Erven Bong & Associates LLC (EBA), which arranges insurance for commercial fishing boats in Washington, Oregon, Alaska and California, is offering an unprecedented rebate of up to $800 over four years to clients who install the FORS Bilge Oil Collector. The innovative device, which was unveiled at last year’s Pacific Marine Expo in Seattle, has been hailed as the first truly eco-friendly solution to the problem of bilge oil pollution. “This is the best system we’ve seen so far for preventing accidental oil spills from dirty bilge water,” says EBA President Eric Erven. “So we’re giving clients that meet certain criteria a $200 rebate every year for four years when they install one, which effectively pays for 90% of the Collector. I really don’t see the down side.” Bilge oil is generally a mixture of heavy fuel and lubricants that leaks out of a ship’s inboard engine and collects in the bilge. There, it mixes with run-off water that is often pumped overboard by means of an automatic bilge pump. “People always think, ‘I’m not going to have a spill,’” says Erven. “But that’s not the reality. We’ve seen some really nasty situations when only three or four gallons get pumped out, and that could be just one vessel with a dirty bilge. That’s why every boat should have something to keep its bilge clean.” Traditional methods for removing oil from bilge water, such as absorbent pads and special filters, tend to just transfer the oil to a landfill. The FORS Bilge Oil Collector is the first system that actually collects oil for recycling as a valuable resource. The device can run on solar power, is programmable to automatically remove up to two gallons of oil a day and requires no maintenance other than periodically emptying the reservoir. “It’s so simple it’s almost painfully clever,” says Erven. “If it were overly sophisticated it likely wouldn’t work for very long in a harsh environment like Alaska, but this is a simple system that really works well.” Bob Elliott, vice-president of FORS (which stands for Fast Oil Recovery Systems), estimates more than 3 million gallons of oil would be kept out of the world’s oceans and landfills if every boat in North America were equipped with the device. “Obviously I think that EBA’s rebate program is great, both for us and for the environment,” says Elliott. “Even without the rebates our product has been paying for itself in about six months, so it’s a great extra incentive for fishermen. It’s a big step toward protecting our fragile marine ecosystems.” To learn more about the FORS Bilge Oil Collector, visit www.forsoilrecovery.com. For more information on Erven Bong & Associates LLC’ rebate program, call 1-800-399-4872.

I installed the Bilge Oil Collector and it’s been admirably extracting accumulated oil, on a three-hour cycle, from Westward’s e/room bilge ever since! The unit seems to be the answer to my seventeen-year quest for a practical solution to the nagging problem of oil thrown-off and accumulated (for 86 years, in a wooden bilge) from Westward’s original Atlas Imperial (externally-oiled) diesel engine. Installation was indeed straight forward, once I settled on a spot with good access to the bilge that would not obstruct engine-room mobility.

I’ll also follow-up with Fisheries Supply (www.fisheriessupply.com) to tell them that I’ve installed a unit and am impressed by it’s performance.  Fisheries Supply has a significant presence in both the wholesale & retail chandlery markets locally and have expressed interest in the unit (“It is nice to see a recovery unit vs. just an absorb and dispose system”.).  If I can get their attention, I’ll encourage them to contact you directly, I want to see a good and necessary product succeed.

Please keep me posted on the heavy-duty (belt-recovery) unit which you showed me briefly; there are a couple of oil docks which might market that unit effectively to their work-boat clientele, all of whom are paralyzed with fear of dumping any oily bilge water.

Regards, Hugh Reilly

Retired Commercial Fisherman

Ballard, WA

In fact, one study that studied oil-soaked seabird plumage throughout the 1990s revealed that 90 percent of the oil analyzed was a mixture of heavy fuel and lubricant oil – precisely the mix that is found in the bilge’s of large ocean-going vessels.

Fast Oil Recovery Systems (FORS) hopes to dramatically reduce this sobering statistic with the introduction of its innovative Bilge Oil Collector, which removes 99.9 percent of the oil in a ship’s bilge.

A major component of the new U.S. Coast Guard regulations, published in the Federal Register on October 13, sets tough new standards on equipment to separate oil from bilge water. Specifically, water after separation must have an oil content of less than 15 parts per million of oil.

While several manufacturers make equipment that complies with this standard, the FORS Bilge Oil Collector, introduced in November 2009, recovers 99.9 percent of oil in bilge water, leaving cleaner water with minimal oil content . Plus, while most other systems collect bilge oil in pads or filters which then sit for years in a landfill, the FORS Bilge Oil Collector is the first system that actually collects the oil, suitable for recycling as a valuable resource.

In its report, “Seabirds and Atlantic Canada’s Ship-Source Oil Pollution,” the WWF estimates that 300,000 seabirds die every year off Canada’s eastern coast as the result of ship-source oil pollution.

Fast Oil Recovery Systems (FORS) hopes to protect the lives of seabirds around the globe with the introduction of its innovative new Bilge Oil Collector, which recovers 99.9 percent of the oil in a ship’s bilge.

Most boat operators use absorbent ads or special filters to extract oil from their bilge. Once used, these oil-soaked pads and filters generally end up sitting in a landfill where they continue to degrade the environment for years. The FORS Bilge Oil Collector actually collects the oil in a reservoir that can then be taken ashore for recycling as a valuable resource.

“Based on conservative estimates, we figure we could keep about 62,000 gallons of oil out of the environment every week if everyone used a Bilge Oil Collector,” says Elliott. “That’s more than 3 million a year, and that’s in North America alone!”