As the most important resource for human survival, safe drinking water is vital for any vessel at sea. But water also presents a storage challenge, while trust in quality can be fragile if water ‘on tap’ is really from a tank.

All vessels need water-treatment systems on board to deal with functions such as ballast-water management, oil-water separation and waste management, but also to support sanitation, laundry, cooking and other needs. Fresh water, however, can be bunkered or produced from seawater by using a desalination plant on board – the latter saving storage space and cutting a vessel’s weight, fuel consumption and CO2 emissions.

For obvious reasons, though, drinkable, or ‘potable’, water on ships is subject to scrutiny. It must come from sources that are approved by the relevant health authority, for example, with responsibility for ensuring safety for use falling to the ship’s master or the officer in charge of loading.

Beyond appearance, colour and taste, drinking water at sea should have been assessed for PH, conductivity, salinity, chlorine, metals and hardness, with samples also taken to verify the absence of microbial contamination. Best practice requires each ship operator to follow a water safety plan, which includes procedures for purchasing, delivery, sampling, storage and distribution of drinking water on board.

For those on board a yacht at sea, however, bottled water can often seem the safest option, despite the self-evident wasteful use of plastics. One reason can be that the water which apparently meets the searching requirements of best practice does not taste so good.

Sustainable drinking-water solutions
EPE Yachting, a division of the leading marine environmental protection organisation Environmental Protection Engineering (EPE) S.A., is on a mission to ensure that guests and crew members alike have no reason to insist on bottled water. Tasked with delivering sustainable solutions that fully engage with the needs of the yachting audience, the division has secured agreements to supply innovations in drinking water production which merit trust that will be proven in the tasting.

EPE Yachting offers a range of freshwater treatment systems to suit the requirements of individual yachts.

ALIOS, for example, is a reverse osmosis system that produces reliable fresh water from the desalination of sea water. The system has been designed to suit all sizes of modern superyachts, while still remaining compact, making it ideal for both retrofits and new builds. ALIOS is manufactured using high quality materials to ensure maximum efficiency throughout its life. It also features automated back flushing with fresh water which not only prolongs the life of the membranes, but ensures the fresh water produced is free of any unwanted substances.

Some of its latest additions are the Slim Line and M70 Soda drinking water systems from Octo Marine, which are supplied by EPE Yachting on an exclusive distributor basis in Greece. The two systems allow yachts to be completely self sufficient by ensuring there is always high-quality, fresh mineral water available to drink on board.

Cool running-water system
The M70 Soda system can also be installed alongside water filtration units, such as the Slim Line and ALIOS systems to provide unlimited ambient, chilled or sparkling water on tap, completely eradicating the need for bottled water.

With regulations tightening and guests also increasingly expecting sustainability measures to be proactive, a 360-degree approach to environmental protection is becoming essential. This needs to focus on technology and solutions that minimise environmental impact without compromising quality and guest experiences, while also fully understanding the financial and operational requirements of vessel owners themselves.

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Environmental Protection Engineering

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