EC publishes the European List of ship recycling facilities

06 February 2017 |  C17007

The EU Regulation on ship recycling 1257/2013 (EU SRR) issued in 2013, requires all ships flying an EU flag to be recycled in a yard included in the List of Approved Ship Recycling facilities issued by the EU.

NOTICE TO
Ship Owners / Managers / Operators  |  Surveyors

With the adoption of the first version of the “European List of ship recycling facilities” the European Commission has taken an important step to help ensure that ships are recycled in facilities that are safe for workers and environmentally sound. From a date to fall at the latest on December 31, 2018, the 2013 EU Ship Recycling Regulation requires all large sea-going vessels sailing under an EU Member State flag to use an approved ship recycling facility.

The Commission had the obligation by December 31, 2016 to publish a first list of approved facilities. The EU list is established with the aim at including:

• ship recycling facilities located in the EU and have been notified by the Member States; and
• ship recycling facilities located in a third country and whose inclusion is based on an assessment of application received by the EU Commission.

Yards that wanted to be on the first edition of the list were invited to apply by July 01, 2016. As the applications received from third countries require more in-depth assessment than expected, this first version of the list published today solely includes European recycling facilities.

EU Member States have notified a total of 18 ship recycling facilities located in the EU as compliant with the relevant requirements of the EU SRR and are therefore de facto included in the European List of ship recycling facilities.

Karmenu Vella, Commissioner for Environment, Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, said: “I congratulate the 18 European companies which have made it on the European List of ship recycling facilities. The List sends a clear signal that there is business and employment in safe and environmentally sound ship recycling, starting in Europe. With the List we close the loop for the European naval industry: these ships were often designed and built in Europe; we can take care of them at the end of their life too – in a respectful way”.

According to article 32 of the EU SRR, the Regulation shall apply from the earlier of the following two dates:

• 6 months after the date that the combined maximum annual ship recycling output of the ship recycling facilities included in the European List constitutes not less than 2,5 million light displacement tonnes (LDT).
• on 31 December 2018.

The recycling capacity of these 18 European recycling facilities amounts only to ca. 0.3 million LDT which is not a sufficient capacity to trigger application of the Regulation. It is also interesting to note that the current list has some limitation in terms of the size of ships enabled to be dismantled. However, with the amount of applications received from third countries, the 2.5 million LDTs threshold could potentially be reached before the deadline on December 31, 2018. This would then trigger the application of the EU Ship Recycling Regulation six months later.

Following Article 26 on Transitional provision, as of the date of publication of the European List, EU Member States may, prior to the date of application of this Regulation, authorise the recycling of ships in ship recycling facilities included in the European List. In such circumstances, the Waste Shipment Regulation 1013/2006 will not apply anymore.

Together with the first version of the European List, the Commission has adopted four further acts to provide information on hazardous materials in ships and facilitate the recycling process. The Regulation obliges all ships visiting European ports – irrespective of the flag they fly – to carry on board an Inventory of Hazardous Materials from the end of 2020 onwards. The measure is expected to improve sourcing of quality ship parts globally and benefit European shipbuilding yards. Already from the publication of the List, all EU flag ships going for dismantling must carry on board an Inventory of Hazardous Materials.

Act now

Ship owners/ Managers/ Operators are invited to take into consideration the issued European List for those ships heading to ship recycling facilities.