US President Trump’s administration says it is ’considering’ further port fees, sanctions, investigations, visa restrictions on crews and other ’penalties’ for ’nations in favour’ of International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) net-zero framework (NZF)
A joint statement from US President Donald Trump’s appointees, the US Secretaries of State, Energy and Transportation, is again threatening countries with reprisals for supporting the passage of a global framework to bring greenhouse gas emissions from shipping to net zero around 2050.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, and Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy have put their names to a second joint letter containing threats against nations – the first letter came out in mid-August – which ’vote’ in support of adopting the United Nations-based IMO’s framework that aims to reduce air pollution from shipping over the next 25 years.
While it remains uncertain whether IMO member states will vote or simply adopt the Net Zero Framework on shipping emissions at the extraordinary session of the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) in London, the US’ stated “unequivocal rejection” of the proposal makes it morelikely that a vote on the measures the framework contains will take place.
The US administration’s letter said US President Trump “has made it clear that the United States will not accept any international environmental agreement that unduly or unfairly burdens the United States or harms the interests of the American people”.
In reality, US President Trump has routinely removed the US from international agreements, including twice withdrawing the US from a foundational United Nations climate change framework plan, the Paris Agreement, sought to discredit the United Nations and expressed overt denials of climate change and its impacts on people and the planet. US President Joe Biden, who served between Trump’s two presidential terms, oversaw immediately rejoining the US to the Paris Agreement, an action that US presidents who follow Donald Trump could mirror.
Among the actions the latest letter from the Trump administration is claiming to be ’considering’ as reprisal “against nations that support this global carbon tax on American consumers” are: investigations and potential regulations against “certain flagged countries”; blocking vessels registered in those countries from US ports, visa restrictions and fees /or revisions of quotas for /D maritime crew member visas; “commercial penalties” tied to US government contracts including shipbuilding contracts, liquefied natural gas terminals and infrastructure, or “financial penalties” on ships flagged under nations in favor of the NZF including additional port fees on ships owned, operated, or flagged by countries supporting the framework; and “sanctions on officials sponsoring activist-driven climate policies that would burden American consumers”.
The US finished its letter by calling the IMO’s climate framework a “European-led neocolonial export of global climate regulations”.
“We will fight hard to protect our economic interests by imposing costs on countries if they support the NZF.
Our fellow IMO members should be on notice,” the US letter closed.
During the course of President Trump’s second term, the US has been pushing hard to renegotiate what it sees as unfair or imbalanced costs of trading with most of its international trade partners. The country has levied or threatened dozens of independent or grouped tariffs against its trading parters and has targeted China in particular. In the same week IMO is set to negotiate and decide on adoption of the NZF, the US is set to roll-out port fees aimed at Chinese-operated vessels and the international shipowners and operators that use the vessels to call at US ports. In return, China has promised its own ’special port fees’ on US-linked vessels.
