SHIPPING EMISSIONS

The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) has recommended that greenhouse gas emissions from shipping should be included in the UK's climate change budgets. The Climate Change Act has committed the UK to cutting all its climate-changing emissions by 80% - based on 1990 levels - by 2050. At the moment, however, international aviation and shipping emissions are not currently included. If the Con Dem Government agrees that this will mean tighter targets for other sectors such as motoring and electricity generation.

Shipping emissions in the Bay of Biscay

The CCC has suggested that shipping might account for up to 10% of emissions allowed under the 2050 target. This is something that needs to be tackled on a global basis, and if coherent co-ordinated international action proves impossible, it is quite likely that the European Union will introduce measures for traffic in and out of European ports.

The World Wildlife Fund and Oxfam issued a report which recommended some kind of global shipping tax which could be used to raise some of the $100 billion dollars per year of climate-related cash that rich countries are committed to providing to the developing world by 2020. The problem of shipping emissions Global Forum on Transport and Environment in a Globalising World (which met back in November 2008 in Guadalajara, Mexico) produced a report on the Environmental Impacts of Increased International Maritime Shipping which looked at the implications for maritime diesel emissions.

The report noted that shipping activity has increased significantly over the last century, and represents a noticeable contribution to global emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases. The report concluded that projections up to year 2020 indicate a growth in fuel consumption and emission in the range of 30%. It also suggested that most scenarios for the near future, the next 10-20 years, suggest that regulations and measures will be outweighed by an increase in traffic leading to a significant global increase in emissions from shipping.

One simple solution is to base manufacturing industry more locally rather than ship finished products across the globe. This is something that would benefit Welsh communities, save money, especially when you consider the rising costs of maritime diesel and reduce the carbon footprint of manufactured goods and cut pollutants which affect all of us.