ECSA, EWABA, eFuel Alliance, the Advanced Biofuels Coalition and GoodFuels on Wednesday (1 June) call on the Parliament and the Council to amend the Commission’s FuelEU Maritime proposal to ensure that shipowners and bunker fuel suppliers together play a key role under the new system. 

For the Regulation to achieve its objectives, the associations call for the introduction of robust requirements on Member States to ensure that bunker fuel suppliers in European ports deliver compliant fuels to ships in sufficient quantities.  

ECSA, EWABA, eFuel Alliance, the Advanced Biofuels Coalition and GoodFuels also support more ambitious targets in the FuelEU Maritime proposal. 

The Commission’s proposed FuelEU Maritime regulation is crucial in promoting the uptake of clean fuels in shipping. However, as it stands now, the Commission proposal falls short of ambition and might not deliver the EU’s ambitious climate objectives for shipping.

In addition, the organisations support the earmarking of revenues generated under the EU ETS and the FuelEU Maritime to facilitate the energy transition of the sector and contribute to bridging the price differential between conventional fuels and sustainable and scalable alternatives, inter alia, through carbon contracts for difference.

Sotiris Raptis, ECSA’s Secretary General, said: “The current FuelEU proposal does not address the responsibilities of the fuel suppliers and how cleaner and safe fuels will become available in Europe. We think that FuelEU Maritime should address both shipowners and fuel suppliers to ensure that low and zero carbon fuels become commercially available as soon as possible.”

“In order to achieve our climate objectives, cooperation between the shipping industry and fuel suppliers is crucial. We strongly welcome the engagement of our fuel supplier partners in this dialogue.”

Dr Monika Griefahn, Chairwoman of the Board of the eFuel Alliance, said: “The proposed targets should be raised to create more powerful incentives to invest in technologies that are not based on fossil fuels.”

Marko Janhunen, Chair of Advanced Biofuels Coalition and Public Affairs Director at UPM, said: “EU institutions must ensure sufficient ambition in policies targeting to reduce transport emissions. Time to act is now as today’s policy decisions define how companies can move forward with investment decisions. With higher ambition level, industry will have certainty to invest in biorefineries and develop sustainable fuels for the marine sector. We recognise and welcome the increased interest in advanced biofuels in the maritime sector.”

Angel Alvarez Alberdi, Secretary General of EWABA, said: “Waste-based and advanced biodiesel is already used in ships today in blends ranging from 15% to 100% without any engine or fuel infrastructure requirements. EWABA considers that technology neutrality and the all-inclusiveness nature of the FuelEU Maritime Regulation proposal is essential for the swift and efficient decarbonisation of the EU maritime sector.”

“Given that shipping will be largely dependent on the use of liquid fuels in the future our industry aims to further strengthen our cooperation with the shipping industry to replace fossil fuels with renewable fuels as quickly, efficiently and economically as possible.”

Rianne de Vries, Public Affairs Lead at GoodFuels, stated: “GoodFuels welcomes the FuelEU Maritime proposal, as policy will be the driving force to decarbonise the maritime sector. However, the targets are not ambitious enough. In the Netherlands, stimulated by policy, waste-based and advanced marine biofuels have been playing a crucial role in the fuel mix.”

“Already in 2020, 800KT CO₂eq was reduced through usage of marine biofuels. FuelEU targets should not constitute a minimum effort but should stimulate the industry to further scale up. The industry is ready, and after all, reversing climate change is about acting.”

Photo credit: CHUTTERSNAP from Unsplash
Published: 3 June, 2022