Studies carried out by metropolitan municipalities on marine pollution prevention and proposals

The main sources of marine pollution are land and sea based pollutants. About 20% of marine pollution is sea based, and almost completely ship sourced. Thus the precautions to be taken for ship sourced pollution has significant importance. The marine traffic of ships carrying several kinds of dangerous goods,particularly oil, poses environmental risk for our sea areas. Besides, the other pollutants reaching the seas from land, via several ways, damage the aquatic life. Turkey as a member of International Maritime Organization (IMO) has to fulfil the conditions, just like the other member states. One of these conditions is obligation to installation and operation of ship waste reception facilities on the ports and terminals of member states. In Turkey, some of the biggest ports and terminals have installed waste reception facilities. While some of these facilities provide service, some of them are idle. In the scope of this thesis, the ship sourced wastes collectedand their amounts in five metropolitan municipalities (Çanakkale, İstanbul, Kocaeli, İzmir, Muğla) are analyzed. About 2/3 of Turkish coastal area are under the responsibility of metropolitan municipalities. In accordance with Metropolitan Municipalities Law, the responsibility to collect all the waste generated in this area belongs to metropolitan municipalities. Considering these municipalities as important port areas; almost all generated waste can be collected from these cities. The distribution of collected ship sourced wastes in Turkey is analyzed, on the basis of ports. Waste collection rates of each port are gathered. The collection rates of bilge water, slop, ballast water, sludge, waste oil, wastewater, garbage are calculated and analyzed. As a result, the major problems faced during ship sourced waste collection are specified, and some proposals, regarding legislation and implementation, are presented for improvement.