from Aliança Navegação e Logística Ltda. (Aliança) and classification society Germanischer Lloyd (GL) held a four day HazMat training course recently.
The course was conducted at Aliança’s offices in Santos, Brazil. Four Aliança experts and six GL surveyors from around South America took part in the course which covered the latest SOLAS and MARPOL requirements as well as the future requirements of the Hong Kong Convention.
The course covered many topics, including: relevant legislation, the evaluation of the onboard situation, preparation for an onsite inspection, the use of communication and software tools, safe working conditions and ship operation, conducting onboard inspections, taking and analysis of samples and statistics and the preparation of reports and ship specific inventory of hazardous materials.
The practical component of the course, which took place on board Aliança’s Copacabana, a 20,000GT GL classed container vessel, focused on HazMat survey work, which is an essential part of sustainable recycling and operation.
Christoph Gessner, Technical General Manager of Aliança, joined the group on the first day and wished them all the best. All ten of the participants completed the course successfully, obtaining a certification which confirms their ability to act as a GL approved HazMat Expert.
This course has been specifically developed in order to train HazMat Experts on how to comply with the incoming IMO Hong Kong Convention and the related 2011 Guidelines for the Development of the Inventory of Hazardous Materials (IHM), which will create a number of new obligations for ship owners.
Interactive case studies support the learning process during the theoretical part of the course. A practical component takes place onboard a ship, as participants learn to prepare an IHM. Successful completion of the course is confirmed a GL certificate.
