Towns take on new federal maritime emission limits - KTOO News - 104.3

Posted - July 30, 2012 5:21 pm - by Ed Schoenfeld, CoastAlaska News - KTOO News

Some Alaska communities are pushing back against a new requirement that ships sailing within 200 miles of the coast burn cleaner fuel. They say the rule, which goes into effect Wednesday, Aug.1st, will hurt cruise traffic and increase shipping costs.

One community is Skagway, where tourism dominates the summer economy.
“It takes years to get a cruise line. And it takes a second to drive one away,” says Steve Hites, owner of the Skagway Streetcar Company and a member of the town’s Port Commission.

He’s telling Skagway’s assembly about new air-emission limits set by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. They cover ships in coastal Emission Control Areas, also called ECAs.

Hites says cleaner fuel is more expensive, and cruise lines will pass that on to customers.
“The cost of the ECA on a cruise ticket could be $150, or three times the cost of the Alaska head tax. We lost five big ships because of the head tax. By extrapolation, will we lose 15 ships?” he asks.



Complete Post at:
http://www.ktoonews.org/2012/07/30/towns-take-on-new-federal-maritime-emission-limits/

EPA: Marine diesel harmful to human health - JUNEAU EMPIRE.com

Posted - Monday, July 23, 2012 -By RUSSELL STIGALL -JUNEAU EMPIRE.com

A treaty between the U.S. and Canada requires certain ships to burn low-sulfur diesel fuel in a North American Emissions Control Area in Alaska beginning August 1 (goo.gl/ZH2Eo). The rule would eventually require cruise and shipping companies to use fuel with sulfur levels at 1,000 parts per million.
John Binkley president of the Alaska Cruise Association has said the cruise industry typically uses emissions controls and fuel with less sulfur than that which is currently required. A change to the new fuel, however, could cost the cruise industry millions of dollars per ship, Binkley said.
The Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Coast Guard are in charge of enforcement. The agency said it is flexible with those affected by the rule in meeting the ECA, according to the EPA in an email interview.
The rule will result in “slashing harmful particulate pollution that causes heart and asthma attacks in communities near ports and hundreds of miles inland," according to the EPA’s response.
Emissions from large marine diesel engines affect populations near ports and hundreds of miles inland, the EPA said. Fine particles, which can cause of asthma and heart attack, and smog-causing nitrogen oxide are two pollutants the EPA expects will increase over time if Control Areas are not enforced.
President George W. Bush signed the Maritime Pollution Protection Act of 2008 in July of that year. This cleared the way for ratification of the MARPOL Annex VI Treaty – the treaty that allows for Emissions Control Areas.
The EPA announced in March of 2009 its proposal to enforce a 230-mile emission control area along U.S. and Canada coastlines. The Agency submitted its proposal to the United Nations International Maritime Organization for approval. The EPA later introduced domestic rules as part of the Clean Air Act to mirror the international treaty rules governing emissions control areas. The International Maritime Organization approved the U.S./Canada ECA in March of 2010. It is scheduled to go into effect Aug. 1.
“At that time, the maximum sulfur content of fuel oil used by ships in the ECA will be limited to 10,000 ppm,” according to the EPA’s email. By 2015 this number drops to 1,000 ppm. Requirements for ships to use advanced emissions controls begin in 2016.
The State of Alaska has sued the EPA to prevent enforcement of the Emissions Control Area in Alaska. The EPA did not comment on the lawsuit.

Post to be found at:
http://m.juneauempire.com/local/2012-07-23/epa-marine-diesel-harmful-human-health

The Urgent Need to Reduce Nitrogen Oxide (NOx) Emissions from Ships Read more: http://www.marineinsight.com/tech/the-urgent-need-to-reduce-nitrogen-oxide-nox-emissions-from-ships - Marine Insight

Posted July 31, 2012 -  Marine Insight

The continuous rise of Nitrogen Oxide (NOx) in the atmosphere is a matter of great concern. Several factors have been stated as the reason for the increase of this element in the air and toxic emission from ships is one of them.


Nitrogen Oxide (NOx) is formed in the atmosphere when fuels such as oil, gas, and coal are burned at a very high temperature. The pollution caused because of NOx is supposed to be known as one of the most dangerous forms, which eventually contributes towards global warming.
Nitrogen Oxide and its effects on the Environment
A high-level of nitrogen oxide being released into the atmosphere can result in to:

• Ground Level Ozone
• Acid Deposition
• Particulate Matter
• Nitrification
• Eutrophication
• Indirect Effect to Global Warming

Significant contributors to this toxic oxide are factories, coal-burning plants and emissions from motor vehicles and marine diesel engines.

Studies show that shipping is the source of 18-30% of the world’s nitrogen oxides. Moreover, though several steps have been taken to reduce the emission of NOx from ships, there is still a long way to go to bring down emissions to zero or an acceptable level.

IMO’s MARPOL Annex VI
MARPOL (Marine Pollution) is one of International Maritime Organization (IMO)’s regulatory policies focuses on preventing different forms of marine pollution including oil, noxious liquid substances, harmful substances, waste water, garbage and emissions of sulphur oxides and nitrogen oxides at sea.
MARPOL Annex VI Regulation 13 sets out the mandatory limitations on NOx. The regulation affects not only ships from signatory states but also ships entering MARPOL signatory-member waters.
MARPOL Annex VI and ECAs
Apart from the mandatory NOx limitations for oceangoing vessels around waters of the member states, IMO also defines Emission Control Areas or ECAs where the MARPOL NOx emission standards will apply.
The ECAs includes:

• Baltic Sea (2006)
• North Sea (2007)
• Waters in North American coasts that include waters adjacent to the Pacific coast, the Atlantic/Gulf coast extending to 200 nautical miles from US coast (2010)
• Waters around Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands that are just recently designated by IMO (effective 2014)
• Norway, Japan and Mediterranean areas are being considered for future ECA proposal.

In the past few years, IMO has become stricter in implementing norms to reduce shipping emissions and to minimize the effects of marine pollution.
Is there a way to reduce NOx emission?
In the hope of complying with IMO’s global limits on nitrogen oxides and the enforcement of more stringent standards within the three Emission Controlled Areas marine diesel engine operators, ship owners and seafarers are left with no option but to find the best technology in reducing the amount of NOx from their ship’s exhaust systems and to take steps to make their ship “greener”.

Among the various emission control applications Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) System comes out to be the most efficient, effectively reducing ship’s NOx emission by 90-95%. By mixing a reagent (SCR 40 – 40% Marine Urea Solution) to the exhaust gas, nitrogen oxides are converted to Nitrogen (N₂), water and Carbon Dioxide (CO₂).  Global Marine Urea Solution Suppliers
Some marine SCR System providers offer the supply of urea solution with their application. A known SCR System provider in Japan is Hitachi Zosen while Miratech is from the United States. Both suppliers offer Marine SCR application that complies with Tier III NOx emission standards.
For marine urea solution requirements, there are growing urea markets in the US, China and recently in Singapore. Read here for more information regarding marine urea solutions in Singapore.

Post to be found at:

http://www.marineinsight.com/tech/the-urgent-need-to-reduce-nitrogen-oxide-nox-emissions-from-ships/

ICS Seeks Changes to Avoid BWTS “Chaos” - MarineLink.com

Posted - Monday, July 30, 2012, 8:19 AM - MarintLink.com

The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), which represents all sectors and trades and over 80% of the world merchant fleet, has called on the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to address some critical issues concerning the imminent implementation of the IMO Ballast Water Management (BWM) Convention. 
Despite delays by governments with respect to ratification, the 2004 BWM Convention, which is intended to prevent damage to local ecosystems by invasive species of marine micro-organisms carried in ships’ ballast water, is expected to enter into force within the next 2 years. 
ICS Director of Regulatory Affairs, David Tongue, explained: “Shipping companies represented by our member national associations have serious concerns about the availability of suitable ballast water treatment equipment, the robustness of the type approval process and, above all, the difficulties of retrofitting tens of thousands of existing ships within the time frame established by the BWM Convention.”
In a submission to the IMO Marine Environment Protection Committee, which meets in October, ICS has requested that the issue of fixed dates for the retrofitting of expensive new equipment by large numbers of ships, perhaps as many as 60,000, needs to be addressed urgently.  ICS believes that a serious discussion is needed at IMO before the Convention enters into force.
In particular, in view of the bottlenecks that will be created when the Convention enters in force, with many ships having to be retrofitted either before their next special survey or their next intermediate survey, ICS has proposed that the IMO should modify the BWM Convention’s requirements so that existing ships should not be required to be retrofitted with treatment equipment until their next full special survey.  In view of the pressures on shipyards that will need to fit the equipment, this would smooth out implementation over a 5 year timeline around the date of entry into force of the Convention, rather than 2 or 3 years as at present.  
Moreover, in order to make it possible for other ships to be retrofitted within the required timeline, ICS proposes that ships approaching their 4th special survey should be exempted from the equipment requirements.
Tongue added: “Given that the costs of fitting the treatment equipment may be in the order of 1 to 5 million dollars a ship, it does not make economic sense for older ships approaching the end of their lives to incur this huge expenditure.  However, the impact on the environment of exempting them would be negligible since these ships will still be required to perform deep water ballast exchange at sea for the 2 or 3 remaining years that most of them will continue to operate.”     
In the event that IMO does not accept the suggestion that ships should not be required to retrofit until their next 5 year renewal survey, ICS suggests that ships over 18 years old should be exempted from the equipment requirements.
In practice, changes to the BWM Convention cannot be adopted until after it enters into force, but given the importance of ensuring smooth implementation ICS sees no reason why IMO cannot agree provisional changes with respect to detailed implementation in advance.
In a separate submission to IMO, ICS has requested that IMO considers modifying its current draft guidelines for type approval of equipment, and for ballast water sampling and analysis that will be used by port state control, so that as far as possible they are comparable with those recently adopted by the United States. 
David Tongue saod: “A large proportion of the fleet will have to comply with the US requirements which cannot be changed.  For the sake of global uniformity we think it would be helpful if the relevant IMO Guidelines can be modified.”
A most important consideration, according to ICS, is that the US standards for type approval of equipment, under its Environmental Verification Program, are far more robust than the IMO equivalent.   Some of the equipment which has already been approved in line with original IMO standards has already had to be withdrawn because it has been demonstrated not to deliver the agreed IMO ‘kill standard’ for removing unwanted marine micro-organisms.    


Post to be found at:
http://www.marinelink.com/news/changes-seeks-avoid346612.aspx

World First in Maritime Industry: NYK Certified GHG Protocol up to 'Scope 3' Standard - NKY Line

Posted July 20, 2012 - NKY Line web page

NYK has received certification (assurance statement) from a third-party certifier that attests that NYK reports and discloses accurate numerical values regarding the data for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions collected from NYK Group companies, after having performed calculations that meet the framework of Scope 1, 2, and even 3 of the GHG Protocol¹ — the international standards for accounting and reporting GHG emissions. This is the first time in the maritime industry that data collection, calculation, and reporting in line with Scope 3 have been certified by a third-party certifier and received the certification.

 

LRQA Japan,² a third-party certifier, checked NYK's GHG data for compliance with ISO14064³ standards and the Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Accounting and Reporting Standard, and confirmed the credibility of the data. The GHG Protocol defines three scopes of GHG emissions: Scope 1 targeting direct GHG emissions from sources that are owned or controlled by a company; Scope 2 targeting indirect GHG emissions for consumption of purchased energy; and Scope 3⁴ targeting indirect GHG emissions generated through the total value (supply) chain from purchasing, transport, to disposal of materials and services required for the company’s business activities.

 

The NYK Group has been aware that the need to respond to Scope 3 as a trend for data certification will be globally expanded. Thus, NYK reviewed its business activities of maritime and air cargo transport from life cycle assessment (LCA)⁵ perspectives, and started monitoring and reducing CO₂ emissions from a wider framework, by positioning it as an NYK value chain where the group provides its services. Specifically, from this fiscal year, NYK is involved in activities to monitor and reduce CO₂ emissions generated not only at the time when vessels and air freighters are operated as transport means, but also at the time when vessels and air freighters are manufactured, as well as when ship and jet fuels are refined.

 

By 2015, NYK aims to reduce CO₂ emissions, the main GHG, generated from NYK’s operating vessels by 10 percent in basic units compared with 2010. NYK — including its group companies — is thus involved in the reduction of fuel usage in the operation of its vessels, air freighters, and land vehicles in daily business activities. Moreover, initiatives to reduce electricity consumption are proactively implemented at all NYK offices. In addition, targeting 69 companies in Japan and 114 overseas companies by using its proprietary systems, NYK collects and totals the monthly numerical values for fuel consumed during transport, as well as the electricity, gas, steam, and water used at each office—including waste materials. Using this data, NYK draws up charts of monthly trends and provides feedback to each company, thus enabling employees to understand trends.

 

Against a backdrop of a global trend for monitoring and calculating data on environmental loads in line with international standards, and to meet requests from customers and related groups/organizations, NYK will promote data monitoring and disclosure throughout the group, and reinforce the corporate stance to reduce its environmental load.

 

The NYK Group strives to pursue environmental conservation and preserve biodiversity to attain a sustainable society.

 

1 GHG Protocol

A globally used international guideline and standard for accounting and reporting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. GHG Protocol Initiatives, which have developed a methodology for the GHG Protocol, started in 1998 as cooperative activities by stakeholders including global companies, NPOs, and government organizations, centering on the World Resources Institute (WRI) — a U.S. think tank — and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) that comprises 170 companies around the world. The GHG Initiatives develop accounting and reporting methodologies for GHG emitted by organizations (companies), including those in consideration of a life cycle assessment (LCA).⁵

 

2 LRQA Japan

A Japanese subsidiary of Lloyd’s Register Quality Assurance (LRQA) that was established in the United Kingdom in 1985 by a 100 percent investment by Lloyd’s Register, and was certified as the first third-party certification organization in the country. LRQA Japan verifies environment management systems for the NYK Group’s 49 companies and 122 offices in Japan and overseas (as of June 2012), and issues certifications for ISO 14001 to individual companies and offices.

 

3 ISO14064

A comprehensive environmental standard published by the International Organization for Standardization, and a requirement to quantify mainly GHG emissions and absorptions

 

4 See the table below for details of NYK's compliance with Scope 1 to 3

	Remarks	Sample objects for calculation
Scope 1	Sources of manageable direct emissions GHG emissions through the company’s own activities at owned facilities, such as fuel usage	l         CO2 emissions from fuels (city gas, heavy oil, light oil, gasoline, etc.)
Scope 2	Sources of manageable indirect emissions Among GHG emissions by energy consumption, those generated by purchased electricity, heat (steam/hot and cold water)	l         CO2 emissions from power companies in electricity usage, and CO2 emissions by regional heat suppliers in the usage of steam, and hot and cold water
Scope 3	Indirect emissions through a company’s value chain apart from Scope 2 GHG emissions through the value chain, including purchasing raw materials and products required for business operations, and product transport and services to offer	l         CO2 emissions resulting from commuting and business trips by NYK employees; at the time of the manufacture of vessels and air freighters; and at the time of refining bunker and jet fuels l         CO2 emissions attributed to the production and transport of raw materials l         CO2 emissions attributed to additional product fabrication at the destination where products are delivered and sold. l         CO2 emissions in line with employees' commuting and business trips

 

5 Life Cycle Assessment

To clarify and access the environmental load in each stage from production ??usage (vessel operation) ?to disposal of materials and services provided

 

http://www.nyk.com/english/release/dbps_data/_material_/NYKCOM_ENGLISH/NYK_Assurance_statement_PC_dmz_mk_PC1.pdf

Post at::
http://www.nyk.com/english/release/1964/NE_120720_2.html

Hawaii Shippers Council: New Bunker Surcharge for Low Sulfur Fuel - Pacific News Center | Sorenson Media Group

Posted - Thursday, 26 July 2012 13:46 - Pacific News Center | Sorenson Media Grou

Honolulu, Hawaii - The Hawaii Shippers Council is advising that shipping lines are expected to adjust their bunker surcharges in coming weeks to account for the higher cost of low sulfur fuel that they are required to use in the "emission control area" (ECA) within 200 miles of the U.S. and Canada coasts.

The Coast Guard will begin enforcing a requirement that ships burn 1 percent sulfur fuel on Aug. 1.
Worldwide, ships can burn fuel with as much as 3.5 percent sulfur, though there is also an ECA off the coast in the Baltic and North Sea.
READ the news letter from the Hawaii Shippers Council below:
[The Hawaii Shippers Council (HSC) is a business league organization incorporated in 1997 to represent cargo interests – known as “shippers” – who tender goods for shipment in the Hawaii trade]
New Bunker Surcharge for Low Sulfur Fuel

Dear Friends,

Shippers get ready for a brand new bunker surcharge on ocean freight to cover the additional costs to be incurred by carriers switching to low sulfur ship fuels as required by an international convention, which the United States Senate has not ratified but is being imposed anyway by President Obama’s administration beginning on August 1, 2012.

The American Shipper Magazine reports that one of the world’s largest container shipping companies, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), has announced it will impose a low sulfur surcharge on all international shipments in and out of U.S. ports.  MSC’s new low sulfur bunker surcharge will be an additional $12 per 20-foot container and $24 per 40-foot container for cargo moving through Canadian and U.S. West Coast ports.

That’s probably a very good guide to the level of new bunker fuel charges that will inevitably be levied in the domestic Alaska, Guam and Hawaii trades by the Jones Act container carriers operating therein.

The American Shipper further reported that The International Chamber of Shipping has been “expressing concern for some time about whether sufficient fuel will be available to allow ships to comply with strict International Maritime Organization regulations aimed at reducing sulfur emissions and whether, as result of insufficient supply, the costs for those ships which are able to obtain the required fuels might be prohibitively expensive."

In response to imposition of this impending new requirement, the State of Alaska under the leadership of Governor Sean R. Parnell (R) sued the federal government in the person of Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton in federal district court on July 13, 2012, asserting that enforcement of the North American Emissions Control Area (ECA) lowering the allowed maximum sulfur content for bunker fuel from 3.5% to 1% within the 200 mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) limits is unconstitutional. (See North American ECA  http://www.epa.gov/nonroad/marine/ci/420f10015.htm )

The 1% sulfur requirement means that the shipowners will have to switch from lower cost and higher energy content residual intermediate fuel oils (IFO) to much higher cost distillate fuels – which are akin to diesel road fuel and called marine diesel oil (MDO) – for the typical modern motor ship.

The Alaska lawsuit alleges “low-sulfur fuel is more expensive, and more difficult to obtain, than the fuel currently used by many marine vessels operating in the waters off the coast of Alaska . . . . . requiring the use of low-sulfur fuel in the ECA will greatly increase operating costs for vessels that supply Alaska’s residents with basic necessities, and for cruise ships that facilitate Alaska’s tourism industry. Enforcement of the ECA will therefore have an immediate and adverse effect on Alaska’s citizens and economy.”

Alaska further claims “the extension of the ECA to Alaska was unlawful because two-thirds of the U.S. Senate did not consent to that extension as required by the U.S. Constitution. Under the Constitution’s Treaty Clause, a treaty cannot bind the U.S., and is not enforceable as domestic law, unless two-thirds of the Senate give advice and consent to the treaty.”

The treaty in question is Annex Vi of the International Convention to Prevent Pollution by Ships (MARPOL) which is administered by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), a specialist agency of the United Nations based in London, U.K.   The Protocol of 1997 (MARPOL Annex VI) was adopted in 1997 and entered into force on May 19, 2005. (See http://www.imo.org/ourwork/environment/pollutionprevention/airpollution/pages/the-protocol-of-1997-(marpol-annex-vi).aspx)

U.S. implementation of MARPOL Annex VI is through the U.S. Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships, 33 U.S.C. §§ 1901 et seq.  The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) of June 27, 2011 will jointly enforce U.S. and international air pollution requirements for vessels operating in U.S. waters.  These requirements establish limits on nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions and require the use of fuel with lower sulfur content with the most stringent requirements applying to ships operating within 200 nautical miles of the coast of North America.  (See http://www.epa.gov/oecaerth/civil/caa/annexvi-mou.html )

Former USCG Captain and maritime attorney Dennis L. Bryant in his Bryant’s Maritime Consulting blog wrote on July 17, 2012,  “the MARPOL Convention (as approved by a two-thirds majority of the Senate) includes a tacit or presumptive consent provision whereby amendments to Annexes to the Convention are presumed to be approved by the party states unless a party state affirmatively objects. For example, the United States affirmatively objected to Regulations 13F and 13G of MARPOL Annex I (relating to alternatives to double hulls on oil tankers) when those regulations were proposed. Therefore, those regulations did not come into force for the United States. It would appear that the constitutionality claim in the Alaska complaint will fail based on tacit consent.” ( See http://brymar-consulting.com/?p=22884 )

That is because the Obama Administration chose not to submit MARPOL Annex VI to  the U.S. Senate for ratification, the governing treaty provisions presume that without a Senate vote that actually defeats the new Protocol of 1997, it becomes effective under U.S. law.

Given Hawaii’s tradewind climate in the middle of the Pacific Ocean it’s not clear that the new low sulfur fuel requirements for ships will benefit the Islands’ environment any more than Alaskans think it will theirs, so perhaps a new U.S. administration would chose to submit MARPOL Annex VI to the U.S. Senate for ratification, and that future Senate would see fit to reject it.

Best regards.

Michael N. Hansen
President
Hawaii Shippers Council
 
Post at:
http://www.pacificnewscenter.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=25804:hawaii-shippers-council-new-bunker-surcharge-for-low-sulfur-fuel&catid=45:guam-news&Itemid=156

Shipping Urges Global Approach To Taxing Carbon - Tax-News.com

Posted - 26 July 2012 - by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-News.com, Brussels

The Chairman of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), the international trade association which represents 80% of the world merchant fleet, has reiterated in a letter to the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that any tax on shipping emissions must be imposed by all nations, and should be agreed through the International Maritime Organization (IMO) at a level commensurate to the industry's contribution to global emissions.
In a letter to IMF Managing Director, Christine Lagarde, which was recently made public, ICS Chairman, Masamichi Mooroka, warned against new market-based carbon reduction measures for the shipping industry while economic conditions are depressed, and while a method to apply a fiscal mechanism on emissions has yet to be agreed.
"The position of the ICS and its member national shipowners’ associations is that if all governments so decide then shipowners, in principle, will have no objection to contributing, at some point in the future, to the Green Climate Fund, or a similar mechanism that might be established by IMO, provided that such money is indeed used for climate change adaptation or mitigation, and that the same charges apply to all ships internationally regardless of flag," Mooroka wrote.
However, he underscored that, "market-based measures are very controversial and most shipowners believe, given the severely depressed state of global shipping markets, that now is certainly not the time to impose an additional major cost on international shipping".
"Any contribution by shipping must be proportionate to shipping's share of total global emissions (less than 3%) and the forum where the details of such a mechanism should be developed is the IMO," he asserted.
The letter responds to comments made by Lagarde in a recent speech which touched on the challenges of meeting climate change targets. In her speech, she called for nations to speed efforts towards the introduction of a fiscal mechanism to apply a price to the environmental damage that their industries cause.
Lagarde suggested the shipping and aviation industries could raise about a quarter of the USD100bn needed to meet climate change mitigation objectives in developing nations by 2020 - resources that developed countries have committed to mobilize under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Green Climate Fund.
She noted however, that countries which have adopted carbon pricing mechanisms are "only at 'base camp' in terms of getting the prices right. Right now, less than 10% of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions are covered by formal pricing programs," she said.
However, Mooroka warned that if changes were introduced as an extension of the Kyoto Protocol it would likely create significant distortions to competition between nations included in Annex I of the Kyoto Protocol (those that have committed to reduce output of polluting gases), and non-Annex I nations (mainly developing nations that have not agreed a legally-binding commitment).
"If any carbon changes were only to apply to ships registered in Kyoto Protocol nations, these ships would be at a major competitive disadvantage to ships registered in Annex I nations. Because of the serious market distortion that would be created, many of these ships would simply change their flag to a jurisdiction where the carbon charge did not apply," Mooroka's letter states.
"For any carbon charges to be acceptable to the international maritime community, it is important to understand that the IMO principle of uniform global rules for shipping will have to be reconciled with the UNFCCC principle of Common but Differentiated Responsibility. This is why the negotiations with respect to shipping that are taking place at IMO and at UNFCCC are so complicated," he adds.
Concluding, Mooroka wrote: "I wish to stress that the shipping industry is committed to playing its part in further reducing its CO2 emissions. We fully support the IMO agreement on technical measures which will help shipping achieve its goal of significantly reducing emissions. We are also participating constructively in the international negotiations about a possible market-based measure that might apply to international shipping. However, it is vital for all concerned to recognize the global character of the shipping industry which transports about 90% of world trade. The application of any carbon charges to shipping, without causing serious market distortion or impeding the smooth flow of world trade, is a very complex matter."


Post to be found at:
http://www.tax-news.com/news/Shipping_Urges_Global_Approach_To_Taxing_Carbon____56487.html