Psaraftis Harilaos N, Zis Thalis
Department of Technology, Management and Economics, Technical University of Denmark, 2800 Lyngby, Denmark.
Int Environ Agreem. 2021;21(3):445-467. doi: 10.1007/s10784-020-09523-2. Epub 2021 Jan 3.
The purpose of this paper is to describe the impact assessment of a mandatory operational goal-based short-term measure to reduce green house gas (GHG) emissions from ships. The specific measure has been proposed by Denmark and other co-sponsors in the context of the relevant discussion at the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and in particular the so-called Initial IMO Strategy. The IMO is a specialized United Nations agency that regulates shipping. The Initial IMO Strategy, adopted in 2018, has been the most recent major international environmental agreement on how to reduce GHG emissions from ships at a global level. The central research question in this paper is to ascertain the potential impacts of the aforementioned measure to least developed countries (LDCs) and small island developing states (SIDS). There are concerns that such states may be negatively impacted, or even disproportionately negatively impacted, by whatever measure is decided by the IMO. After gaps in the literature and data are identified, our methodology develops a list of potential negative impacts, and looks at a set of factors that may influence these impacts. Then, we discuss how the goal-based measure may impact LDCs/SIDs as regards each of the identified negative impacts. The analysis argues that for LDCs and SIDS a risk for negative and disproportionately negative impacts exists. The only negative impact of which both the probability and the consequence are considered high is the difficulty to finance retrofitting of old ships or investment in new ships. As such, this is likely a disproportionally negative impact. At the same time, the degree of share (or responsibility) of the goal-based measure with respect to such potential negative impacts, vis-à-vis the share of other factors contributing to these impacts, cannot be precisely ascertained, even though we conjecture this share to be low.
本文旨在描述一项基于运营目标的强制性短期措施对减少船舶温室气体（GHG）排放的影响评估。丹麦和其他共同提案国在国际海事组织（IMO）的相关讨论中，特别是在所谓的《国际海事组织初始战略》背景下提出了这一具体措施。国际海事组织是联合国负责监管航运的专门机构。2018年通过的《国际海事组织初始战略》是关于如何在全球层面减少船舶温室气体排放的最新重大国际环境协议。本文的核心研究问题是确定上述措施对最不发达国家（LDCs）和小岛屿发展中国家（SIDS）的潜在影响。有人担心，无论国际海事组织决定采取何种措施，这些国家都可能受到负面影响，甚至受到不成比例的负面影响。在确定文献和数据方面的差距后，我们的方法制定了一系列潜在负面影响清单，并研究了可能影响这些影响的一系列因素。然后，我们讨论了基于目标的措施在每一个已确定的负面影响方面可能如何影响最不发达国家/小岛屿发展中国家。分析认为，对于最不发达国家和小岛屿发展中国家来说，存在负面和不成比例负面影响的风险。唯一被认为可能性和后果都很高的负面影响是为旧船改装或新船投资融资的困难。因此，这可能是一种不成比例的负面影响。同时，尽管我们推测基于目标的措施相对于导致这些影响的其他因素的份额在这些潜在负面影响中所占的份额较低，但无法精确确定。
