Impact of Pollution Regulations in China Unclear

The impact of the new pollution regulations that will come into force in China from 1st January 2012 are still unclear to many ship owners. During a seminar entitled ‘Shipping and the New Pollution Regulation in the Peoples Republic of China - Implementation Imminent' that was held on 16th November 2011 in Beijing, China, and organised by the International Tanker Owners Pollution Fund (ITOPF), many of the delegates still were not completely sure how to comply, just six weeks ahead of the implementation date. 

 

From the 1^st of January 2012, China will make the ship owner responsible for the first cleanup, as is already the case in Korea, Japan and Canada. Therefore, ship owners visitng ports in China should have contracts in place with an Oil Spill Response Organisation (OSPRO) onshore. Zhang Chunchang, deputy director of the Oil Spill Response Centre, Yantai, from the Maritime Safety Administration of China (MSA) told the delegates more details about the background to the new regulations. China, with 18,000 kilometres of shoreline and a substantially increasing number of tankers calling at ports there, is prone to oil spills. To improve and protect the marine environment and enhance capabilities of adequate response, it's necessary to implement the new regime. Zhang Chunchang repeated that ship owners should contract OSPROs and have these contracts subject for review to the Maritime Safety Authority.

 

Speaking at the seminar, Colin Williams, director with Steamship Mutual and Chairman of the International Group of P&I Clubs Pollution Sub-Committee, advocated measures  undertaken by the Chinese government to prevent from oil spill in general, but pointed out that it is still very unclear for ship owners who is to sign such a contract with an OSPRO, since up until now there is no list of OSPROs contracted by the Chinese government and the retainer fees are very high. Williams said ship owners might look at costs ten times higher than for instance in the United States. He held a strong appeal to the Chinese policy makers to have a look at the timetable, because the deadline of 1^st January 2012 is almost impossible to meet, taking the named uncertainties into account. Karen Purnell, managing director of ITOPF, said that with ten of the busiest ports of the world in China, the Maritime Safety Authority of the Peoples Republic is doing a good job. The upcoming weeks are crucial though in finding a consensus between the ship owners and the MSA on how to comply with this new set of rules. The seminar in the Grand Hyatt in Beijing was a starting point in finding that consensus, but the overall conclusion during the reception afterwards was that the tanker owners were still not certain about the impact of the new regulations.

 

Sample emergency response contract (PDF)

msa-agreement-for-ship-pollution-response.