Shipping regulations at a turning point - dismantling ships as contribution to a blue economy, net zero and raw materials security

This article addresses the changing regulatory environment for ship recycling. Often criticized for dire health and safety conditions at breaking destinations in the Global South, our contribution considers ship recycling as a potential future source for secondary steel in green transformations. It represents an analysis of ongoing changes in the regulatory framework, i.e. entry into force of the Hongkong Convention, EU's attempts to revise its directive on the topic, the Basle Convention on hazardous waste, and the manifold pledges for net zero. Together, this can be characetrised as a tremendous shift in incentives for shipping industry. We will share a state-of-the-art assessment with an outlook. Furthermore, we did an initial assessment of steel stocks based on publicly available data, and a local case study. Here, we assess the capability of Bremen, a city in Northern Germany, to gain a relevant future market share. Our results indicate the future market is significant, roughly equivalent to the entire current US car fleet in terms of steel stocks, and the ability to act locally depends on a variety of critical factors, including political will, entrepreneurial capital, and space requirements. The latter is also part of an ongoing PhD thesis on the topic (Anja Binkofski).

The contribution concludes with an outlook on the importance of such a development for a 'blue economy' at international scales, the transition towards ‘net zero steel’ and provides a perspective on future research needs.

We did a paper on the topic (ERL 2023) and have continuously updated since, including presentations at the European Commission and at the ShipRecycling Lab2.0. We are also in close contact with others from Brasil, Bangladesh, India, etc, industrial stakeholders, and colleagues from EU projects.