On January 14th, the European Commission published a draft Implementing Regulation laying down a list of non-EEA ports to be excluded from the definition of “port of call” under the FuelEU Maritime Regulation.
FEPORT replied on the 20th of February to the call for feedback reiterating its concerns regarding carbon and business leakage in the context of the implementation of ETS Maritime and FuelEU.
The FuelEU draft Implementing Regulation and the already existing secondary legislation under ETS Maritime exclude Tanger Med (Morocco) and East Port Said (Egypt) from the definition of port of call and FEPORT believes that this deters some forms of evasion – most notably changing the order of port calls or adding and additional stop – via those ports.
The scope of the Regulation should however be expanded, allowing for the possibility of including additional ports beyond the 300 nautical miles and 65% transhipment thresholds, while at the same time considering the statistics of individual terminals.
In addition, it should be recognised that excluding non-EEA ports from the definition of port of call only addresses certain forms of evasion, but does not help in tackling the reconfiguration of cargo flows or shipping routes in the case of transhipment or relay traffic.
FEPORT position paper finally underlined the need for taking measures to improve the attractiveness of ports in the EU when it comes to bunkering while improving the business case and return on investment for onshore power supply.
