PROMINENT Greek shipowner George Procopiou labelled European rules “simply bullshit” at a convention in Cyprus at this time, doubling down on his long-standing criticism over greenhouse fuel emissions guidelines for shipping.
Contemporary from being anointed Cyprus’ ‘shipping persona of the 12 months’ at a lavish trade operate on Sunday evening, Procopiou aired his perspective on the futility and stupidity of EU rules, receiving applause from the 800-strong viewers.
After telling attendees that Greek shipowners had embraced step-by-step technical improvements to chop emissions, he launched right into a diatribe in opposition to decarbonisation, praised Saudi power coverage, and ended feedback with a jab at gender-neutral language.
“Shipowners are the most important environmentalists that exist, we love the ocean,” he advised the Maritime Cyprus 2023 convention.
Procopiou, who owns Dynacom Tankers Management, has constructed 135 tankers over a 48-year profession, and up to now month revealed orders for eight bulk carriers at a Chinese language shipyard.
“That’s the reason we’re on this enterprise; we aren’t right here to destroy the ocean; we love the ocean,” he continued.
“That’s the reason we care. All the time we go to the shipyard and we attempt to enhance — by means of air lubrication and new engines, for instance. Though our ships are 11 years outdated, we order an enormous variety of belongings as a result of the brand new fashions are 35% or 40% higher in consumption.
“These are the little steps. The remaining is simply bullshit.”
Procopiou’s feedback had been made at a convention with the tagline “an agenda for change” and diverted dialogue from the intense threats to European shipping’s competitiveness posed by the buying and selling bloc’s resolution to include worldwide shipping into its emissions buying and selling system tax from 2024.
Alongside maritime targets that cut back the GHG depth of shipping fuels over the subsequent decade, shipowners in Europe, together with Cyprus, are grappling with the implementation of harder emission targets.
The ETS tax was unfair to European shipowners and one other burden on competitiveness, stated Andreas Hadjiyiannis, president of the Cyprus Union of Shipowners. Regulators took shipping without any consideration, he added in response to a query in regards to the uncertainty posed by the ETS tax.
“Europe just isn’t treating its shipping with care. They don’t seem to be pleasant to shipping. They see us as a polluting automobile, not a automobile by means of which the entire world has modernised,” he stated.
Whereas European shipowners had been clearly going to be accountable to regulators to give up EU carbon allowances, Hadjiyuiannis stated the identical couldn’t be stated for non-EU homeowners.
“God is aware of how they’ll pay, when they’ll pay, or if they’ll pay,” he advised the viewers.
The session additionally included different outstanding Greek shipowners Thanassis Martinos, managing director of Eastern Mediterranean Maritime, and Suzanna Laskaridis, director at Laskaridis Shipping Co.
The panel touched on acquainted speaking factors, from shipping being ignored by regulators who failed to grasp how the sector labored, to complaints that EU sanctions prevented many homeowners from collaborating within the high-profit cargo of Russian oil.
“We’re simply the lorry drivers,” in response to Procopiou, who stated crusing at slower pace was his long-touted argument to reducing emissions from shipping.
Martinos stated the ETS tax would evolve right into a two-tier market as some shipowners bypassed Europe, however that this supplied alternatives for many who had been organised.
“We’ve widespread curiosity to cut back the emissions as a result of lowering emissions means much less bunkers,” stated Procopiou.
“Methanol, ammonia, hydrogen, however that is for the subsequent, subsequent era, perhaps my granddaughter’s, as a result of now LNG is offered the final 50 years and nonetheless the distribution system just isn’t accessible.”
He stated Europe was “extra involved in how we title elements of our physique” than sustaining its eminent world place, which was now threatened by China, which surpassed Greece earlier this 12 months as the most important shipowner.
That is the second 12 months when Procopiou has taken the stage to air his populist views on decarbonisation. Final 12 months, he advised the viewers that future fuels had been fiction, and wouldn’t be seen in his life or his son’s life. This 12 months, he calculated that every tonne shipped by sea resulted in emissions of lower than 40g of carbon dioxide.
Regulating to decrease this to a determine reminiscent of 35g per tonne was “an entire waste of effort” he stated.
