This week we have been able to invest in a large Oil drum! Exciting…definitely!
Do you know how often oil gets changed in outboard motors? Out boat goes out nearly every day of the year, so that is a lot of work for our engines, which we like to keep in top notch condition because they are very expensive!
That means that we change the oil in the engines every 2 weeks, that is 2 gallons of oil in per engine and 2 gallons of old oil out.
In Galapagos there is a pretty strict control about where the old oil goes. We send ours to San Cristobal island where there is a company there who collects used oils and transports it to the mainland Ecuador. This company must have permission from the National Park, and they in turn give us certificates demonstrating that we dispose of our used oil correctly. I honestly couldn’t tell you what happens to the oil once it reaches the mainland Ecuador, that is something we need to follow up on.
The exciting news of our large oil drum though, is that instead of buying 4 x 1 gallon plastic oil containers every 2 weeks .. that add ups to approx 100 containers every year, we now don’t use any!
We do have 2 larger plastic containers that are filled with old oil and are sent to San Cristobal, but they are reusable containers and are sent back to us.
I don’t exactly know how many boats there are in Galapagos that cater to tourism and fishing, but I do know there are hundreds and that means there are thousands of plastic oil containers being used every year.
So if you take other tours in Galapagos, ask your guides and captains how the boat you are on disposes of it’s used oil and even how it disposes of the toilet waste, does it have a treatment plant that is required by the National park?