€5m CO2 reduction incentive scheme launched

Due to run until the end of 2022, the scheme will enable ship owners, charterers, fuel suppliers and producers and related parties experimenting with fuels that reduce CO2 emissions by over 50% to apply for research and development funding.

Allard Castelein, CEO of the Port of Rotterdam Authority, said: “We wish to play an active part in the reduction of CO2 emissions generated by the shipping sector. Through this scheme, we are able to give various parties just that extra financial push they need to realise a concrete project in this area.”

Strict criteria

In cases where the proposed project involves biofuels, these need to be of an advanced nature and be produced from residual flows and waste flows. The alternative fuel in question needs to be bunkered within the port of Rotterdam.

Applications should be submitted before 1 July 2022.

The scheme was first announced during the Energy in Transition Summit in April 2018, as part of the Port of Rotterdam Authority’s ambition to help decarbonise the logistics chains that run via Rotterdam and bring its port activities in line with the goals set out in the Paris Agreement.

This incentive scheme aligns with the goals set out in the World Ports Climate Action Program, which was launched in September 2018. In this partnership – a Rotterdam initiative – the port authorities of Hamburg, Barcelona, Antwerp, Los Angeles, Long Beach, Vancouver and Rotterdam are working together on projects intended to reduce the shipping sector’s contribution to global warming.