For European shipowners faced with scrapping
a tanker at the end of its working life, it’s a no-brainer: sell it for €3
million to be broken up for scrap on a beach in Bangladesh, or recycle it in an
environmentally friendly shipyard that complies with EU standards — and get
nothing.
The vast majority of EU shipowners choose the
former option, often changing the flag of registry on their aging ships for
just a few thousand euros — but now Brussels plans to crack down on a practice
that is polluting beaches in the developing world and putting lives at risk.
With efforts to come up with financial
incentives to get shipowners to choose EU-approved yards currently becalmed,
the European Commission has decided to update a worldwide list of shipyards
that meet European social and environmental standards — by this fall — and
oblige owners of commercial vessels flying an EU country flag to use
EU-compliant facilities for recycling by 2019.
NGOs fear those rules will remain largely
toothless, because EU shipowners can simply change the flag of registry of
their vessels for as little as €2,400 before sending them off to be scrapped in
foreign yards that don’t meet EU standards.
Although 40 percent of the world’s fleet is controlled by EU entities,
only around 20 percent fly a EU flag, a share that falls to 9 percent for
end-of-life ships, according to a study by the European Commission.
“In theory, it should be very easy for
European shipowners to pick a EU recognized yard, but the reality shows that
the vast majority of EU-owned or EU-flagged end-of-life vessels end up for
dangerous and dirty breaking on beaches of Bangladesh, India or Pakistan,” said
Ingvild Jenssen, founder and director at NGO Shipbreaking Platform, a coalition
of 19 organizations working to prevent pollution and unsafe working conditions
caused by beaching — the practice of running old ships aground on third-world
beaches.
Beaching is by far the most common
shipbreaking method in South Asia, according to Shipbreaking Platform. It says
86 percent of the world’s end-of-life tonnage was broken on beaches in 2016.
The practice is very polluting and the working conditions are “appalling,”
Jenssen said.
According to the NGO, at least 22 workers
were killed in Bangladeshi yards in 2016 and 29 suffered severe injuries. Last
year saw the worst catastrophe in the history of the industry, when 28 workers
were killed and more than 50 injured when an explosion and a massive fire
ripped through a tanker beached in Gadani, Pakistan.
In Bangladesh, unskilled workers — many of
them under 18 — cut vessels apart for an estimated $3 for a 12- to 16-hour
working day, according to a report by the European Economic and Social
Committee. The life expectancy for men in the shipbreaking industry is 20 years
lower than for Bangladeshi men in the general population.
Most of a ship’s steel is coated with paint
containing lead, mercury, zinc, arsenic and chromium, according to a study by
the International Law and Policy Institute. The tides also wash out PCBs,
asbestos and huge quantities of oil from beached ships.
Instead, EU rules mandate that approved
facilities must have impermeable floors and dismantling must be done without the
elements coming in contact with the sea or “any other permeable surface such as
sand or gravel.”
But tough environmental standards and
well-paid workers mean that shipowners shy away from using EU-approved yards.
“We are handicapped by the high costs of
labor, social charges and taxes,” said Antonio Barredo, managing director of
DDR Vessels, a Spanish decontamination, dismantling and recycling company.
Asian yards also have an advantage over their
European rivals because they are closer to local steel industries. “The reason
why the yards in Asia are interested in recycling the ships is because they use
the scrap,” said Patrick Verhoeven, secretary-general of the European Community
Shipowners’ Associations, an industry group. “There is a live steel scrap
industry – which we do not have in Europe. It does not make economic sense to
do it here.”
As a result, the French port of Bordeaux, one
of 18 EU-approved facilities, currently dismantles one ship a year, which is
usually a vessel owned by public entities.
“We have room for 10 ships a year,” said
Patrick Brocart, director for shipyards at the port of Bordeaux. “Today we are
a very small player.”
Money talks
Most European shipowners are taking a hard
look at the bottom line when deciding what to do with their old vessels, and
for now profit wins out over environmental worries.
In 2016, 328 vessels owned by EU entities or
bearing EU flags were dismantled, of which 84 percent were beached in South
Asia, Jenssen said.
According to the NGO, German shipowners were
responsible for 97 ships rammed up on the beaches of South Asia out of a total
of 99 vessels sold for demolition. Greece was responsible for 104 vessels sold
to South Asian shipbreaking yards in 2016, the highest absolute number for an
EU country.
SHIPS DISMANTLED WORLDWIDE
In 2016, a total of 862 were dismantled
worldwide — the bulk of them in only 5 countries.
India - 305
Bangladesh - 222
Pakistan - 141
Turkey - 92
China - 74
Rest of the world - 28
(Source: NGO Shipbreaking Platform)
One solution being mulled in Brussels is to
give shipowners a financial incentive to use cleaner yards.
The idea would be to charge a fee to all
ships calling at an EU port. The money collected over a ship’s lifetime would
be refunded if it was eventually scrapped at an EU-approved yard. The scheme
was supported by NGOs and the European shipyard industry, but strongly opposed
by shipowners, who complained it would disrupt efforts for a global solution
brokered by the International Maritime Organization. Although the organization
adopted the Hong Kong Convention on the safe disposal of ships in 2009, it
still hasn’t come into force because too few countries have ratified it. The
association of international shipowners has only voluntary guidelines.
Verhoeven warned that even if the EU agrees
on a financial incentive aimed at cancelling out the difference between
dismantling in South Asia and using EU-approved yards, it would be ineffective
because European yards have a capacity shortage – an argument yards here
reject.
“We do have capacity in Europe, but it is not
adequate to dismantle the big bunker vessels or container vessels,” he said.
“And I do not think we will ever have it, unless a government or the EU decides
to put money in creating these facilities.”
In the end, the Commission balked at
introducing the fee, calling for “further analysis” of the measure’s
compatibility with EU and international law.
Instead, the Commission is hoping moral
persuasion does the trick — saying its updated list of shipyards, for which it
has received 22 applications from outside the bloc, will still have a global
impact. “Applications to the list have come from facilities in different
regions of the world, including South Asia,” said a Commission spokesperson.
“This suggests that the list will be a reference for the whole sector,
irrelevant of flag.”
Source: politico.
23 August 2017
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