# Nati nal

MAINTENANCE & REPAIR, INC.

December 2, 2009

FILED VIA REGULATIONS.GOV

Docket Management Facility U.S. Department of Transportation West Building Ground Floor

Room W12-140 1200 New Jersey Avenue, S.E. Washington, D.C. 20590

Re: Standard for Living Organisms in Ships’ Ba llast Water Discharg ed in U.S. Waters (Docket ID No. USCG-2001-10486)

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing on behalf of National Maintenance & Repair, Inc. (NMR) concerning the U.S. Coast Guard’s (“USCG”) August 28, 2009 Ballas t Water Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”). National Maintenance & Repair, In c. is an inland marine transportation company operating on the Upper Mississippi River. Our co rporate headquarters are in South Point, Ohio with our base of operations in Hartford, Illinois. We operate a fleet of towboats and tank barges and employ 270 persons. National Maintenance & Repair, Inc.

is an active member of the American Wate rways Operators (“AWO”), the national trade association for the U.S. tugboa t, towboat and barge industry.

National Maintenance & Repair, Inc. fully suppor ts AWO’s efforts on this issue, and would encourage the USCG to pay close attention to the comments submitted by AWO in this rulemaking process, particularly as those comments relate to: (1) the need for a uniform

national standard for ballast wa ter and other vessel discharges; (2) the lack of a sufficient scientific and technical support in the record for the proposed regulations; (3) the need to expressly provide in the final regulations that ballast water treatment is not required for towing vessels and barges operating in the U. S. domestic trade; (4 ) the need to exempt all other vessel operations that do not pose a ri sk of introducing invasive species; (5) the

need to eliminate the two-tier approach or provide lifetime gr andfathering for vessels with installed treatment systems; and (6) the need to ensure that the proposed practicability review is sufficiently robust and comprehensive.

FOOT OF HAWTHORNE STREET  P.O. BOX 38  HARTFORD, ILLINOIS 62048

618-254-7451(IL)  800-325-3625(Outside IL)  314-355-4400(St. Louis)December 2, 2009 Page 2

For our part, National Maintenance & Repair, Inc. would request that the final rule expressly state that inland river towboats and barges are not subjec t to the new ballast water discharge standards.

Apparent in the Preliminar y Regulatory Analysis document accompanying the NPRM contains analysis that would seem to clearly indicate that the USCG does not believe that the proposed regulations would apply to inland towing vessels and barges.

Specifically, on page 37 of that document, the USCG explains:

We have not included the following vessels in the affected population that would incur addi tional costs from the proposed BWDS based on consultation with the ballast water program personnel and USCG expertise: ...

Vessels less than or equal to 100 ft. Vessels in this size range typically operate in more s heltered environments and do not load and discharge ballast. Their stability characteristics generally accommodate the amount and type of cargo they carry, precluding the need to use ballast water as a stability enhancer.

Some towing vessels (tugs towing behind and general). These vessels do not carry cargo and, thus, do not experience drastic changes in draft that would affect their stability characteristics. Therefore, they do not typically load and discharge ballast water.

River vessels. Rivers are usually very sheltered environments having limited wind and wave spec tra. While current conditions play a very large role in sa iling and towing char acteristics, ballasting is not generally used to improve these. The operations of the river barge trade make installe d ballast water systems very rare and loading and discharging ballast water through void tank main deck openings, without installed piping and pumps, would be a costly and extremely time-consuming evolution.

On page 12 of this analysis the USCG states : “Approximately 7,575 vessels from the current vessel population, of wh ich 2,616 are U.S. vessels, woul d be required to meet the BWDS” – a statistic which would clearly indica te that the USCG do es not believe that inland river towboats and barges should, or even would be subject to the new standards.December 2, 2009 Page 3

This USCG preliminary analysis obviously recognizes and agrees with our industry’s ballasting practices. In particular, our barges and towboats simply do not discharge ballast water, for many of the reasons cit ed in the Preliminary Regulatory Analysis. Further any inland river towboat or barge owned or operated by National Maintenance & Repair, Inc. which would carry ballast water would use only potable water when ballasting or they are otherwise expre ssly prohibited by company po licy from exchanging ballast water in different Captain of the Port Zones. Unfortunately, the text of the NPRM is not as clear on these points as t he supporting documentation, so additional clarification in the

final rule would be beneficial.

To the extent that the USCG decides to apply the new standards to inland towboats or barges, the final rule should provide the inland towing industry with sufficient flexibility to comply with the new standards by means ot her than installing expensive treatment systems. Those alternative options should in clude the use of potable water as ballast or company policies expressly prohibiting the exch ange of ballast water in different Captain

of the Port Zones.

Thank you for kindly considering these comments.

Sincerely,

John W. Moren

Executive VP, Administration National Maintenance & Repair, Inc.

cc: Jennifer Carpenter, AWO