Environmental News

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…

The International Association of Dredging Companies (IADC) has produced a new paper: “Sand as a resource: Best practices to conduct responsible dredging projects” was initiated and presented by its Sustainability Committee.According to the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), 50 billion cubic meters of sand is mined annually. Of this amount however, only a small percentage (2-4%) is dredged by dredging companies.As a sector, the dredging industry has extensive expertise in the sustainable extraction of sand…

Around 6 billion tons of marine sand is being dug up each year in a growing practice that a U.N. agency said is unsustainable and can wipe out local marine life irreversibly.Sand is the most exploited natural resource in the world after water but its extraction for use in industries like construction is only loosely governed, prompting the U.N.

U.S.-based Pacific shipping company Matson announced it has adjusted its sailing routes to help reduce the risk of whale strikes off the coast of California.Shipping channels into and out of San Francisco Bay and the Los Angeles/Long Beach port complex transit federally protected national marine sanctuaries. These sanctuaries –Monterey Bay, Greater Farallones, and Cordell Bank national marine sanctuaries–are destination feeding areas for threatened and endangered humpback and blue whales from late spring through the fall.In 2015…

Almost two centuries after Charles Darwin's voyage around the world, environmentalists plan to follow in his footsteps by undertaking a two-year journey across four continents to study endemic wildlife and boost conservation.The group will set sail on board a 105-year-old schooner on Tuesday from the southern English port of Plymouth, from where British naturalist Darwin's own expedition began in 1831, leading him to develop the theory of evolution by natural selection.The 40,000 nautical mile "Darwin200" expedition hopes to anchor in 32 ports, including all the major ports visited by Darwin's

Moorestown, N.J. based Gallagher Marine Systems (GMS) and Wilton, Conn. based ECM Maritime Services (ECM) have merged as of June 30, 2023, forming a single maritime regulatory consulting, compliance, emergency preparedness, security and response firm.All key personnel from both companies will remain intact as the combined companies integrate software platforms, workflows and staff into a combined organization. In the interim, both GMS and ECM operations will continue unchanged.The collective company will be led by current GMS president and former ECM employee, Thomas Wiker.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday called for agreement to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 at crunch shipping talks in London this week and urged decarbonisation efforts to move faster.China, however, is pushing back on the targets, according to a diplomatic note issued by Beijing.Shipping, which transports around 90% of world trade and accounts for nearly 3% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, is facing calls from environmentalists and investors to deliver more concrete action…

An emerging technology to fish for lobsters virtually ropeless to prevent whale entanglements is exciting conservationists, but getting a frigid reception from harvesters worried it will drive them out of business and upend their way of life.Injuries to endangered North Atlantic Right Whales ensnared in fishing gear have fueled a prominent campaign by environmental groups to pressure the industry to adopt on-demand equipment that only suspends ropes in the water briefly before traps are pulled from the water.The Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch…

The Arctic Ocean could be ice-free in summer by the 2030s, even if we do a good job of reducing emissions between now and then. That’s the worrying conclusion of a new study in Nature Communications.Predictions of an ice-free Arctic Ocean have a long and complicated history, and the 2030s is sooner than most scientists had thought possible (though it is later than some had wrongly forecast). What we know for sure is the disappearance of sea ice at the top of the world would not only be an emblematic sign of climate breakdown…

The United States' Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) on Tuesday issued a final environmental assessment (EA) on potential impacts from offshore wind leasing on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf in the Gulf of Mexico, marking another step toward the potential first-ever offshore wind lease sale in the Gulf.The assessment, completed with the help of the Gulf of Mexico Intergovernmental Renewable Energy Task Force—a collaboration between Tribal, Federal, state, and local government agencies—found "no significant impacts to environmental resources"…

Jeffersonville, Ind. based American Commercial Barge Line (ACBL) announced it has signed a contract with Bayou La Batre, Ala. shipbuilder Steiner Construction Company for the design and construction of a new EPA Tier 4 retractable towboat.“Investing in our future is a key part of ACBL’s strategy. We are proud to introduce the first Tier 4 Mitsubishi engines to the marine industry,” said Mike Ellis, CEO,  ACBL. “The addition of this new Tier 4 retractable towboat represents our…

Lobsters versus right whales: The latest chapter in a long quest to make fishing more sustainableMaine lobster fishermen received a Christmas gift from Congress at the end of 2022: A six-year delay on new federal regulations designed to protect critically endangered North Atlantic right whales.The rules would have required lobstermen to create new seasonal nonfishing zones and further reduce their use of vertical ropes to retrieve lobster traps from the seafloor. Entanglement…