Germany to promote EU maritime strategy including shore power

Germany's government plans to use the country's EU Council Presidency in the second half of 2020 to advocate a common European maritime economy strategy aimed at strengthening the bloc's competitiveness and reconciling economic activity at sea with climate action, the economy ministry (BMWi) says. "The challenges for the maritime economy are growing given the increasing competition, the needs of the environment and the climate," said Norbert Brackmann, the government's coordinator for the maritime economy. Brackmann said he will promote the introduction of a centralised EU body that coordinates activities in individual member states to form a more coherent European approach. "This includes a common shore power initiative in the EU" to facilitate the use of local electricity grids by ships in ports, he added. Brackmann said Europe's maritime economy includes shipbuilding, trade and logistics as well as offshore wind power.

Germany has said it will facilitate the use of shore power for ships in a bid to reduce the use of large vessel's combustion engines in its North Sea and Baltic Sea port cities. According to the ministry, maritime trade covers up 90 percent of international long-distance trade. If treated as a country, the global marine transport sector would have ranked 6th in terms of CO2 emissions in 2015, just below Germany, according to transport NGO ICCT.