Shipping industry flags support for carbon trading scheme

Not to be outdone by this week's commitment from the aviation industry to halve emissions by 2050, several leading shipping industry bodies have confirmed they too would support efforts to cut emissions through a global cap-and-trade scheme, although they stopped short of setting specific targets.

The UK Chamber of Shipping yesterday joined with its sister organisations in Australia, Belgium, Norway and Sweden to propose a global emissions cap-and-trade scheme specifically for the sector.

The groups released a discussion paper arguing that a sectoral scheme, which would cost the industry up to €6bn a year based on the current price of carbon, would prove more effective and easier to enforce than integrating shipping firms into existing cap-and-trade mechanisms, such as the EU's emissions trading scheme (ETS).

The shipping industry has long maintained that including it in regional schemes such as the ETS would prove ineffective as shipping companies could simply relocate to countries operating outside such schemes.

UK Chamber of Shipping president Jesper Kjaedegaard warned that without an effective global scheme, overall emissions would continue to rise as businesses find ways to avoid paying for carbon allowances.

"It is important that any solution is global and developed through the UN’s specialist maritime agency – the International Maritime Organization," he said. "It is also vital that any emissions trading regime is implemented without driving goods to other modes of transport, which would increase overall emissions and damage commercial shipping."

However, he added that with shipping responsible for about three per cent of global CO2 emissions, that sector had a responsibility to cut its carbon footprint. "We believe some form of emissions trading system is the way to do it," he said.

The proposals will now be presented at today's meeting of the UN's International Maritime Organisation as it prepares to make its recommendations on how the industry should be included in the international climate change treaty that is expected to be finalised at the UN's forthcoming summit in Copenhagen.

The paper argues that a sectoral cap-and-trade scheme would provide shipping operators with a clear incentive to invest in more efficient technologies and optimise voyage planning to cut emissions.

However, it stops short of recommending emissions targets, leaving the key issue of where the emissions caps should be set to the IMO.

"We would welcome a challenging target. But we are looking to the UN's International Maritime Organisation or the UNFCCC [UN Framework Convention on Climate Change] to set that," Kjaedegaard told the Guardian, adding that the dispersed nature of the shipping industry meant that, unlike the aviation industry, it faced considerable challenges collecting carbon data and agreeing on industry-wide targets.