Shipping Dropped From Latest Draft of COP21 Climate Deal

The United Nations appears to have dropped shipping emissions as a target under a new climate deal.

Emissions from the shipping and aviation sectors Wednesday were dropped from the latest draft of a global climate agreement being worked out by the United Nations at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) in Paris.

A previous December 5 draft of the agreement was reported to have included the wording "parties pursue the limitation or reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from international aviation and marine bunker fuels."

That text was absent in the latest draft, but EU officials are understood to be amongst those pushing to re-introduce such language.

"I don't know who got it out but we are fighting for it to be put back in," EU Energy and Climate Commissioner Miguel Arias Canete was quoted as saying by Reuters, who added that the move was "a step backwards."

Green groups Seas At Risk and Transport & Environment (T&E) also voiced their concern, saying in a joint statement Wednesday that "the dropping of international aviation and shipping emissions from the draft Paris climate agreement published this afternoon has fatally undermined the prospects of keeping global warming below 2°C."

Andrew Murphy, policy officer at T&E, said: "Those parties calling for an ambitious agreement must insist that language on international transport be reinserted."

Still Early Days

As previously reported by Ship & Bunker, in the build up to COP21 the International Maritime Organization (IMO) urged world leaders to decide against the idea of an overall emissions cap for the shipping industry, saying "such measures would artificially limit the ability of shipping to meet the demand created by the world economy, or would unbalance the level playing field that the shipping industry needs for efficient operation."

The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) also stated that, under the guidance of the IMO, the industry was capable of "far more ambitious" reductions in CO2 emissions than current government targets.

But with negotiations on the climate deal expected to continue until the weekend, ICS secretary general Peter Hinchliffe warned it was "still early days" and shipping could still be included in the final agreement.

"The discussion is far from over and I am sure that Europe will have at last one more go at inclusion," he said.

Last month Ship & Bunker reported that green groups had labelled emissions from shipping, along with aviation, the "elephant in the COP21 negotiations room."