2010 outlook: Shipping and carbon emissions - Carbonpositive

Posted - Friday, 8 January 2010 - Carbonpositive

While disappointment over the lack of direction from the UN climate conference on reducing carbon emissions in the maritime sector was the post script to a horror year for shipping in 2009, Copenhagen’s failure does at least renew the opportunity for the world’s supreme maritime body to plot its own course on greenhouse action.

The emissions challenge comes on top of a host of pressures on the shipping sector. The financial crisis and the world recession left the industry with low freight rates and a great excess of capacity going into 2009 - with a not-insignificant volume of new buildings on slipways around the world threatening to worsen the situation. While 2009 ended better than it started, no one appears to be predicting anything more than a modest recovery in the world economy and the shipping sector in 2010, but there is confidence that at least the worst is passed....

http://www.carbonpositive.net/viewarticle.aspx?articleID=1798