A letter in response to the articles in Lloyds List
SIR, I have recently, with interest and perhaps some surprise, read a number of articles in your newspaper discussing the stance (or absence thereof) of various shipping organisations when it comes to market based measures (MBM)as a climate policy option in the International Maritime Organization.
Surprise of course, because BIMCO went public even before the COP15 meeting in Copenhagen in 2009 expressing a preference for the levy/compensation fund as opposed to an emissions trading system, as this best conformed to the nine IMO principles at that time.
We have since then had many more MBM proposals on the table and the IMO Group of Experts assessing their individual aspects. The task at hand is thus to reduce the number of options towards a final IMO MBM for shipping.
Notwithstanding this, BIMCO has felt that it was more important to focus on the energy efficiency design index (EEDI) discussions within IMO, before re-addressing or expressing preferences for any particular MBM. Without a technical measuring formula, it is not possible to document improvement in energy efficiency of ships.
The EEDI is one such formula, which eliminates undue influence from the commercial operation of ships, appropriately developed under the auspices of IMO, as the only organisation with sufficient technical capability to establish a regulatory instrument for carbon dioxide emissions for shipping.
BIMCO supports a transparent, predictable and enforceable regulatory instrument with global application that drives energy efficient solutions.
In the absence of better initiatives BIMCO supports the EEDI as a reasonable proxy for a ship’s energy efficiency, although it is recognised that, with the current formulation, there may be issues with ship types designed specifically to cater for particular transport needs. The EEDI appears to be the obtainable compromise that can maintain IMO as the authority regulating international shipping, and thus BIMCO is advocating for, and supporting, its early adoption by the IMO.
When this is done we will again focus our efforts on the MBM debate, but let this not stir up an untimely debate on MBMs and distract focus from the MEPC adoption of the EEDI.
Lars Robert Pedersen
The letter is in response to the articles in Lloyds List.
This article appeared in Lloyd’s List on 27 June 2011.For more information visit www.lloydslist.com