Company: CMDB
Filing Date: 2025-04-17
Form Type: 20FR12B/A
Source: 0001140361-25-014307
Chunk: 140

Company: Costamare Bulkers Holdings Ltd
Filing Date: 2025-04-17
Form: 20FR12B/A
Chunk 140
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 Discharge National Standards of Performance, new final regulations pursuant to VIDA which set discharge standards that are as least as stringent as the VGP. These new standards are enforceable through U.S. Coast Guard regulations, which must be promulgated within two years. Until the Coast Guard’s regulations are final and enforceable, vessels will continue to be subject to the existing discharge requirements under the VGP. On December 2, 2016, the Marine Safety Center announced the approval of the first Coast Guard type approved Ballast Water Management System (“BWMS”). Since the approved BWMS became available, vessels calling at U.S. ports have been required to have such systems installed by their first regular dry-docking after January 1, 2016. Vessel owners and operators are alternatively permitted to meet the discharge standard without the use of a BWMS or, apply for an individual, justified extension to the compliance date. We comply with the most recent version of the VGP for all of our vessels that operate in U.S. waters or have received permission from the Coast Guard to perform ballast exchange operations in U.S. waters for a maximum of five years after the compliance date for each vessel. We do not believe that any costs associated with meeting the requirements under the VGP or the Vessel Incidental Discharge National Standards of Performance will be material.

U.S. Coast Guard regulations adopted under the 1996 U.S. National Invasive Species Act (“NISA”) also impose mandatory ballast water management practices for all vessels equipped with ballast water tanks entering or operating in U.S. waters. Amendments to these regulations, which became effective in June 2012, established maximum acceptable discharge limits for various invasive species and/or requirements for active treatment of ballast water. The U.S. Coast Guard ballast water standards are consistent with requirements under the BWM Convention. Several states, including Michigan and California, have adopted legislation or regulations relating to the permitting and management of ballast water discharges. California has extended its ballast water management program to the regulation of “hull fouling” organisms that attach to vessels and adopted regulations limiting the number of organisms in ballast water discharges. Other states could adopt similar requirements that could increase the costs of operation in state waters.

The EPA has adopted standards under the CAA that pertain to emissions from vessel vapor control and recovery and other operations in regulated port areas and emissions from the large marine diesel engines from model year 2004 or later. Several states also regulate emissions from vapor control