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Pollution of Lake Water : The International Joint Waterways Commission is Now Considering the Subject From All Angles * HE International Joint Waterways | Commission met in the Federal building, Detroit, on Tuesday, Nov. 10, to consider the pollution of boundary waters by vessels and to provide, if pos- sible, a remedy therefor. During the past two years a corps of experts under the direction of Dr. Allan J. McLaughlin has made a detailed study of lake water, hav- ing analyzed some 17,000 samples taken from over 1,700 points from the head of the lakes to the outlet into the St. Lawrence river. The result of these findings was published in THE Martine Review of February, 1914, and indicates that the lakes are polluted for a con- siderable distance off the shores of the leading cities, as well as in the con- necting rivers. The great bulk of the water in the open lake, however, re- mains in its pristine purity and the very clear indication of these areas in the re- port is of great value to vessel owners. Samples taken in the rivers tend, in the opinion of Dr. McLaughlin's ex- 'perts, to show that the vessels were re- sponsible for a certain part of the pol- lution and it was to investigate this feature that the International Joint Commission invited the Lake Carriers' Association and the Dominion Marine Association to submit arguments in re- buttal. The Lake Carriers' Association was represented at the hearing by Presi- dent William Livingstone, Secretary George A. Marr, A. W. Thomson of Cleveland and: Prot.: H. C.\:Sadler . of Ann Arbor University. The Dominion Marine Association was represented by J, We. Norcross of Toronto, A. A, Wright of Toronto and Francis A. King, secretary, of Kingston, Ont. The American members of the International Joint Commission are James A. Tawney of Minnesota, Obadiah Gardner of Maine and R. B. Glenn of North Caro- lina. The Canadian members are Th. Chase Casgrain, Henry A. Powell of St. John,' N. B., and Charles A. McGrath of Ottawa 'All were present with the exception of Th. Chase Casgrain who - has just been appointed postmaster gen- eral of Canada. Mr. Tawney pre- sided. ' President Livingstone informed the commission that insofar as the Lake Carriers' Association is concerned it would do everything in its power to co- operate with the Commission because he felt that no commercial interest should stand in the way of the general health. He added, however, that he did not know exactly what was required of the Association because the pollution caused by the municipalities preponderated so enormously that anything the vessels might do would be of no avail whatever so long as the cities were permitted to discharge raw sewage into open water. In answer to the question, President Livingstone stated that it was the in- variable custom in so far as he knew for vessels to discharge sewage over- board untreated. On the question of water ballast President Livingstone stated that many of the modern car- riers had to make the trip up the lakes light and were therefore compelled to carry several thousand tons of water ballast in their water bottoms and side tanks to make them manageable. This water was frequently let into the ship shortly after leaving port and the prac- tice was usually followed of pumping it out an hour or two. before she reached the loading port in order to get the vessel in proper condition for load- ing. Weather conditions obviously had a great deal to do with the subject. No modern bulk freighter could leave port in light condition against a beam wind without water ballast as the tug could not hold her. In reply to the question as to whether waterworks in- takes were respected, President Living- stone replied that a special circular had been issued to all the vessels of the As- sociation not to pollute the water within a radius of four miles of the Detroit waterworks intake, and that there is no reason why such a rule should not be- come general in respect to all intakes. He added that the Lake Carriers' Association had defined the areas in the great lakes from which supplies of water might be drawn for drinking pur- poses aboard ship and that these areas were based upon the findings in Dr. Mc- Laughlin's report. He was not aware of any outbreak of typhoid fever on any of the ships belonging 'to the Asso- ciation. In closing he assured the com- mission that the Lake Carriers' Asso- ciation would go to any _ reasonable length to safeguard health in the treat- ment of sewage aboard ship and the discharge of water ballast and would assist the government in every way in bringing about a satisfactory remedy, suggesting that if the government ex- perts desired to experiment with tank installations, the Association would be glad to turn over to them as many ships as they required for experimental purposes. He did not think that the vessel owners themselves should make installations which might after all prove not to be satisfactory to the general government. ' In this connection Mr. Powell an- nounced that the public health service is now -experimenting with a tank in- stallation in which the sterilizing agency is live steam. He added that it had lately been installed on a boat and that if it works out well it will be found to be a very inexpensive outfit. President Livingstone closed by sub- mitting several circulars on drinking water and sanitation in general that were isstied by the Association last spring. He also made it very clear that while lake vessels carried throughout the season a floating population of about 15,000,000, it really meant very little when con- trasted with the permanent population along the shores of the lakes. In fact these 15,000,000 passengers can only be regarded as so many passenger hours. Granting that each passenger spent five hours on the water, it would work out into a permanent population of about 10,000 and even these would be scattered over a territory of nearly 1,000 miles in length. Any pollution that is subject to the rectifying influence of 1,000 miles of motion, fresh air and _ sunlight can amount to very little, if anything at all. Francis King, secretary of the Do- minion Marine Association stated that the attitude of his Association was to do all that could be done and it would be governed by anything that the com- missiou. recommended as practicable. He was perfectly satisfied in his own mind, however, that the vessels were guilty of only about one-five hundredth of the pollution to which the lakes are subject and that nothing whatever would be accomplished by eliminating this prac- tically infinitesimal fraction unless the great offenders were also eliminated. He added that no system would be practicable aboard ship that did not have installations both forward and aft. One of the commissioners intimated that the lanes upon which the vessels traveled were polluted at certain points by the vessels themselves. He must have had in mind converging tracks, say at the foot of Lake Huron, or in Whitefish Bay, because the actual lanes in open water are several miles wide. This point was picked up by J. W. Nor- cross and commented upon in his tes-