All in all, cargo ships are a major contributor to global warming, producing great amounts of the carbon dioxide that not only warms the planet but also leads to ocean acidification. The ships also generate black carbon, or soot, which is acutely dangerous to the Arctic. This particulate matter attaches itself to ice, causing the sun's rays to be absorbed rather than deflected, melting the ice at an ever-faster rate. Faster-melting ice means more passable waters for ships in the Arctic, which means more black carbon, which means faster-melting ice ...
No wonder the Arctic is warming at twice the rate of the rest of the planet.
The International Marine Organization's new rules would begin to cut ships' sulfur oxide emissions in coastal areas by 2015. But there is one way that cargo ships could easily and instantly reduce their carbon footprint: simply slowing down.
- The IMO has calculated that a speed reduction of just 10 percent by 2010 would result in a 23.3 percent reduction in emissions.
- One shipping company, Hapag-Lloyd, found that slowing ships by 20 percent reduced fuel costs by half.
- Slower cargo ships are roughly 10 times more fuel efficient than trucks and a hundred times more efficient than air transport -- but as ship speeds increase, that advantage is wiped out.
In addition, shutting off ship engines in port -- in other words, not idling a vehicle equivalent to 2,000 diesel trucks -- would significantly reduce emissions. Better ship design that cuts water resistance is a technology that exists and that isn't yet in common use. And, of course, there's the dramatic -- and not that far-fetched -- concept of using kites to save fuel. These are all steps that could be taken much sooner than 2015.
14 hours ago
