The European Commission transmitted to the EU Member States, on Thursday 2 September, a document aimed at establishing EU positions on the agenda items of the ninth session of the Intersessional Working Group on reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from ships established by the International Maritime Organization (IMO).
The aim is to facilitate coordination between the Member States and the Commission in the run-up to the ninth session, which is due to take place from 15 to 17 September.
Obtained by EUROPE, the document proposes that Member States support the introduction of life-cycle guidelines for estimating GHG emissions from new ships. These would be based on internationally recognised life cycle assessment methodologies for the evaluation of fuels, the Commission says.
According to the EU position defended by the institution, these guidelines would be based on sustainability and GHG emission reduction criteria in order to encourage the adoption of sustainable alternative fuels at the global level.
The Commission also wants the EU to oppose the proposal made by Australia, Japan, Norway and the International Chamber of Shipping (see the proposal: https://bit.ly/38DiAYr ). This proposal envisages structuring the calculation of emissions in two parts: upstream, ‘Well-to-Tank’ (WTT) - including emissions from extraction, production, conversion, transport, distribution, etc. - and downstream, ‘Tank-to-Wheel’ (TTW) - corresponding to the stage of use of fuel in the ship.
However, the Commission points out that “their estimation of the upstream GHG emissions should be opposed, as it is not built on a solid scientifically and technically based ground, deviating from internationally accepted methodologies to evaluate the life cycle of emissions”.
As a reminder, the current IMO strategy on shipping emissions sets two intermediate targets: (1) reduce CO2 emissions per transport activity by at least 40% by 2030 with a view to achieving a 70% reduction by 2050, compared to 2008; (2) reduce total annual GHG emissions by at least 50% in 2050 compared to 2008.
In order to achieve these objectives, IMO Member States were invited to submit concrete proposals to its ‘Marine Environment Protection Committee’ (MEPC).
On 17 November 2020, the EU Council approved new regulations aimed at reducing emissions from ships (see EUROPE 12605/32). These measures were finally adopted in June 2021, but environmental NGOs consider them nevertheless to be insufficient (see EUROPE 12589/20).
See the Commission document: https://bit.ly/2YqhVIb (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)