Japanese shipowner Mitsui OSK Lines has signed in to the Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonisation (GCMD).
MOL said today that it had inked a five-year “Impact Partnership” agreement with the two parties holding a signing ceremony at GCMD's office in Singapore.
Annoucing its latest move, MOL said decarbonisation in the maritime industry needs an accelerating collaboration and increasing investment by shipping companies, their customers, ports, energy suppliers and public sector actors.
The company said that as an impact partner of GCMD it will participate in the centre’s projects by providing access to vessels, operating data and evaluation reports so that internal learnings can be shared publicly and used for future trials.
MOL stressed the importance of the carbon budget concept which imposes a ceiling to the cumulative amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) that can be emitted globally in order to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degree Celsius by 2050.
The company said intermediate targets to reduce emissions, in addition to a net-zero target, are necessary.
“While plans are in place to adopt low or zero emissions vessels in the future, it is important to deploy measures to reduce emissions now,” it said. “Such measures include the use of low-carbon and transition fuels that are available today, and deploying energy savings devices onboard vessels.”
GCMD chief executive Lynn Loo said: “We are excited to tap on MOL’s track record in developing technical energy efficiency measures to broaden our perspective as we scope an initiative to help increase industry adoption of measures that can increase the fuel efficiency of ships.”
Mitsui OSK Lines representative director and executive vice president and chief operating officer Toshiaki Tanaka said: “We are very pleased to be a partner of one of the most important global coalitions. We will make our biggest effort to contribute and accelerate progress towards the net zero future in the maritime industry, together with GCMD and all its partners.”
Set up on 1 August 2021 in Singapore as a non-profit organisation, GCMD aims to help the industry eliminate GHG emissions by shaping standards for future fuels, piloting low-carbon solutions in an end-to-end manner under real-world operations conditions, financing first-of-a-kind projects, and fostering collaboration across sectors.
The centre's strategic partners include the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore, BHP, BW Group, Eastern Pacific Shipping, Foundation Det Norske Veritas, Ocean Network Express, Seatrium, bp, Hapag-Lloyd and NYK.
GCMD said it also has 15 partners that engage at the centre level, plus over 80 partners at the project level.
