The latest IPCC report on Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate, which builds upon previous IPCC's reports, established a causal link between anthropogenic impacts and ocean acidification, by noting a significant decrease in the Ocean's uptake of CO2, with consequent damage to Earth's ecosystems, which in turn has traceable repercussions on the Arctic Ocean and then from the Arctic to the Planet Earth. The impact of ocean acidification is not only in the biological ecosystem but also on human activities, such as livelihood, food security, socio-economic security and developing communities. However, who can possibly be held ethically/legally responsible for ocean acidification from a climate justice perspective? Since what happens in the Arctic does not stay there, a more systematic law and policy approach to study options and responses in a multi-level, climate-ethical, global perceptive is needed. This paper sheds light on the legal responses available at global, regional and national levels to ocean acidification in a law of the sea and ocean context, both in the Arctic and from the Arctic. The gaps in legal and policy responses in connection to the ethical climate component will be identified. It will shed light on the planetary limits that humanity needs to stay within in order to maintain the future of the Earth. Since it touches upon questions of legal responsibility, on who is responsible for ocean acidification, it will connect to the “supply side” of fossil fuels production and global extraction projects causing anthropogenic CO2 emissions, one of the major causes of ocean acidification. It will also identify which actors, be they "officials" or "non-officials" (such as international organizations, states, regional institutes, Arctic citizens or even forums) should be held ethically responsible, and who should take action.
The impact of climate change in the Arctic Ocean such as ice melting and ice retreat facilitates natural resources extraction. Arctic fossil fuel becomes the drivers of geopolitical changes in the Arctic Ocean. Climate change facilitates natural resource extractions and increases competition between states and can result in tensions, even military ones. This article investigates through a political and legal analysis the role of China as an emerging regulatory sea power in the Arctic Ocean given its assertive “energy hungry country behaviour” in the Arctic Ocean. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and the Arctic Council (AC) are taken into consideration under climate change effects, to assess how global legal frameworks and institutions can deal with China’s strategy in the Arctic Ocean. China’s is moving away from its role as “humble power” to one of “informal imperialistic” resulting in substantial impact on the Arctic and Antartic dynamism. Due to ice-melting, an easy access to natural resources, China’s Arctic strategy in the Arctic Ocean has reinforced its military martitime strategy and has profoundly changed its maritime military doctrine shifting from regional to global in the context of UNCLOS. In particular, it is wondered, what China understands about the public order dimension of UNCLOS. The article concludes that despite China’ assertive behaviour towards the Arctic environmental ocean and its rise as global sea power, for the time being, China cannot be considered as a variable for Arctic security as there are no sufficient legal and policy objective elements to adduct that it constitutes a threat to Artic ocean security.
This article explores how adopting a combined ecosystem and justice approach to deep-sea mining (DSM)-particularly in vulnerable regions like the Arctic-would constitute a paradigm shift in ocean environmental law and governance. Such a shift would move ocean governance beyond fragmented, technocratic, and resource-driven frameworks toward an integrated, equitable, and sustainability-centered regime grounded in ecological integrity, social justice, and respect for human rights and local traditions.
The 76th session of the Marine Environment Committee (MEPC 76) of the International Maritime Organization adopted several mandatory measures in June 2021 to reduce carbon emissions from ships. One of the measures is the carbon intensity indicator (CII), which is the carbon emissions per unit transport work for each ship. Several options of CIIs are available and none of them is chosen to be applied yet. We prove that, at least in theory, requiring the attained annual CII of a ship to be less than a reference value, no matter which CII option is applied, may increase its carbon emissions. Therefore, more elaborate models, combined with real data, should be developed to analyze the effectiveness of each CII option and possibly to design a new CII.
Maritime transport is the backbone of international trade. The amount of total international maritime trade in million tonnes loaded was 8408 in 2012 and had increased to 11.076 by 2019, for an average annual increase of 3.12%. In early 2020, the world fleet contained 98.140 ships of 100 gross tonnes and above with 2.06 million dead weight tonnage of capacity. The greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from shipping activities are not negligible. According to the fourth GHG study commissioned by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), in 2018, global shipping emitted a total of 1056 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2), accounting for around 2.89% of global anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Due to the international nature of shipping, efforts to control CO2 emissions from ships are absent from the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement. In an attempt to phase out carbon emissions from shipping entirely, the IMO formulated a strategy to cut the total annual GHG emissions from shipping by at least 50% from their 2008 levels by 2050; however, no mandatory rules have been promulgated since the release of this strategy.
Given the insufficient progress made by the IMO, the European Union (EU) decided to take a leading role in promoting the reduction of CO2 emissions from maritime transport. In 2015, the EU issued regulations on the monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) of CO2 emissions from ships with a gross tonnage above 5000 arriving at, within, or departing from ports under the jurisdiction of an EU member state, to come into force at the beginning of 2018. It should be noted that, under the MRV regime, even if only one port on a voyage is within the European Economic Area (EEA) and the other is not (e.g., a voyage from Rotterdam directly to Singapore), the ship must still report the total CO2 emissions of the whole voyage, rather than just the emissions of the part of the voyage within EU waters.
The MRV regime has been in operation for over two years, and the CO2 emissions data for the 2018 and 2019 reporting periods have already been published. Based on the data collected, on 16 September 2020, the European Parliament took the bold step of voting for the inclusion of maritime transport in the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS). This is a market-based system that uses economic tools such as a levy on bunker fuels and an emission trading system to provide monetary incentives for polluters to reduce emissions. The European Commission is conducting an impact assessment of the ETS, the results of which are expected in 2021. At this time, it is unclear how the inclusion of shipping into the EU ETS will work. There are two possibilities. The first is that only intra-EU voyages will be included; that is, only voyages from one EEA port to another EEA port will have to pay CO2 emission costs. The second is that both intra-EU voyages and voyages between an EEA port and a non-EEA port will have to pay CO2 emission costs, with the cost of a voyage between an EEA port and a non-EEA port being based on the CO2 emissions over the whole voyage, rather than the part of the voyage within EU waters. As the second possibility also covers the first possibility, we examine the implications of both possibilities but focus more on the second.
As a reaction to an increasing concern with the decreasing of standards in shipping during the 1970s and 1980s the International Maritime Organization adopted the ISM Code, which became mandatory in 1998. This study revisits the ISM Code, firstly exploring the genesis of the code at the international level, and then its operationalization at the national and local level. Based on a three-step case study, the interplay between the essence of the ISM Code and praxis onboard is explored. The study explores the distortion and erosion of the essence of the ISM Code when implemented on the national level in Danish law (step one) and by two Danishbased companies (step two) and finally investigates the local effect of the code as it is displayed onboard (step three).
The study is conducted as an applied socio-legal study; thus, it adopts both an internal (doctrinal) and an external (empirical) approach. It also combines the topdown and bottom-up perspective, consequently applying different methods to fit the content of the different levels examined, while maintaining a qualitative approach.
The research design is inspired by the hermeneutic circle. The first circle (Part I the international level) explores the genesis of the ISM Code, aim to explore the causal explanation for and to determine the essence of the ISM Code. The ‘essence’ is constituted by the ‘principles’ that the regulators intended to be essential to achieve ‘the purpose’. With Santos’s cartographic metaphor as a theoretical analytical framework combined with legal dogmatic method, the first part concentrates on small-scale legality (the international level). The second circle (Part II) is related to medium-scale legality (the national/transnational level). Part II explore the operationalisation of the ISM Code as it is implemented in Danish law, applying legal dogmatic method, combined with analyses of written formal communication to identify the inter-legality that distort the principles when implemented at a national level (step one and two). The third circle (Part III) relates to large-scale legality, applying Goffman’s theoretical framework to analyse the micro level, that constitute the onboard praxis. Praxis is compared with legislation, v revealing a frontstage behaviour that is compliant with regulation and documented by checklists, while in fact praxis deviate, ‘to make it work’ the crew exhibits what Goffman denoted a backstage behaviour.
The ISM Code introduces meta-regulation as a regulatory mechanism. Metaregulation is linked to Santos’s concept of globalization and governance matrix; the study applies Parker’s definition of meta-regulation and the triple loop to study the concept.
The study identifies three principles that constitute the essence of the ISM Code; (1) to establish a genuine link between the company and the flag State; (2) to ensure that the company becomes responsible for the ship’s operation; and (3) to empower the master, ensuring her or his authority. The analyses proved that each of the three principals were distorted at respectively meso and micro level, and that even though the intent was to promote good ship management, in reality it has provided companies the opportunity strut in borrowed plumes.
A number of solutions, with varying efficiency, have been proposed to mitigate discards. In this paper twelve mitigation measures were reviewed by their strengths and weaknesses, along with opportunities and threats, they might entail. How mitigation methods could either support or counteract others was also reviewed. The analyses of the mitigation measures are based on expert knowledge and experience and supported with existing literature. Discarding is highly variable and is influenced by numerous biological, technical and operational factors as well as social and economic drivers. These influences need to be carefully considered when designing management approaches. Finally, all reforms must be carefully considered within the context of a broader management system. The full management system needs to be thought of coherently to create an incentive framework that motivates fishers to avoid unwanted catches. It is only in this setting that discard mitigation methods may be potentially effective.
This article discusses the development of second ship registers and their interconnections to the policy idea of maritime clusters. Through a narrative of the contemporary history of Danish maritime policy, the article shows how these apparently different policy measures were closely related and together constitute a coherent framework based upon specific values, views of cause–effect relationships, and perceptions of major challenges and their context. Danish maritime policy provides an excellent case for the study of the contemporary history of maritime policy-making. Denmark was among the first of the traditional shipping nations to set up a second register, and the concept of maritime clusters became part of Danish maritime policy before it emerged as a construct in European Union maritime policy. We provide detail on the unfolding of some of the most important recent events in Danish maritime policy and highlight its development as a process of learning that involves the prolonged drafting and fine-tuning of statements and ideas, and the borrowing and adjustment of policy ideas developed elsewhere.
The paper focuses on the impacts of the inclusion of the maritime sector in the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS). The enforcement of a regional Market-Based Measure (MBM) such as the EU ETS may provide financial incentives to shipping operators to reconfigure their networks and avoid voyages inside the European Economic Area (EEA). This paper investigates the risk of container vessels engaging in evasive port calls by replacing EEA transshipment hubs with nearby non-EEA competitors. We perform a cost-benefit analysis that calculates the cost of EU Allowances (EUAs) for several international services and compares it with a relocation scenario. Our case studies focus on the Piraeus-Izmir and the Algeciras-Tanger Med scenarios and identify the EU carbon price turning point that will render the switch of the transshipment hubs a cost-effective choice for the operator. The results show that the preference of a non-EEA hub will become attractive for carbon prices well below 25 EUR per metric ton of CO2. Further, in all cases, the hub switch results in a rise in the overall carbon emissions attributed to the service which amplifies the risk of carbon leakage. Our results show that the relocation would lead to revenue loss for the EU ETS and penalization of the EEA transshipment hubs in close proximity with hubs outside the EEA, thus posing a threat to their economic activity and development.
The pressure on shipping to reduce its carbon footprint is increasing. Various measures are being proposed at the International Maritime Organization (IMO), including MarketBased Measures (MBMs). This paper investigates the potential of a bunker levy in achieving short-term CO2 emissions reductions. The analysis focuses on the tanker market and uses data from the latest IMO GHG studies and a variety of other sources. The connection between fuel prices and freight rates on the one hand and vessel speeds on the other is investigated for the period 2010-2018. A model to find a tanker’s optimal laden and ballast speeds is also developed and applied to a variety of scenarios. Results show that a bunker levy, depending on the scenario, can lead to short-term CO2 emissions reductions of up to 43%. Policy implications are also discussed, particularly vis-à-vis recent IMO and European Union (EU) action on MBMs.