Brussels, 21/03/2000 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday, the European Commission adopted its communication on the maritime safety of oil tankers to be presented to the Transport Council on 28 March. As EUROPE expected, the Commission proposes: i) stepping up controls of vessels visiting Community ports, ii) tightening the selection criteria of classification societies, responsible for checking vessels for Member States, iii) banning single hull tankers according to the same timetable as the United States (from 2005, 2010, or 2015, according to tonnage).
Later, the Commission will present another package of measures on, among other things, the creation of a European body for maritime safety and on an additional system for compensation in case of shipping accidents (for the details, see EUROPE of 25 February, p.14 and 3 March, p.11).
Presently, almost 90% of EU oil imports come via shipping. The average age of the oil tanker fleet registered in the EU was 19 in 1999 and over 45% of the European fleet is over 20 years of age. Thus, it seems that the Greek and Norwegian shipowners are the most hostile to the Commission's proposal regarding the elimination of single hull tankers. Greek shipowners remark that these tankers represent 68% of the world's fleet. The Commission does, however, seem to have received assurances from European shipyards that there will be sufficient production capacity to respond to the demand for double-hulled oil tankers. The Commissioner for transport, Loyola de Palacio says that it is "a unique opportunity to take ambitious and clear decisions to avoid disasters like that of Erika in the near future".