Select committee: Environmental Audit Committee
Recommendation 32
Seventh Report - Net zero and UK shipping
Published 29 May 2024
Paragraph 205
Environmental Audit Committee Net zero aviation and shipping All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
The revised Plan will represent a significant policy statement from Ministers in response to the IMO’s revised GHG strategy. It must be cast so as to outstrip the ambition of the IMO’s current strategy, while setting out stretching yet deliverable policy objectives and actions for the UK maritime sector. At a minimum we expect it to contain: • interim and overall targets for emissions from UK domestic and international shipping to 2050, together with a detailed plan to achieve the targets and details of the modelling and assumptions underpinning the targets; • a strategy to supply UK domestic and international shipping with zero-emission fuels derived from hydrogen, together with a strategy to develop facilities for the production, transmission and storage of such fuels, so as to outstrip IMO targets for the replacement of conventional fuels; • measures to leverage the UK’s expertise in shipping law and hydrography so as to support route optimisation measures in global shipping, and • measures to deliver decarbonised shore power to vessels berthed in UK ports, so as to reduce their emissions and improve port air quality.
From: Environmental Audit Committee, Seventh Report - Net zero and UK shipping (HC 509), paragraph 205, 29 May 2024
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 13 February 2025 (deadline 29 July 2024).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government accepts most of the Committee's recommendations on net zero shipping, partially accepts some and "notes" others, and says its planned maritime decarbonisation strategy will address many of them.
- On IMO action, it accepts the recommendations and says it will build consensus so that "ambitious measures are agreed" at the 83rd MEPC in 2025 and implemented in 2027, and will seek to increase the stringency of the 2023 GHG Strategy when revised in 2028.
- It accepts the recommendation on interim targets, saying it is "considering options" for 2030 and 2040 targets, and aims to legislate for international aviation and shipping emissions in the Sixth Carbon Budget at the earliest opportunity, "subject to Parliamentary scheduling".
- On funding, it "partially accepts" the recommendation, saying it will consider how best to take it forward "as part of the next multi-year spending review". It "notes" the recommendations on a revenue support mechanism and on consulting on port entry limits, saying more evidence is needed and that consulting on port entry would be "premature".
- It accepts the recommendation on the revised plan, saying the strategy will be published "shortly" and will cover a pathway to net zero with interim goals for 2030 and 2040. It gives no specific date.