Pollution from marine vessels linked to heart and lung disease : study

Pollution from marine shipping causes approximately 60,000 premature cardiopulmonary and lung cancer deaths around the world each year, according to a report published online in the Articles ASAP section of the journal Environmental Science and Technology. The report benchmarks for the first time the number of annual deaths caused globally by pollution from marine vessels, with coastal regions in Asia and Europe the most affected.

Conducted by James Corbett of University of Delaware and James Winebrake from Rochester Institute of Technology, the study correlates the global distribution of particulate matter - black carbon, sulfur, nitrogen and organic particles - released from ships' smoke stacks with heart disease and lung cancer mortalities in adults.

The results indicate that approximately 60,000 people die prematurely around the world each year from shipping-related emissions. Under current regulation, and with the expected growth in shipping activity, Corbett and Winebrake estimate the annual mortalities from ship emissions could increase by 40% by 2012.

Ships run on residual oil - a byproduct of the refinery process which has sulfur content thousands of times greater than on-road diesel fuel.

- Fact : southern Singapore is home to PSA, one of the world's busiest shipping ports. Fact : southern Singapore is home to high-end residences that have been built or are being built near the coastline or around the nearby island of Sentosa.

Seeing how it is quite unlikely that those giant container ships, tankers and passenger liners hanging around the area are going to convert to nuclear, electric or some other sort of emission-free propulsion system anytime soon, I think there has got to be a collision between these two facts somewhere.

(2007-11-09 00:24:56 SGT) [Env] Permalink

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