\u201cScientists tell us that this is the decisive decade \u2013 this is the decade we must make decisions that will avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis,\u201d he emphasised in the opening address to the summit. He followed this up with a commitment for the US to cut carbon emissions by 50-52 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030.<\/p>\n
Other nations made similar commitments \u2013 Canada to limit carbon emissions by 40-45 per cent by 2030, Japan by 46 per cent by 2030 and strikingly the UK announced its intention to set into law the ambitious target of reducing emissions by 78 per cent by 2035. Furthermore, this latter target will, for the first time, include the UK\u2019s share of international shipping and aviation emissions.<\/p>\n
There is a lot of work to do to turn theory into practice, and while there are still key nations that have not stepped up to make commitments on carbon emissions \u2013 notably China and India \u2013 it is clear that emission reduction has metamorphosed from an illusory goal to a serious objective in today\u2019s world.<\/p>\n
The bandwagon of emission reduction is well and truly rolling, as is increasingly evidenced in the ports and shipping sector. Without doubt the largest volume of news received on a daily basis by Port Strategy is what can broadly be called sustainable news \u2013 steps in our sector to make the planet a cleaner and better place to live ranging across a myriad of subjects extending from low carbon shipping solutions through to measures to improve social sustainability.<\/p>\n
Interestingly, there is also today a growing recognition of the importance of sustainability in the investor and financial markets \u2013 the right credentials in this respect can deliver benefits and conversely if there is a perception that such credentials are not in place there can be penalties.<\/p>\n
A near pioneering move in the former respect was announced by Hapag Lloyd in late March \u2013 i.e. plans to issue a sustainability linked corporate senior note for \u20ac300 million. This note is associated with a clearly defined sustainability target; namely by 2030 the co2 intensity of Hapag-Lloyd\u2019s liner fleet is to be reduced by 60 per cent compared with 2008, the reference year of the International Maritime Organisation. The favourable terms of the loan enable the early redemption, in-full, of an existing \u20ac300 million EUR bond \u2013 plainly a beneficial move.<\/p>\n
The other side of the coin is highlighted in the story Adani Runs into Myanmar Quagmire on p6. Adani has been removed from S&P\u2019s Dow Jones Sustainability Indices which feature companies that perform well environmentally and in a social context. It has also experienced some divestment by investors \u2013 both events stemming from its past association with the Myanmar Economic Corp (MEC), which the USA states is a military holding company that supports the regime that overthrew Myanmar\u2019s civilian government.<\/p>\n
It has to be said that in the eyes of many this action is harsh \u2013 it nevertheless highlights the growing influence of sustainability in the maritime environment including in the core areas of finance provision and investment. Sustainability now has a price tag attached.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
COMMENT: President Biden said at the recent Leaders\u2019 Summit on Climate that we are in a \u201cdecisive decade\u201d for tackling climate change, writes Mike Mundy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-1459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-viewpoint"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1459\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1459"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=1459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}