A shipping industry under “environmental siege” might appear to some people to be something of an overstatement. Nevertheless, it is worth pointing out that our industry is not one that is careless with its operating environment, but one which has consistently and persistently improved its environmental credentials year on year. Working closely with its international regulator in the International Maritime Organization (IMO), bringing to this body the accumulated operating experience of every kind of ship, BIMCO does its level best to ensure that environmental regulations are practical, affordable and necessary.
It is thus significant that “environment” is to be the theme of the incoming President of BIMCO Mr. John Denholm. Itemising the various challenges faced by the industry today, Mr. Denholm points to the significant costs within this area, which are being loaded onto a shipping industry which at present is in no position to afford them.
It is the practicalities implied by all these environmental pressures which BIMCO, as always, emphasises, and where practical knowledge and experience of ship operation can make a difference. The organisation deals in realities rather than hopes and it is very necessary, points out Mr. Denholm, to confront the possibility that there may be no great and exciting breakthrough in scrubber technology in the near future, that the availability of clean distillate fuels may be problematical and that it will be some years before an LNG fuelling infrastructure is available for deep sea vessels.
Thus BIMCO needs to bring these realities to the regulators and to point out the need for more realism in the implementation dates for sulphur limitation. Similarly, it will be BIMCO that will be taking to IMO the realities of the Ballast Water Convention, and while there is recent movement in the timelines that give some encouragement, there is still risk that owners will be spending substantial sums on ballast systems which fail to meet approval in some parts of the world. Whatever is done has to be “workable” and to work globally rather than nationally or regionally. BIMCO, points out its President, “always looks for practical solutions” and has a reputation for discovering them, through compromise and focus.
The shipping industry, not least because of its drive towards fuel-saving and efficiency, has done and is still doing, a great deal to reduce carbon emissions. The industry, of course, works with what it believes to be technically and practically feasible. The global warming lobby, by contrast, often operates to a political agenda where the practical consequences of its actions often seem to be regarded as inconsequential and immaterial in the great scheme of things. The reduction of carbon emissions from shipping is thus seen as a target by environmental interests and little else about the means to achieve this, is regarded as important.
So it is perhaps very understandable that Mr. Denholm has chosen such a theme for the forthcoming years of his presidency. BIMCO, as he points out, can make a difference.
Source: BIMCO