By David Conway

Floridians are familiar with the staggering sight of cruise liners near port, so huge they eclipse the sky on their passage to and from exotic, distant places. But it's likely that few of us know the equally staggering amounts of waste those ships generate.

A typical cruise ship, which carries about 3,000 passengers including staff, has the waste disposal problems of a small town.

In an analysis from environmental group Oceana, compiled from reports by the Environmental Protection Agency and the cruise industry, we learn that a typical cruise ship can produce up to 30,000 gallons of sewage a day. This so-called "black water" may or may not be treated before being dumped into the oceans. A ship also generates daily more than 200,000 gallons of "gray water" from laundries, showers, kitchens and engine operations. Add to that oily bilge and ballast water, a stream of plastic bottles and other incidental debris, multiply the output by the number of ships plying the oceans, imagine these ships entering fragile coastline and reef ecosystems, and you begin to get the nature of the problem.

This kind of pollution has been linked to shellfish bed closures, coral reef destruction, the death of marine animals, oxygen-depleted dead zones that wipe out native marine species, beachwater contamination and harmful algae blooms.

Cruise ships and their parent companies have long operated beyond much public scrutiny and the law. Cruise lines are exempt from the discharge permitting program of the nation's Clean Water Act. Still, the industry has paid more than $40 million in fines since 1999 for violating the few federal laws that regulate them. Keep in mind that since 2001, the Coast Guard, the main policing agency of cruise lines, has been far more concerned with homeland security than monitoring ships' operations.

Advanced wastewater treatment systems can cut levels of pollutants in black and gray water, but so far only one cruise line, Royal Caribbean, has agreed to install such equipment. Others have refused to do so, except in Alaska, where they are required to by state law.

The time may be near, however, when cruise lines will be held legally accountable for the wastes their ships discharge at sea.

Legislation introduced in the federal House and Senate this spring, known as the Clean Cruise Ship Act of 2004, calls for tighter restrictions on cruise ship emissions, installation of better onboard waste treatment systems, and closer monitoring of discharge practices. The Durbin Bill, co-sponsored by Rep. Sam Farr (D-CA), Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Rep. Christopher Shays (R-CT), represents the first time the federal government has attempted to regulate cruise ship pollution at the national level. It comes as public pressure intensifies against the booming cruise industry's environmental practices.

In Florida, surprisingly enough, there are no state laws which specifically regulate the dumping of cruise ship pollutants. Ships' practices here are governed by voluntary agreements, called Memorandums of Understanding, or MOUs, between the state and the cruise line associations, the Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association (FCCA) and the International Council of Cruise Lines (ICCL).

The Florida MOU indicates that member cruise lines agree to discharge wastewater beyond Florida territorial waters, which extend three miles from shore. MOUs also stipulate that cruise ships will not discharge gray water in port, and only at a distance of four miles from shore. Beyond four miles, gray water can be dumped into the ocean without treatment. As for sewage, it can be dumped once treated, beyond three miles, while a ship is underway at a speed greater than six knots.

Beyond four miles, raw sewage can be dumped directly into the ocean.

Despite those lax standards and scant oversight, cruise lines continue to rack up impressive violations. In 2002, Carnival Cruise Lines pleaded guilty in South Florida to federal charges associated with improperly discharging oily bilge water and falsifying records. Discharge of oil is prohibited by federal law and international accord. The company agreed to pay $18 million in fines and enter five years

of probation. In August 2003, Carnival's probation officer cited the company for violating the terms of that probation by filing false reports made by environmental-compliance employees. This March, Carnival Cruise Lines admitted that for the first three months of 2004, one of its chief engineers had been improperly processing bilge water on the ship Noordam, homeported in Tampa. That's just Carnival, in South Florida. The scenario gets repeated around the country.