Source: Contra Costa Times
Four years after the Golden State began pushing for clean-fuel shipping regulations, the globe's governing maritime body is set to adopt rules affecting the entire U.S. and Canadian coastline.
The International Maritime Organization is meeting in London this week to vote on standards requiring soot-spewing ships use cleaner fuels within 200 miles of the neighboring nation's coasts.
The vote marks the culmination of years of political and legal wrangling about the impact of ship emissions on the health and well-being of coastal residents, port workers and ship employees.
California currently has a rule requiring cleaner fuels within 24 miles of the coast, but recent studies show 40 percent of ships passing the state's coast are skirting the rules by traveling outside the "clean-air" zone.
The IMO standards would end that problem by pushing the boundary nearly 10 times further - too far for ships to easily bypass without wasting costly fuel.
More importantly, the plan would cut cancer-causing diesel particulate soot by 85 percent.
And on the topic of health, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates the effort would save Americans at least $110 billion in healthcare every year.
Attorney Rich Kassel of the Natural Resources Defense Council, in London this week, says the IMO's vote could also result in 14,000 fewer premature deaths from pollution-related illness in 2020.
"Cleaning up these floating smokestacks is critical," Kassel said by e-mail. "Most burn residual bunker fuel, which can contain up to 45,000 parts-per-million of sulfur, and lack even the most basic of pollution controls. Sulfur is a naturally-occurring presence in petroleum, and its presence leads to sulfur dioxide and particular matter emissions (aka soot) that trigger asthma emergencies, cancer, and thousands of premature deaths across the U.S. every year."
Ultimately, the problem of ship emissions is of particular interest to residents and workers based around seaports like Long Beach and Los Angeles, where visiting freight ships released some 434,000 tons of carbon dioxide - a greenhouse gas - into local skies in 2007 alone, according to the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
That's on top of 7,000 tons of nitrogen oxides, 4,500 tons of sulfur oxides and 675 tons of carbon monoxides released by freight into our skies annually.
The IMO law would require ships use fuels with sulfur content of no more than 1,000 parts-per-million beginning in 2015.
By comparison, diesel used in cars and trucks in the U.S. can hold sulfur content no higher than 15 ppm.
The effort may not be as strong as many preferred, but given the powerful lobbying effort against it, supporters will be content with a yes vote in London.
Security meeting
The Port of Long Beach is hosting a forum at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at El Dorado Park to discuss security measures in and around the harbor.
The meeting at the park's Bridge Room, 2800 Studebaker Road, will include a general overview on port security from officers representing the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, the port and Long Beach Police and Fire.
Port security has improved dramatically since 9/11, with federal, state and local governments pumping tens of millions into additional personnel, bomb-detecting equipment, screening techniques for workers and visitors and surveillance covering the port's nearly 3,200 acres.
The port complex handles more than $1 billion worth of cargo daily and is considered a prime terrorist target for anyone intent on further trashing the globe's economy.
The International Maritime Organization is meeting in London this week to vote on standards requiring soot-spewing ships use cleaner fuels within 200 miles of the neighboring nation's coasts.
The vote marks the culmination of years of political and legal wrangling about the impact of ship emissions on the health and well-being of coastal residents, port workers and ship employees.
California currently has a rule requiring cleaner fuels within 24 miles of the coast, but recent studies show 40 percent of ships passing the state's coast are skirting the rules by traveling outside the "clean-air" zone.
The IMO standards would end that problem by pushing the boundary nearly 10 times further - too far for ships to easily bypass without wasting costly fuel.
More importantly, the plan would cut cancer-causing diesel particulate soot by 85 percent.
And on the topic of health, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates the effort would save Americans at least $110 billion in healthcare every year.
Attorney Rich Kassel of the Natural Resources Defense Council, in London this week, says the IMO's vote could also result in 14,000 fewer premature deaths from pollution-related illness in 2020.
"Cleaning up these floating smokestacks is critical," Kassel said by e-mail. "Most burn residual bunker fuel, which can contain up to 45,000 parts-per-million of sulfur, and lack even the most basic of pollution controls. Sulfur is a naturally-occurring presence in petroleum, and its presence leads to sulfur dioxide and particular matter emissions (aka soot) that trigger asthma emergencies, cancer, and thousands of premature deaths across the U.S. every year."
Ultimately, the problem of ship emissions is of particular interest to residents and workers based around seaports like Long Beach and Los Angeles, where visiting freight ships released some 434,000 tons of carbon dioxide - a greenhouse gas - into local skies in 2007 alone, according to the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
That's on top of 7,000 tons of nitrogen oxides, 4,500 tons of sulfur oxides and 675 tons of carbon monoxides released by freight into our skies annually.
The IMO law would require ships use fuels with sulfur content of no more than 1,000 parts-per-million beginning in 2015.
By comparison, diesel used in cars and trucks in the U.S. can hold sulfur content no higher than 15 ppm.
The effort may not be as strong as many preferred, but given the powerful lobbying effort against it, supporters will be content with a yes vote in London.
Security meeting
The Port of Long Beach is hosting a forum at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at El Dorado Park to discuss security measures in and around the harbor.
The meeting at the park's Bridge Room, 2800 Studebaker Road, will include a general overview on port security from officers representing the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, the port and Long Beach Police and Fire.
Port security has improved dramatically since 9/11, with federal, state and local governments pumping tens of millions into additional personnel, bomb-detecting equipment, screening techniques for workers and visitors and surveillance covering the port's nearly 3,200 acres.
The port complex handles more than $1 billion worth of cargo daily and is considered a prime terrorist target for anyone intent on further trashing the globe's economy.
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