UK Chamber of Shipping charts a $915 million course to net zero in new budget proposal

Wedoany.com Report-Oct 10，The UK Chamber of Shipping has published a roadmap laying out the ways shipping in the UK could reach net-zero emissions by 2050 with a proposed plan for £700 million (circa $915.5 million) worth of investments in the upcoming Budget as part of efforts to aid the country in becoming a clean and ecologically forward shipping hub.

Central to the roadmap is an updation of the Clean Maritime Plan, which was initially released back in 2019 with the goal of guiding the UK’s emission reduction endeavors.

Launched by Maritime Minister Nusrat Ghani MP in London, the plan called for all new UK waters ships ordered from 2025 onward to be engineered with ‘zero-emission compatible technologies’. To this purpose, the plan set aside a £1 million ($1.3 million) competition to discover ‘new and innovative’ ways to minimize maritime emissions.

Despite the effort, the government had never followed through with the plan, prompting maritime bodies to write to the UK’s maritime minister Mike Kane, urging for the establishment of a long-term decarbonization plan.

The Chamber of Shipping, the British Ports Association, the British Tugowners Association, Cruise Line International, Maritime London, the Society of Maritime Industries, the UK Major Ports Group and Workboat Association, who were the signatories of the letter, exhorted that a successor to the Clean Maritime Plan should be a top-most priority.