All-rounder regulations

Invasive species hitching a ride around the world courtesy of ‘AtoB Shipping’, desecrating native watery flora, fauna and wildlife. It’s dirty and frankly depressing that for decades we’ve been blindly and progressively destroying our territorial waters.

But people are now talking about it and they are talking about it a lot. Ship operators are being taken to task through the IMO Ballast Water Management Convention, which is coming to a national legislator near you in the not-to-distant future.

This is just one item from a long list of frequently reviewed regulations and rulings that bring complaints from ship operators. But what gets forgotten in the debates about the cost and challenges of complying with ever-stricter regulations designed for ship operators is that there is often an overlooked port angle that needs consideration.

On the ballast treatment front, ports need to be in on the act, providing adequate reception facilities for any leftover nasties and having the facility to check that any treated ballast water doesn’t inadvertently bring a different kind of pollution into port waters. There are costs and time implications that are not routinely factored into day-to-day port operations.

While they are the most vocal, ship operators aren’t the only ones to feel the pinch of new legislations. Ports need to keep a weather eye on the regulatory agenda as well; direct or indirect costs can be significant.

Fast approaching on the regulatory horizon is a mooted carbon tax on shipping; what’s the implications of this for ports? If this month’s pivotal Conference of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol taking place at the Paris Climate Change Conference in November (COP 21) really wants to clamp down on shipping, will ports and their environs get off lightly?

Some ports are ahead of the game when it comes to carbon emissions, but there are plenty more that are still waging war against them. Who out there could afford a blanket tax on emissions produced by its port and its industrial tenants?