Shipping Climate goals at risk as IMO fails to take improved energy efficiency seriously

Spain, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, and Japan must steer clear of slowing process

As this week’s International Maritime Organization’s Marine Environment Protection Committee meeting (IMO, MEPC 82) comes to a close, the Clean Shipping Coalition urged the national delegations of countries that support ambitious climate action to properly resource and pick up the pace of negotiations to ensure that shipping’s climate pollution peaks and reduces in line with the IMO’s 2023 GHG strategy, thus curbing the sector’s contribution to the worst impacts of climate breakdown.

“The Clean Shipping Coalition is particularly concerned that the revision of the IMO’s Carbon Intensity Indicator (CII) ship efficiency standards, which commenced at this meeting, has not been allocated the resources it requires to succeed”, Clean Shipping Coalition President Delaine McCullough. “While we saw encouraging signs of a rapidly growing number of IMO member states coming together around the universal GHG emission levy, including efforts by states to combine several options into one, there is a disturbing lack of progress on making the hard choices”.

“Nowhere is this more problematic than the lack of urgency we are seeing around strengthening the energy efficiency measure”, continued McCullough“To be clear: failure to maximise the efficiency of the sector immediately will put the goal of cutting emissions by 30% by 2030 completely in serious jeopardy.”

“Wrangling over the negotiating time, with some delegations supporting one strand of the talks poaching meeting time off the other is no way to conduct this work. The levy, fuel standard and efficiency measures are equally important and need to be treated as such by negotiators and the IMO”, added McCullough. “The governments of Spain, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Japan and others must ensure that their delegations do not continue to hinder progress.”

Along with last week’s Intersessional Working Group on Reduction of GHG Emissions from Ships (IMO, ISWG-GHG-17), this was the first occasion with all three critical elements of the IMO's implementation of its GHG Strategy - the Carbon Intensity Indicator (CII) revision, Global Fuel Standard (GFS) and a greenhouse gas (GHG) levy on the table at the same moment.

Biodiversity
This week the IMO also endorsed the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF). The GBF is a landmark agreement that was adopted in December 2022 to reverse biodiversity loss.

“During MEPC 82, NGOs expressed gratitude to the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity for attending this week's meeting to speak to the importance of more concretely linking the work of the GBF with the work of the IMO and this committee”, said Andrew Dumbrille, Equal Routes. “Much of what the CBD secretariat emphasised would be well served by our proposal for a high level task force which would elevate biodiversity and pollution concerns to the same level of urgency as climate actions. A co-benefits solution space is needed at the IMO to make urgent progress on addressing the triple planetary crisis, and shipping at the nexus of climate, pollution and biodiversity.”

Global Fuel Standard
“There is a real danger that the Global Fuel Standard measures under negotiation during MEPC 82 will incentivize bad biofuels linked to deforestation and food security, instead of promoting alternatives based on green hydrogen”, said Constance Dijkstra, IMO Policy Manager at Transport & Environment.

The next steps will be crucial to decide by how much ships will have to reduce their fuel GHG emissions, whether those reduction targets should be based on a Well-to-Wake basis, and ultimately which fuels we give a chance to and which ones the shipping industry should simply stop using.”

Greenhouse Gas Levy
“It is encouraging to see that a greenhouse gas levy for international shipping has gained traction again during MEPC 82, however, while delegations work together on proposals, the course of climate ambition should not be compromised”, said Bastien Bonnet-Catalloube, Expert on decarbonisation of aviation and shipping, Carbon Market Watch. “Likewise, if additional analyses can complement the Comprehensive Impact Assessment, its findings should not be watered down. While reducing ship speed can reduce emissions, slow rule-making processes at the IMO will only increase them. Countries must hurry to find an ambitious compromise and adopt a high levy to ensure the polluter-pays principle is applied, the cost gap between polluting and green fuels is bridged and sufficient revenues are raised for a just and equitable transition.”

“Countries at the IMO are moving way too slowly to make decisions on the crucial details of the policy measures needed to meet the emission cuts committed to in the 2023 greenhouse gas strategy”, said Sandra Chiri, International Outreach Manager, Shipping Emissions, Ocean Conservancy. “One of the most important—and contentious—points the member states debated this week was how and to whom to allocate the revenues from a carbon price to accelerate shipping's energy transition. These details really matter. If they get this wrong, the transition to zero-emission shipping will not be fair and equitable for all. Time is of the essence to meet greenhouse gas reduction goals. We urge countries to step up their collaborative work to make progress.”

"With just six months left until the next deadline, the time to act is now if the shipping industry is to meet the IMO decarbonisation targets”, said Anaïs Rios, Shipping Policy Officer, Seas At Risk. “And it's a no-brainer - The right tools already exist: An ambitious levy, combined with efforts to reduce energy use through technologies such as wind, and a global fuel standard. This three-step approach not only offers the most cost-effective path to zero-emissions but also ensures that everyone benefits from the transition - cutting shipping greenhouse gas emissions whilst making sure that no country is left behind. So, what are we waiting for?"

Black Carbon
“With the IMO finally looking set to regulate black carbon emissions from black carbon, which will greatly lower the impact of the shipping sector on Arctic sea and glaciers - member states must now agree on which fuels are appropriate for use in the Arctic, so that robust rules can be put in place”, said Dr Sian Prior, Lead Advisor to the Clean Arctic Alliance. “Many countries made clear their increased and wide-spread support for the regulation of black carbon emissions during MEPC 82, however their challenge now is to agree how best to ban the use of unsuitable highly polluting fuels, e.g. residual fuels currently being used in the Arctic which produce high levels of black carbon - especially as global shipping seeks to decarbonise - and draft an IMO regulation for adoption”, she added.

Emission Control Areas
“We welcome the approval of two new Emission Control Areas (ECAs) in the Canadian Arctic and Norwegian Sea”, said Sönke Diesener, shipping expert at NABU. “Targeting Nitrogen Oxides, Sulphur Oxides and Particulate Matter, these ECAs will be vital in reducing air pollution and protecting public health, the environment and climate. Furthermore, we want to congratulate Portugal for presenting the assessment of establishing another ECA in the North Atlantic and for their commitment to preparing a proposal until the next meeting of the IMO’s Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC 83). It’s good to see progress being made and we call on the IMO and governments to protect even more areas in the future.”

Scrubbers
Scientists recently announced that we have passed the planetary boundary for ocean acidification and the Arctic is acidifying faster than the global ocean, yet all discussion was yet again postponed, with further consideration of the use of scrubbers and regulation of discharge water from scrubbers now tabled for 2025. The consequence is that worldwide, around 5000 ships will continue pumping over ten gigatons of acidic and toxic scrubber water into the ocean, including into protected areas and critical wildlife habitats.

“The IMO’s lack of action on scrubbers is frustrating - fortunately some governments and ports have recently taken action to ban the discharge of scrubber waste in their coastal and port waters, including most recently Sweden and Denmark”, said Eelco Leemans, Clean Arctic Alliance Technical Advisor. “But we need action to ban the dumping of scrubber waste in important wildlife habitats and marine protected areas, and a total ban on the use of scrubbers in the Arctic.”

Underwater Noise
“We welcome the support from many member states to prioritise the implementation of the revised guidelines for reducing underwater radiated noise from ships”, said Sarah Bobbe, Senior Manager, Arctic Program, Ocean Conservancy. “Support for the three year experience-building phase and action plan from industry and member states signals that necessary steps will be taken to effectively reduce underwater radiated noise from ships.”

Plastics
​​“We are pleased to see the commitment to tackling plastic pellet pollution from ships. However, it is essential that all review of the Action Plan to address marine plastic litter from ships not only check off activities but also ensure meaningful reductions in plastic entering our oceans. The continued release of plastic from ships is causing serious and lasting harm, and years of delays in the review process, including at MEPC-82, are deeply frustrating. Urgent action is needed, including mandatory measures, robust enforcement and shared responsibility, to prevent further plastic pollution and protect the marine environment,” said Amy Youngman, Legal and Policy Specialist, Environmental Investigation Agency.

Shipbreaking
The IMO was alerted to the many dangers posed by the dismantling and recycling of the global fleet, and why the Hong Kong Convention, which will enter into force in June 2025, does not provide the necessary protections. Addressing the MEPC, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Toxics stressed the need to ban the scrapping of ships on tidal mudflats and direct accountability for environmentally sound ship recycling to the States that control shipping companies.

“We urge the international community, and especially UNEP and ILO, to ensure that ship recycling is conducted in line with existing environmental and labour rights protections”, said Ingvild Jenssen, Director of the NGO Shipbreaking Platform.

“Ships are toxic waste, and simply dumping the many hazardous materials that are embedded within their structure, their paints, and their tanks onto developing countries, as the Hong Kong Convention would allow, is unacceptable.”