Stockholm (NordSIP) – Global shipping is the first specific industry sector to be covered by a legally binding agreement to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The outcome of the UN’s International Maritime Organisation (IMO) meeting announced on 11 April 2025 has been broadly welcomed as a vindication of international environmental negotiations. This follows a year of contentious and ultimately compromised attempts to progress international agreements on climate, biodiversity, plastics, and packaging waste.
Delegates at the 83rd session of Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC 83) that ran from 7 to 11 April 2025 approved new fuel standards for ships and a global emissions pricing framework for the sector. These will be formally adopted in October of this year and will become mandatory for the vessels over 5,000 gross tonnes in 2027. These larger ocean-going craft account for 85% of total shipping emissions and stand to pay a penalty of $380 per tonne of Carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) if they fail to meet decarbonisation targets by increasing their use of alternative fuels. The targets will focus on gas fuel intensity (GFI) calculated using a well-to-wake approach to determine the amounts of GHGs emitted for each unit of energy used.
Discussions on the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships known as MARPOL have been ongoing since 1973, with MEPC 83 representing the latest additions. In closing the session IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez stated: “The approval of draft amendments to MARPOL Annex VI mandating the IMO net-zero framework represents another significant step in our collective efforts to combat climate change, to modernise shipping and demonstrates that IMO delivers on its commitments.”
Choppy waters ahead for decarbonisation efforts
The negotiations at MEPC 83 were not without controversy and the outcome has been met with disappointment by several non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and most small island states. Although global shipping only accounts for 3% of GHG emissions, the sector’s widespread use of Heavy fuel oil (HFO) would mean this share could double by 2050 under a business-as-usual scenario. As well as burning exceptionally polluting HFO, roughly half of global shipping activity involves the transportation of fossil fuels to world markets. The United States (U.S.) withdrew from the MEPC 83 session before the final vote, and Saudi Arabia was joined by several other fossil fuel producing nations in voting against the draft text. The island nations generally voiced their dissatisfaction by abstaining. These countries are among the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change and had been campaigning for much stronger legislation. Frustration was also expressed over the delayed implementation of the new measures, which some described as unnecessary delaying tactics.
Delaine McCullough, President of the Clean Shipping Coalition (CSC) bemoaned what she considered a highly watered-down agreement: “This week, IMO member states squandered a golden opportunity for the global shipping sector to show the world how it can turn the tide on catastrophic climate heating, putting their own goals – eliminating the sector’s GHG emissions without leaving any countries behind – out of reach.” While some observers celebrated the fact that 63 nations had backed the proposal, the CSC described it as a ‘shipwreck’ that had been largely scuppered by the vested interests of petrostates. Moreover, the various alternative fuels proposed for the sector are very much a work-in-progress with persistent doubts about their environmental credentials and scalability. Much like redirecting a supertanker, the MEPC 83 outcome points to a long and very slow course towards the decarbonisation of global shipping.
