MOVING WATER AND MORE Ships using water as ballast carry fish, plants and bacteria from their native origins to othe rparts of the world. One such trip: FIRST: A ship takes in thousands of gallons of water from the Black Sea as ballast for a trip across the Atlantic Ocean and to the Great Lakes. In the water are zebra mussels. SECOND: As new cargo is loaded in the USA, the ballast water is pumped out, along with the mussels. The zebra mussels reproduce rapidly in their new habitat. They clog water lines and threaten native fish and shellfish populations. OTHER BALLAST IMPORTS Common name Origin Invading Damage done Mitten crab Northern Asia U.S. West Coast Burrows into riverbanks and dikes, causing erosion Round goby Black and Caspian seas North America Preys on the eggs of other species Asian kelp Northern Asia U.S. West Coast Grows swiftly, displacing native algae and altering habitat Green crab European Atlantic Coast USA Competes with native crabs and becomes dominant species Sources: United Nations International Maritime Organization, U.S. Geological Survey

The invasive critters are stowaways in the tons of water that ships pump in and out of their hulls for stability and maneuverability.

Every year, billions of gallons of this ballast water are discharged into U.S. waterways, releasing everything from fish to microorganisms

"It's a huge problem that is invisible to most people," says Tim Eichenberg, a lawyer at the Ocean Conservancy, an environmental group. "The ballast is dumped underwater, so you don't see it happen, and the damage is below the surface."

The shipping industry agrees that untreated ballast is a problem. "It's well-established that saltwater ships coming from around the world have brought invasive species to our waters," says Stuart Theis, a veteran shipping executive who heads the U.S. Great Lakes Shipping Association. "The question is what to do about it."

Some mayors and state legislators have started to say it's time to consider what once was unthinkable: banning all foreign ships — "salties," they're called — from the Great Lakes.

"At a certain point you have to say, 'When is it time to get the salties out of the lake?' " says Gary Becker, mayor of Racine, Wis., and a director of the Great Lakes Cities Initiative, a group of mayors.

Racine depends on Lake Michigan for recreation and tourism, an industry that has gained political clout in the region as the area's industrial economy has shrunk.

Moving tons of cargo

In 2006, salties accounted for 1,365 trips into and out of the Great Lakes, according to the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Commission. The ships carry grain, steel, coal and other cargo. A typical salty ship, with a crew of 25, might deliver foreign steel and leave with grain from U.S. farmers. Salties account for less than one-third of the deliveries on the Great Lakes. "Lakers" — ships that deliver only within the lakes — account for the rest.

The problem of invasive species is most severe in the Great Lakes, a self-contained freshwater system under attack from foreign intruders brought in by ocean ships passing through the St. Lawrence Seaway. The region has more than 100 invasive species, including the notorious zebra mussel, a fingernail-size creature from Asia that clogs industrial pipes and litters beaches with sharp shells that make it painful for people to go barefoot.

The urgency of cleaning ballast accelerated when one of the world's most feared fish diseases — viral hemorrhagic septicemia, or VHS — caused a large fish kill in the Great Lakes in 2006. VHS is a saltwater-fish virus that is deadly to a wide range of freshwater sport fish that lack genetic resistance.

Coastal waters have suffered, too. The Asian clam has taken over much of the floor of San Francisco Bay, replacing native clams and oysters.

In the absence of federal regulations, states have started to impose strict standards on ballast. On Jan. 1, Michigan started requiring permits for ships to release ballast. To get a permit, the ship must show it has technology onboard to treat ballast to kill invasive species. Last year, California imposed rules that ballast have no detectable level of organisms by 2020.

"The states are understandably impatient that we don't have federal regulations, but the shipping industry can't deal with different standards in every state," Theis says.

The Coast Guard has authority to regulate ballast under the National Invasive Species Act of 1996. It hopes to release an environmental analysis this summer. Proposed regulations could arrive in 2008.

"It's a … complex issue," says Bivan Patnaik, regulatory coordinator for environmental standards at the Coast Guard.

Congress has considered several proposals for standards over the last few years, but the bills have died because of disagreements over details, such as whether federal law should overrule state laws.

Cargo firms won't buy treatment systems, which cost $500,000 to $1 million per ship, until they know the regulations, says Joel Mandelman, vice president of Nutech 03 Inc., an Arlington, Va., company that sells a system to treat ballast.

'A Catch-22'

Regulators won't set standards until they know what technology works. And venture capitalists won't invest in developing a technology without knowing the regulation and marketplace.

"It's crazy. This is a Catch-22 that's been going on for a decade," Mandelman says.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the shipping industry began trying to reduce the release of invasive species. The industry encouraged ships to certify they had "no ballast on board." Those with ballast were expected to exchange the water in deep ocean, where high salt content would kill most invasive species.

The strategy hasn't worked. "We haven't seen a reduction in invasive species since these practices went into effect," says University of Michigan scientist Thomas Johengen.

Johengen's research found that ships can't dump all their ballast. A layer of murky water and sediment remains in the cavelike structure of a ship's hull. Even ships labeled as having "no ballast on board" are carrying invasive species.

When a ship unloads foreign cargo in the USA, the vessel takes on ballast. The Great Lakes water mixes with the foreign residue to become an aquarium for invasive species. Later, when the ship takes on U.S. cargo before it leaves, the freighter dumps perhaps 60,000 tons of ballast mixture into the Great Lakes.

Johengen says ballast must be treated inside the ship to kill invasive species.

It's not clear how best to do that. Several approaches — using chemical, heat, ozone or ultra-violet rays — are being explored. Research has been slow because it's unclear what the regulations will require.

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Enlarge By John L. Russell, AP Zebra mussels are one of more than 100 species invading the Great Lakes.