The Board of Directors of BIMCO has approved the organisation’s updated greenhouse gas (GHG) position statement, saying that new commercial solutions and shared responsibilities between charterers and shipowners will be required.
An important issue is the allocation of the responsibility for carbon pricing. BIMCO makes it clear that the commercial party responsible for setting the speed and route of a ship should also provide for emissions allowances or credits under a market-based measure (MBM). “We believe that in the case of a time charterparty, this responsibility should lie with the charterer, and under a voyage charterparty, it should be with the party that commits the ship to the voyage charter,” says David Loosley, BIMCO Secretary General & CEO.
BIMCO supports the Initial Strategy of the IMO, and its vision and objectives, but believes more ambition is needed. Therefore it supports the objective of net zero carbon for shipping by 2050.
BIMCO also believes a global market-based measure (MBM) putting a price on carbon is an essential part of the solution to incentivise investment in and operation of low-carbon emitting ships. The MBM should be established and administered by the IMO and it would be advantageous if it features predictability and stability with regard to carbon price, thus lending itself suitable to be incorporated in commercial contracts.
The IMO decided at MEPC 57 to adopt nine fundamental principles that a future MBM should have. BIMCO agrees it should be:
1. effective in contributing to the reduction of total global greenhouse gas emissions
2. binding and equally applicable to all flag States in order to avoid evasion
3. cost-effective
4. able to limit, or at least, effectively minimize competitive distortion
5. based on sustainable environmental development without penalizing global trade and growth
6. based on a goal-based approach and not prescribe specific methods
7. supportive of promoting and facilitating technical innovation and R&D in the entire shipping sector
8. accommodating to leading technologies in the field of energy efficiency
9. practical, transparent, fraud-free, and easy to administer.
BIMCO warns that premature retirement of ships could result from retroactive application of unsustainable additional mandatory technical measures. This could result in unwarranted removal of needed capacity from the global supply chains and unnecessary additional emissions from building new ships.
