Environmental News

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced it is seeking comments on its proposal to renew and revise 56 existing nationwide permits and issue one new nationwide permit authorizing activities associated with improving fish passage. Nationwide permits authorize activities in wetlands and other waters that are regulated by Section 404 of the Clean Water Act and/or Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899.“The streamlined set of nationwide permits proposed today offers a clear…

PETRONAS CCS Ventures Sdn. Bhd. (PCCSV) MISC Berhad (MISC), and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd., (MOL) announced the incorporation of a strategic joint venture (JV), Jules Nautica Sdn. Bhd. This JV will lead the development and act as the ultimate owner of Liquefied Carbon Dioxide (LCO₂) carriers, which are critical for transporting LCO₂ to designated storage sites as part of advancing carbon capture and storage (CCS) solutions.The trio completed the Front-End Engineering Design (FEED) for a 62…

Tugboat and towboat owners across the nation eye fuel efficiency and emission reduction technologies and techniques in advance of increasingly stringent regulations.he first half of 2025 has seen a great deal of attention on emissions from vessels, with an eye towards their continued reductions in the coming years. Mid-April saw the International Maritime Organization (IMO)’s much anticipated Maritime Environment Protection Committee’s MEPC 83 meeting participants lay out plans for reduced greenhouse gas emissions in the coming years…

Evac Group, a leader in sustainability technologies and solutions, has launched Dehydro, an onboard waste management system designed to meet the specific needs of smaller vessels. Traditional onboard waste systems typically require high volumes of wet waste to be cost-effective, which makes them impractical for smaller vessels. The Dehydro system, using dehydration technology, makes onboard waste treatment viable for smaller ships, reducing the need for overboard discharge or costly offloading to land-based facilities.

Increasingly, maritime finance is tied to the environmental impact of the asset or project.Under Zero-Emission Accelerating Ship Finance (the Program), which is jointly operated by the Development Bank of Japan Inc. (DBJ) and ClassNK, ClassNK evaluated the LNG-fueled car carrier OCEANUS HIGHWAY (IMO No. 1046049), owned by Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, Ltd. ("K" LINE). DBJ provided financing to "K" LINE.ClassNK evaluates ships based on a comprehensive scoring model jointly developed with DBJ from the perspective of ‘decarbonization…

In support of the Biden-Harris administration’s goal of deploying 30 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind energy capacity by 2030, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) today issued a Record of Decision identifying environmental measures expected to be applied to future wind energy development of the six lease areas offshore New York and New Jersey in an area known as the New York Bight. BOEM estimates that full development of the six lease areas could generate up to 7 GW of offshore wind energy, enough to power up to two million homes. This decision follows BOEM’s announcement of the New York Bight Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement on October 21, 2024.

DP World has expanded its Green Marine membership by adding the Vancouver, Nanaimo, and Saint John terminals to the program. DP World’s terminal in Prince Rupert has been Green Marine certified since 2013. Doug Smith, CEO of DP World in Canada, said: "We are committed to integrating environmental practices into our operations and continuously improving our sustainability, and we know from our experience with the program that Green Marine will provide us with the tools we need to achieve this ambitious goal."David Bolduc, Green Marine President and CEO said: "We are very pleased to welcome three more DP World terminals in Canada. DP World's…

The Port of Los Angeles handled a record 954,706 Twenty-Foot Equivalent Units (TEUs) in September, a 27% increase over the previous year. It marked the close of the busiest quarter ever at the Port, which processed 2,854,904 TEUs in the last three months. Nine months into 2024, the Port of Los Angeles is 18% ahead of its 2023 pace. “Just as impressive as these new records is the fact that we managed all this cargo with skill and efficiency,” said Port of Los Angeles Executive Director Gene Seroka. “None of this would be possible without the incredible efforts of our longshore workers, truckers, terminal and rail operators, and other supply chain partners.

MarineNews Editor Joseph Keefe weighs in with a look at the previous five years on the waterfront. It’s not what you think.You might be aware that I stepped away for a moment in late December 2019. The five years that followed, whizzed right by – well, all but that miserable part of being virtually locked in my house for six months during “the Pandemic.” Enough said. Now back in the Editor’s chair here at MarineNews magazine, it is apparent that while some things on the collective waterfront have changed…

Orkney-based marine services firm Green Marine UK has expanded its environmental monitoring offering for offshore wind to deliver ‘full-scope’ projects following a surge in contracts with Scotland's Marine Directorate.This follows 18-months of continuous work, largely involving the collection of PAM (Passive Acoustic Monitoring) devices. Operations have lasted up to 20-days retrieving circa 40 devices over distances approaching 250 nautical miles.PAM incorporates underwater microphones (hydrophones) to effectively monitor and record migratory fish, marine animals and the environment.

U.S. ocean carrier Matson is doing its part to limit whale strikes, including rerouting vessels to avoid protected areas and helping to develop cutting-edge technology that detects whales and alerts crew members of their presence.In August of last year, Matson made route adjustments to its weekly triangulating Oakland-Long Beach-Honolulu voyage to minimize the time our vessels spend inside whale protection zones of the northern and southern California coasts. Fleet Operations…

Unregulated tankers sidestepping Western sanctions are posing a bigger risk to the Mediterranean region and Greece is undertaking more protective measures to safeguard its coast, the country's shipping minister told Reuters on Tuesday.Up to 850 oil tankers are estimated to form the so-called shadow fleet transporting oil from countries such as Iran and Venezuela as well as Russia, which has multiple restrictions on its oil exports.The ships carrying these oil cargoes pose a massive environmental challenge…

The operator of Japan's first domestically-built whaling mothership in more than seven decades said on Thursday it had no plans to send the whaler to the Antarctic Ocean, although the new vessel is capable of reaching the region.The 7.5 billion yen ($48 million) Kangei Maru, whose construction was completed less than two months ago, has a cruising range of 7,000 nautical miles."This ship is designed to be able to go to the Antarctic Ocean. But we won't be going to the Antarctic as long as we are engaged in commercial whaling…

Shipping fuel regulations introduced in 2020 have led to a substantial cut in sulphur dioxide (SO2) pollution, but may also have made the ocean warmer by reducing cloud cover, according to a modelling study in a paper published late on Thursday.International Maritime Organization (IMO) rules to tackle marine pollution forced shippers to cut their fuel sulphur content to 0.5% from 3.5%, leading to an 80% decline in SO2 emissions, according to a research team led by Tianle Yuan at the University of Maryland.SO2…

Kimberly Lutz and America’s Watershed Initiative (AWI) are making every effort to sustain the Mississippi River for generations to come.The Mississippi River is one of the world’s largest river systems and is arguably America’s most critical waterway. Flowing over 2,350 miles, spanning, at points, up to eleven miles, and discharging approximately 593,003 cubic feet of water per second into the Gulf of Mexico, the Mighty Mississippi is awe inspiring in terms of its natural characteristics as well as its commercial impact on both the American and global economies.

"The Columbia River and its tributaries, wetlands, and estuaries are the lifeblood of the Pacific Northwest, providing abundant water, power, recreation, agriculture, transportation and natural resources that have supported livelihoods, cultural and spiritual practices, commerce and economic growth.” - President Biden, Memorandum of September 27, 2023.Those abundant benefits directly impact about 13 million people in the Pacific Northwest. Hydropower extends that plentitude to millions more, powering cities and industry from Idaho to California.

When the Rubymar sank in the Red Sea after a Houthi attack, the ship went down carrying 21,000-tonnes of fertiliser which could trigger massive algal blooms that could create "dead zones" for marine life and starve coral reefs of light.Alongside a slick of leaking fuel, the ammonium phosphate sulphate fertilisers could deliver an extreme pulse of nutrients into waters harbouring rare corals, marine mammals and reef fish, creating a spread of foamy scum on the water.According to a maritime warning circulated to ships in the area…

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand earlier this month stood with local leaders and environmental advocates at Albany City Hall to demand that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) take additional action to clean up polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) “forever chemicals” in the Hudson River.PCBs are toxic manmade chemicals that can linger in water and soil for decades. Exposure is associated with a variety of serious health conditions, including cancer.From 1947 to 1977, General Electric dumped 1.2 million pounds of PCBs into the Hudson River north of Albany.

Green Instruments A/S and Danish Technological Institute have developed a real-time flue gas sensor technology - The Extinction-Minus-Scattering (EMS) measurement method - to accurately measure black carbon emissions from ships, a tech which could be instrumental in meeting increasing regulatory demands of the shipping industry for black carbon emission standards. The EMS method enables real-time in-situ measurement capabilities, traceability, and lowered ownership costs, tackling…

Techcross, a comprehensive environmental company, will participate in the 2023 Kormarine.Techcross, known for its performance and sales in electrolysis-type ballast water management systems (BWMS), will showcase its expansion into new business areas alongside its existing BWMS at the 2023 Kormarine.As regulations have become more stringent for achieving net-zero and environmental protection goals, Techcross has diversified its lineup of ESD (Energy Saving Device) aimed at improving ship operation efficiency as well as focusing on AMP system.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District is working to delay upriver progression of salt water from the Gulf of Mexico by augmenting the sill initially constructed in July 2023.Construction is underway to increase the existing underwater sill from a depth of -55 feet to a depth of -30 feet. A 620-foot-wide navigation lane will be kept to a depth of -55 feet to ensure deep-draft shipping continues along the nation’s busiest inland waterway.USACE initially constructed…

California’s maritime sector is essential to America’s role in the global economy and to the supply chain. Yet, a mandate from the California Air Resources Board (CARB) has cast a shadow over the safety and efficiency of this sector, which will have far-reaching effects on the nation.While CARB’s intentions to bolster air quality are commendable, and California’s maritime industry has a proven track record of working to lower emissions, the hasty directive for tugboat operators…

Woodside Energy last week announced it would start seismic testing for its Scarborough gas project off Australia’s west coast, before reversing the decision in the face of a legal challenge from Traditional Owners.Seismic testing is highly controversial in marine environments. Australia’s federal regulator (the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority) is currently examining a proposal for seismic testing in the Otway Basin in Bass Strait, which conservationists say has attracted more than 30…