Port greenhouse gas emission reduction: Port and public authorities' implementation schemes

Abstract

Ports are unavoidable hubs of anthropogenic emissions owing to the dependence of landside and seaside operations on fossil fuels. Additionally, designing and implementing decarbonisation measures to mitigate climate change by reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in ports and beyond is a difficult issue. Therefore, this study aims to identify and analyse policy instruments and tools – implementation schemes – which ports implement to reduce GHG emissions, ultimately assisting in driving the uptake of technical and operational measures by port polluters, i.e. port, land transport, and shipping operators. This study was conducted by means of a systematic literature review (112 studies), and informed by a four-dimensional conceptual framework, i.e. port policymakers, port polluters, uptake of GHG emission reduction technical and operational measures, and the implementation schemes. The study differentiated between the technical and operational measures on one hand, and implementation schemes on the other. In addition to collating the schemes under five homogenous groups and nine categories; their characteristics, best practices, limitations and key issues, including opportunities, were discussed. Findings indicate that despite there being various challenges and issues in the implementation schemes, port policymakers, either public or port authorities, can utilise a variety of measures to reduce polluters' GHG emissions while at the same time maintaining business integrity. Nevertheless, monitoring of emissions, and identification of best performing combinations of implementation schemes along with inter-port and maritime stakeholders' and port policymakers' collaboration are the suggested way forward to better implement the measures and create a level playing field. While the results of this study contribute to improving the understanding of implementation of port GHG emission reduction, and enable port policymakers to make reliable decisions, it also contributes to academic knowledge and provides aspiring researchers with a fertile future research agenda.