Emissions ‘could grow by 150%’

Shipping emissions could double or even triple by 2050 under a ‘business as usual scenario’ portrayed by the authors of the second IMO GHD study 2009.
“Mid-range emissions scenarios show that, by 2050, in the absence of policies, ship emissions may grow by 150% to 250% – compared with the emissions in 2007 – as a result of the growth in shipping” it states.
The report assessed the range of impacts of the various operational and technological developments in recent years, and the potential of the market-based measures to stimulate emission reductions that the IMO has been discussing.
It also looks at the pros and cons of the energy efficiency design index and the energy efficiency operational indicator, two of the measures being developed by the IMO to be used against benchmarks to set industry emission targets.
The others are the ship efficiency management plan and two market-based instruments – a maritime emissions trading scheme and an international compensation fund based on a global marine bunker levy.
One of the key areas of the report is its marginal abatement cost curve. This plots the maximum achievable reductions against cost effectiveness – part of which is the assumption that cheaper, more effective measures will be implemented before more expensive, or less effective tools.
The marginal abatement cost curve assumed by the report’s authors takes a fuel cost of US$500 per tonne in 2020: a figure much higher than today’s fuel price, but chosen as the implementation of low-sulphur limits will have driven operators to use distillate fuels, which will cost more.
With this figure, the potential is about 210m tonnes to 440m tonnes of CO, a reduction of about 15%-30% of emissions by using existing operational measures.
Jasper Faber, manager of environmental economics at CE Delft, an independent research organisation in the Netherlands was one of the main contributors to the report.
If shipping is to contribute to the global emission reduction measures then it needs to be part of a broader scheme or needs to be quite advanced operational instruments brought in place given the limited potential of the technical measures such as the EEDI, according to the report.