The chief of the UN body overseeing world shipping says he’ll fight during 2010 to secure oversight of maritime emissions regulation for his agency, and to ensure a level playing field across rich and poor countries alike in any global regime that emerges. Efthimios Mitropoulos, head of the UN’s International Maritime Organisation (IMO), said in an interview with Bloomberg, these would be his main priorities this year in the lead up to the next UN climate conference in Mexico.
Mitropolous also said a carbon price on maritime emissions still won’t be considered by the IMO for another year but that, nevertheless, key operational and technology measures could slash carbon emissions in the world’s fleet by 20 per cent as early as 2012.
The UN climate convention (
UNFCCC) conference in Copenhagen in December failed to agree an approach for shipping emissions abatement, or which body might assume responsibility for its oversight. A market-based scheme to price emissions, either an emissions trading scheme or a carbon tax on
bunker fuels, is the direction the UNFCCC has been leaning. There has been speculation since Copenhagen over whether the IMO might step up its efforts to develop a market-based scheme of its own to help force the issue of oversight in its favour. But Mitropolous now appears to have reconfirmed the IMO's position of last July to pursue efficiency measures first and not consider market measures before 2011 – effectively putting carbon pricing off for several years.
Under Kyoto Protocol principles that underpin UNFCCC approaches to greenhouse regulation, and which currently cover shipping, any measures must differentiate between developed and developing countries to reflect their economic circumstances. Four out of five ships sail under the flags of developing nations.
Differing rules for rich and poor nations would cause serious distortions in the industry, encourage ship owners to move their ships to a flag of least environmental cost and undermine the emissions reduction regime, Mitropoulos said. “I consider that it would create a very, very dangerous precedent if we were to move away from the level playing field,” he told Bloomberg. “It would introduce double standards on an industry that has to be regulated on an equal basis all over the world.”
The two key energy efficiency measures the IMO is looking to for early emissions reductions are cuts to the cruising speed of ships from 25 knots to 20 knots or less - so-called slow steaming - and using new, more efficient hull designs in new vessels. The IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) meets in London in three weeks to review the results of a voluntary trial of such measures - and consider whether to make them compulsory across the shipping fleets of 169 nations. But further consultation and approval would have to sought and the new standards would not come into effect before 2012, Mitropolous said.
The European Union is watching IMO and UNFCCC developments closely and weighing its options for introducing a carbon pricing scheme on European port movements, a decision that would effectively draw in much of the global fleet.
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