Air pollution has become one of the most challenging environmental issues in the shipping industry worldwide. As the marine fuels that ships use are high-sulphur heavy fuel oil and residual oil, shipping emissions typically include greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, as well as sulphur oxide and dioxide, black carbon and particulate matter. As a shipping and port giant, China has realized the necessity of controlling shipping emissions in recent years and put effort into promoting its regulatory system to effectively control emissions from ships in Chinese territorial seas and ports. Specifically, China has already established its own ECAs (Emission control areas), requiring ships in these areas to use cleaner fuels or adopt necessary emission abatement technologies.
In this lecture, Prof. Zhang Qiang, who works for the NGO think-tank Shanghai Institute for International Shipping, will discuss these efforts and the work his organization does to promote pollution reduction and to introduce green technologies to China’s shipping industry.
