Shipping Left Out in Climate Pact, Industry Deals with It

Shipping was not specifically mentioned in the landmark Paris climate agreement reached among 195 nations in December, but the industry still has a role to play in the reduction of CO2 emissions worldwide.

While the agreement does not specifically cite international shipping, the International Chamber of Shipping said the global transport trade agencies will continue to implement its own emissions-reduction plans.

“It is more of a presentational thing, really,” Simon Bennett, director policy and external relations for the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), told EBN. “The absence of shipping in the agreement is unfortunate for those who are not aware of what has already been agreed upon and the work the industry has been doing. They might perceive that somehow shipping has been left out of the process, which is not the case.”

Regardless of the omission in the pact, the ICS said the shipping industry will continue to implement measures to reduce CO2 per [metric] ton-km by at least 50% before 2050 compared to 2007 across the entire world merchant fleet.

“Ideally, there might have been a reiteration of the International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) role in shipping, but for fiscal reasons and the high-level priorities of the conference, it wasn’t possible to include that reference,” Bennett told EBN. ‘But that omission does not represent any problem because the work of the IMO will continue as it is required in the existing protocol.” [...]


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