Collaboration aims to cut dredging emissions

Five major players have come together in a ‘united approach’ to cut emissions in dredging by using cleaner engines and renewable energy carriers in a procurement strategy that will impose minimum requirements over a period of time.

So far the parties involved include Rijkswaterstaat (the Dutch Public Works and Water Management Office); the Port of Rotterdam; North Sea Port (the Netherlands and Belgium); Kystverket Norway (Norwegian Coastal Administration; and the Harwich Haven Authority in the UK.

They say they want to standardise procurement practices to give dredging contractors confidence to invest in reducing emissions, and urge other ports to join the initiative. Minimum emission requirements for dredging vessels will be introduced first, which will then be gradually increased over time.

“Emission reduction is both an ambition and a goal for Norway”, said Jostein Moe, head of department for construction in the Norwegian Coastal Administration. “We believe there is room for more ambition, but the collaboration already represents an important starting point. We must explore and implement the next steps toward achieving our long-term goals.”

The agreement does stress the importance of avoiding ‘a race to the lowest emissions at high prices’ and creating a level playing field, however the procurement strategy will ’collectively create and introduce minimum requirements per period of timer for the emissions of the dredging vessels’.

“These minimum requirements will increase over time, step by step until we reach the needed standards in time,” point 8 of the statement says.

Further details of the agreement in the management statement, in which the parties invite others to join, can be found  here.