Questions and Answers
during the webinars on “Feasibility study on alternatives to the beaching
method of ship recycling”. 08 and 10 October 2013
Q. During the feasibility study did you consult with the
ship recycling facility owners in India? If yes, what was their reaction to the
outcome of the study? Was there any positive feedback on their interest for
planning an investment to improve their recycling processes, as foreseen in the
study?
A.
We tried to consult with the ship recyclers in South Asia during the course of
the study. While conducting it, we experienced some reluctance as well as
interest in how this could be done. But up to this point, we have not received
any definitive feedback from ship breakers.
Some ship recyclers are
more progressive and foresee, particularly in light of the European regulation
that has been developed, that a more forward-looking policy has to be adopted
in Asia, too. Of course we know that there are ship recyclers in many countries
who, if they can’t conduct the industry on the beach, will not be willing to
advance towards alternative facilities, but I do believe that there are some
companies considering the matter. This study is particularly aimed at those
companies. Unfortunately until now, there was not a lot of feedback from ship
recyclers. Although over the years I’ve worked in the industry I noticed
interest in this subject matter.
Q. We recently learnt of one project in the Indian state of
Gujarat where a company has applied to get a permit to create a new ship recycling
facility in the Mundra port area. This would be the first Indian facility using
different ship breaking methods (i.e. other than beaching). I was wondering if
you know about this project. (I am not referring to another project related to
a dry dock)
A.
The secretariat didn’t identify any project of this type during the study. But
it would be important to disseminate information on such experience.
Q. Are there certification schemes for ship recycling yards
that are complying with labour and environment standards apart from the ISO
14000 series?
A.
Quite correctly, focusing on the Asian region, for example, ship recycling
companies do seek to be ISO 9000 and 14000 compliant. In each location, there
are facilities compliant with those standards. There is also another standard
that has been developed and that is directly related to ship recycling. This is
the ISO 30000 series, specifically a management standard which was developed to
assist ship recycling facilities in implementing procedures to ensure environmental,
safety, health, and labour standards so as to comply with national and
international regulations.
Q. What more can you tell us about the Chang Jiang
shipbreaking site in China?
A.
The yard is located at Jiangyin city, near a town called Wuxi, a few hours west
of Shanghai on the Yangtze River. This is the yard that a renowned shipping
company partnered with to carry out improvements so that they could send their
ships to be recycled in an environmentally sound manner.
Q. In terms of hazardous wastes, of potentially recyclable
materials and scraps, do you know if studies were carried out and are available
on which parts can be recycled in ships? Is there a material flow analysis of
certain ship types available that may be suitable for planning and upgrading
standards?
A.
You will find a general analysis in a World Bank study available at: http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2010/12/13695952/ship-breaking-recycling-industry-bangladesh-pakistan.
On the basis of the inventories of hazardous materials that were made available
for the study, this study contains these estimations on certain types of ships.
General information on hazardous liquids and parts containing hazardous
substances is also included in the Basel Convention Technical Guidelines for
the Environmentally Sound Management of the Full and Partial Dismantling of
Ships available at: http://www.basel.int/Portals/4/Basel%20Convention/docs/meetings/sbc/workdoc/techgships-e.pdf.
This information may also be available
in publications or web sites of shipping companies or classification societies.
In addition, a project that the Basel, Rotterdam and Stockholm conventions are
conducting, and that should be starting within the next following months, will
develop inventories of hazardous wastes in the Gadani - Hub area of Pakistan,
as well as in the Chittagong region of Bangladesh, places where ship recycling
and other industrial activities take place in these countries and that may
produce hazardous wastes. The inventories to be developed are more localized
and, clearly, most of the information will come from the ship recycling yards
and from inventories of hazardous materials comprised in the ship. The
objective of this study is to assist these countries in developing the
requisite hazardous wastes management infrastructure which is, at the moment,
is completely lacking.
Q. Referring to the abovementioned project, is this
mentioned on the Basel Convention homepage? On the ship dismantling web page,
next to the feasibility study, there is a paragraph on this project, but not
much information is yet available.
A.
On the Basel Convention website, the path to the mentioned project is:
Implementation/Ship Dismantling/Capacity Building. This project has not yet
commenced in earnest thus there is limited information available at this time.
The project should start in the next month or two.
Q. Have you identified investors and do you think there is a
willingness from countries or private donors to upgrade ship recycling
facilities, according to the feasibility study?
A.
We did not look into investors but they could basically be development banks,
banks with interest in ship recycling. There is a clear interest to upgrade
ship recycling facilities in some Asian Countries such as Pakistan, India and
the Philippines - a country where, for the moment, domestic ships are recycled
using slipway methods, but where there may be interest in future to accept
vessels from other countries.
Q. When the
ships get to the ports to be dismantled is there, in the Basel or Hong Kong
Conventions, a requirement to have a lab test and make an inventory of
hazardous chemicals, their qualification and their concentration?
A. The Hong Kong Convention
is probably the most relevant in this area even though it has not yet entered
into force. The guidelines for the development of the inventory of hazardous
materials, developed under the framework of this convention, do talk about
sampling of hazardous substances on board. The Convention requires that an
inventory of the ships’ hazardous materials be made. It is left to the local
administration to develop procedures to assert that this be done. In Bangladesh
for example, following the ship building, breaking and recycling rule of 2011,
they have developed procedures where personnel go on board and check whether
the inventories are accurate. The Basel Convention Guidelines also provide
information in this regard, and can be accessed through the Basel Convention
website at: http://www.basel.int/Portals/4/Basel%20Convention/docs/meetings/sbc/workdoc/techgships-e.pdf.
Of course, under the Basel Convention, the competent authorities may choose to
undertake a sampling of the shipment if there is a question as to whether it
matches what is indicated in the movement document. This can be particularly
important if a ship is to be repatriated for example.
Q. This question is addressed, in particular, to a
participant from a university, which is involved in a ship dismantling project
with the Chinese Government. Can you tell us more about your project?
A.
This project is funded by the European Commission, in the framework of a
bilateral program that runs between the European Union and China called “the
Environmental Sustainability Programme”. This is a three-year project that
started at the beginning of August 2013. The kick-off meeting for the project
will take place in Beijing, in October 2013. The basic idea of the project is
to review environmental hazards to increase the recovery of recyclable
materials and to include occupational health and safety issues in the current
practices. One important module we have included aims, on one hand, to carry
out a material flow analysis on certain ship types, on the other hand, to
implement a third party inspection system. As shown in the presentation, this
is closely related to the topic of how ship owners try to identify potentially
certified ship recycling yards. With that third party inspection system
developed, including indicators, the project aims to create a Chinese internal
certifying system for these existing yards, in order to improve the
competitiveness of the Chinese ship recycling sector. Some project components
will conduct research on indicators that could make more visible potential
improvements in the ship recycling process at the yards. The indicators will
form the basis of a sustainability assessment which is also part of the
project. The project also includes a policy dialogue module. This will be based
on the whole project outcome, through this module we would like to open a
dialogue on some national regulations/standards that may or would be
implemented in China, in the future.
Q. A follow-up question: Will you implement the project in
cooperation with the Chinese government and the ship recycling association in
China?
A. Besides the ministry,
the project will be implemented in cooperation with the ship recycling
association as an associate partner. The project also aims to establish a China
ship recycling network at a national level and to link this network with the
existing international networks.
Q. In the presentation it was mentioned that one of the key
challenges in ship recycling is to find ship yards that are working respecting
ESM standards. Did you encounter any control systems in place on the matter?
Did you identify the third-party that would carry out inspections in the
framework of your project in China?
A.
For China we did not yet identify it, although we met and talked with
controlling officers that are out to overview the ship recycling yards’
compliance with national regulations. In the current situation, ship owners
find it difficult to monitor the whole process and in some cases they had to
allocate their own personnel to carry out quality assurance of the process.
Q. Will this feasibility study be presented at the upcoming
meeting of the Open-ended Working Group? In the study, are there
recommendations for further action from the Basel parties to work on? Will the
study simply be presented there or will some kind of a programme of work emerge
from that?
A.
Actually this study was presented to the eleventh meeting of the Conference of
the Parties to the Basel Convention, back in April-May 2013. It won’t be
discussed again at next OEWG. At OEWG-9, the secretariat will be providing
updates on the next project that we are undertaking on Inventories that was
previously mentioned. In terms of recommendations resulting from this study and
the case study, the secretariat is trying to assist parties in complying at
ship recycling facilities with not only the Basel Convention but also the Hong
Kong Convention. The entry into force of the Hong Kong Convention will
certainly enhance the standards of the industries of this sector. Both the
Basel and the Hong Kong conventions provide useful legal and policy frameworks to
regulate this industry.
