Barry Hartman News

Industry frets about the coming deadline. Shipping desperately wants to be ready, but will global shore-based infrastructure and refining capacity match the demand that is sure to come? And … are regulators listening to industry’s concerns? In early June, the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) held a public workshop in Washington to help the agencies prepare for the January 1, 2020 deadline for worldwide implementation of very low sulfur marine fuel that meets the new 0.50% sulfur cap as set forth by the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

A team of K&L Gates LLP environmental and maritime lawyers representing a coalition of shipping interests has obtained an order from a United States District Judge in San Francisco to allow the maritime industry additional time to comply with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) newly-issued requirements governing the discharge of pollutants from vessels. Enacted by the EPA on December 18, 2008, under the Clean Water Act, the 80-page Vessel General Permit was to have taken effect the following day. Applicable to most commercial vessels over 79 ft long, the permit requires the development of best management practices for 26 different discharge streams, including deck run-off.