EMEA News
Red Sea Crisis Added 18 Million Tons of CO2 Emissions in EU Container Shipping
Container shipping's emissions progress suffered a major setback in 2024 due to Red Sea rerouting, according to new research.
Threats from Houthi attacks have forced carriers to divert vessels around the Cape of Good Hope, resulting in a 45% surge in CO2 emissions from EU-related container shipping, consultancy Sea-Intelligence said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.
This sharp rise follows years of consistent declines, with average annual reductions of 4.4% between 2018 and 2023.
"If, purely hypothetically, we assumed there was never a Red Sea crisis and that the container lines would again in 2024 have reduced their total emissions by 4.4%, this would have led to total emissions of 34.7 million tons in 2024," it said.
Instead, the actual figure reached 52.7 million tons -- an 18 million ton increase directly linked to the Houthi threat in the Red Sea.
Sea-Intelligence notes this added volume is equivalent to the entire national emissions of Cambodia.
While the overall shipping industry recorded a 10% CO2 rise, container shipping was hit hardest. Other shipping segments showed no major emissions spike.
