We have obtained the information on the captioned topic from our correspondent in USA, Murphy, Rogers, Sloss, Gambel & Tompkins as follows:

The California State Lands Commission (“Commission”) has recently adopted regulations to codify the Marine Invasive Species Act Enforcement and Hearing Process in order to decrease further the risk of transferring nonindigenous species from vessels into California state waters.  The regulations will be effective on 1 July 2017. 

The Marine Invasive Species Act requires vessels that arrive at California port, are 300 gross registered tons or more, and are carrying or capable of carrying ballast water, to submit a U.S. Coast Guard Ballast Water Management Report (“Report”) to the Commission.  Vessels are required to submit the Report at least 24 hours before the vessel arrives at that California port.  If the vessel’s voyage is less than 24 hours, the vessel must submit the Report prior to departing the port of departure. 

Attention should be paid to the fact that vessels moving from one California port to another are required to file a separate Report for each port arrival.

Please visit the following website for more details:

http://www.slc.ca.gov/Programs/MISP.html