Friends of the Earth issue their 2016 cruise ship report card

[Tom O.]

Here is the article writer's final conclusion:

 

The cruising public would do well to choose Disney cruises for their “happiest place on Earth” vacations. As for our Santa Barbara ship visitors, perhaps calls from those of us on the front lines of their sewage would encourage them to make us happy as well.

 

Yes that sounds very biased.

[whogo]

Was this really "unpleasant news", or just facts based upon their own chosen set of evaluation criteria.

I think it is unpleasant to see the environmental cost of cruising. "According to the EPA, each day an average cruise ship is at sea it emits more sulfur dioxide than 13 million cars and more soot than 1 million cars."

[OlsSalt]

I think it is unpleasant to see the environmental cost of cruising. "According to the EPA, each day an average cruise ship is at sea it emits more sulfur dioxide than 13 million cars and more soot than 1 million cars."

 

You need to also add the context of the sulfur dioxide impact. This fails as a stand-alone fact.

[OlsSalt]

I think it is unpleasant to see the environmental cost of cruising. "According to the EPA, each day an average cruise ship is at sea it emits more sulfur dioxide than 13 million cars and more soot than 1 million cars."

 

You need to also add the context of the sulfur dioxide impact. This fails as a stand-alone fact. There are currently 1.2 billion cars on the planet. This might be the impact of a hiccup or the power of a full blown hurricane.

 

Heaven forbid I stay home instead, and BBQ in my back yard. I could muster in my basement for two weeks with the lights off turned eating only organic mushrooms I suppose. Putting trade-offs for all these inherently "polluting" human activities is a tough call. But the moral costs of fossil fuels is a worthy discussion.

 

Replacing the demand for human energy with fossil fuel energy in the development of civilization across the globe is today under the microscope. As it should be. May the cruise industry continue to improve on their own small piece of this global concern. And may we continue to be more accommodating when we get 'hot cabins" when traveling in the tropics.

Edited December 20, 2016 by OlsSalt

[whogo]

This appears to be the opinion piece in question: https://www.noozhawk.com/article/karen_telleen_lawton_cruise_ships_environment_121916 It is an opinion piece, more rational and fact based than a lot of opinion pieces.

[claudiniusmaximus]

Thanks for the article. I'd agree. It is even titled "opinion" so isn't pretending to be anything but that.

 

Also its interesting that the article *does* state quite clearly that one of the FOE scoring criteria is transparency,

 

" the low scores reflect a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency" is written quite clearly. There is no need to even go to the FOE scorecard to see that, it's right there in the body of the article.

 

I'm a bit confused by the OPs assertion otherwise. Maybe he was being misleading and biased. That would be ironic.

 

 

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Edited December 20, 2016 by claudiniusmaximus

[OlsSalt]

Thanks for the article. I'd agree. It is even titled "opinion" so isn't pretending to be anything but that.

 

Also its interesting that the article *does* state quite clearly that one of the FOE scoring criteria is transparency,

 

" the low scores reflect a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency" is written quite clearly. There is no need to even go to the FOE scorecard to see that, it's right there in the body of the article.

 

I'm a bit confused by the OPs assertion otherwise. Maybe he was being misleading and biased. That would be ironic.

 

 

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I am wondering why you selectively edited the full sentence?

 

In addition to poor absolute performance, the low scores reflect a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency.

 

Accuse me for reading into the authors intent, but this leave the impression that except for Disney, "cruise ships are poor absolute performers". When in fact HAL ships got fairly good environmental mitigation scores, but were dinged down to a C for their "transparency failure".

 

It was far more helpful to read the actual FOE resource for the facts, than attempt to discern them from the interpretive narrative as written in this media piece.

Edited December 20, 2016 by OlsSalt

[claudiniusmaximus]

The full quote is

 

"In ddition to poor absolute performance the low score reflects a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency"

 

I also left out this part

 

"Friends rates the ships on sewage treatment, air pollution reduction, water quality compliance and transparency."

 

Because they actually mention it twice. Despite you staring otherwise. You aren't accusing me of not being transparent are you? My irony-ometer couldn't cope.

 

 

 

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[claudiniusmaximus]

I am wondering why you selectively edited the full sentence?

 

In addition to poor absolute performance, the low scores reflect a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency.

 

Accuse me for reading into the authors intent, but this leave the impression that except for Disney, "cruise ships are poor absolute performers". When in fact HAL ships got fairly good environmental mitigation scores, but were dinged down to a C for their "transparency failure".

 

It was far more helpful to read the actual FOE resource for the facts, than attempt to discern them from the interpretive narrative as written in this media piece.

 

 

The FOE score card does give cruise ships an overall poor performance. The article is honest in that regard and in its references to transparency being a criteria. It even lists some of the other ships that get better scores etc it's pretty well balanced overall.

 

Your OP was attacking the source now you're stating the source is reliable it's just the article that's "fake" even though once the article actually gets posted it turns out that in most of the places it refers to the FOE scorecard is actually mostly accurately reflecting that FOE scorecard.

 

I can't keep up with your changes of tack.

 

 

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[OlsSalt]

The full quote is

 

"In ddition to poor absolute performance the low score reflects a refusal to confirm current environmental technologies, resulting in failing grades for transparency"

 

I also left out this part

 

"Friends rates the ships on sewage treatment, air pollution reduction, water quality compliance and transparency."

 

Because they actually mention it twice. Despite you staring otherwise. You aren't accusing me of not being transparent are you? My irony-ometer couldn't cope.

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

 

....refusal to confirm..... resulting in failing grades for transparency.

 

We are on the same page as to the actual words used. It was the linking these words to the overall tone of the article that I found to be the primary disconnect.

 

Which warranted on my part, further exploration into the actual FOE rankings per criteria and per cruise line. FOE arbitrarily demanded cruise lines meet their "transparency" standards, or else they will flunk them.

 

FOE was transparent about this bottom-line demand. I grant you that. And now we all know where FOE is coming from.

Edited December 20, 2016 by OlsSalt

[OlsSalt]

NB: These are the over-all scores and reflect ALL cruise lines, except Disney, got an F in "transparency".

 

 

Information about Disney Cruise Line Disney Cruise Line A-

Information about Cunard Cruise Line Cunard Cruise Line C

Information about Holland America Line Holland America Line C

 

Information about Norwegian Cruise Lines Norwegian Cruise Line C

Information about Princess Cruises Princess Cruises C

Information about Carnival Cruise Lines Carnival Cruise Line D

 

Information about Fathom Fathom D

Information about Oceania Cruises Oceania Cruise D

Information about Regent Seven Seas Cruises Regent Seven Seas Cruises D

 

Information about Royal Caribbean Int'l Royal Caribbean Int'l D

Information about Seabourn Cruise Line Seabourn Cruise Line D

Information about Celebrity Cruises Celebrity Cruises D+

 

Information about Silversea Cruises Silversea Cruises D-

Information about Costa Cruises Costa Cruises F

Information about Crystal Cruises Crystal Cruises F

 

Information about MSC Cruises MSC Cruises F

Information about P&O Cruises P&O Cruises F

Edited December 20, 2016 by OlsSalt

[OlsSalt]

FOE raw scores for HAL:

 

B - Sewage treatment

C+ - Air Pollution reduction

A- - Water Quality Compliance

F - Transparency (failure to submit info to FOE)

 

C - Overall FOE score for HAL

[chengkp75]

As with lots of what I see about the maritime industry from FOE, you need to take lots of it with grains of sea salt.

 

Take for instance the air pollution grade:

 

"while ships that only installed scrubbers or only installed shore power capability but did not dock at ports with shoreside power were given a C"

 

So a cruise line or ship that installs a scrubber to reduce emissions while outside of a port, and installs shore power capability to "cold iron" or shut down the ship's engines in port, but don't dock at ports with shoreside power are penalized. There are about 20 ports worldwide that have the infrastructure to supply power to ships, most can't accommodate cruise ships' large demands, many can only handle one or two ships at a time, and most tellingly, the decision as to whether a port wishes to invest in the costly infrastructure of shore power is completely beyond the control of the cruise line. Why should a cruise line be given a poorer grade because their demographics call for their ships to port where there is no interest on the part of the national, state, or local authorities to invest in this?

 

And to base the cruise lines' water pollution score strictly on whether or not the ships had violations of Alaska's water quality standards is pretty ridiculous, given the amount of passenger miles cruised outside of Alaska.

[KirkNC]

NB: These are the over-all scores and reflect ALL cruise lines, except Disney, got an F in "transparency".

 

We

Information about Disney Cruise Line Disney Cruise Line A-

Information about Cunard Cruise Line Cunard Cruise Line C

Information about Holland America Line Holland America Line C

 

Information about Norwegian Cruise Lines Norwegian Cruise Line C

Information about Princess Cruises Princess Cruises C

Information about Carnival Cruise Lines Carnival Cruise Line D

 

Information about Fathom Fathom D

Information about Oceania Cruises Oceania Cruise D

Information about Regent Seven Seas Cruises Regent Seven Seas Cruises D

 

Information about Royal Caribbean Int'l Royal Caribbean Int'l D

Information about Seabourn Cruise Line Seabourn Cruise Line D

Information about Celebrity Cruises Celebrity Cruises D+

 

Information about Silversea Cruises Silversea Cruises D-

Information about Costa Cruises Costa Cruises F

Information about Crystal Cruises Crystal Cruises F

 

Information about MSC Cruises MSC Cruises F

Information about P&O Cruises P&O Cruises F

 

That scale actually makes HAL look good in comparison particularly when you consider the "F" for transparency. Remove that and HAL looks more like a B.