GREEN MARINE EUROPE, THE ENVIRONMENTAL PROGRAMME GAINS IMPACT

Green Marine Europe, the environmental programme gains impact. Green Marine Europe (GME), an environmental certification programme dedicated to the maritime industry, unveiled its 5th annual performance report, following a half-day of discussions, organised in Brussels (Belgium) around the industry’s environmental transition and its financing  

• 66 members in 10 European countries

Adapted by Surfrider Foundation Europe from the North American Green Marine certification programme, Green Marine Europe today has 66 members across 10 European countries: Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

Benefitting from continued growth, this membership encompasses 31 participants (ship owners and shipyards), 18 supporters (scientific research institutes, environmental organisations and government agencies), 8 associations representing the maritime industry, and 9 partners (suppliers of products, services, equipment and new technologies related to the maritime industry).

• Shipyards certified for the first time

In just two years, the number of participants in the Green Marine Europe environmental certification programme has doubled – from 15 to 31.

Twenty-eight of the 31 participants are certified for 2023, with 3 participants having no operations or having joined the programme during the year. They will undertake the self-evaluation and external verification process next year.

The 2023 year saw the certification of the first 3 shipyards participating in the programme. During this first year of certification, the sites involved took ownership of the programme and acquired a more precise vision of the measures to be deployed to reduce their environmental impact.

Green Marine Europe is also collaborating on the CirclesOfLife project, launched in January 2024 and funded by the European Union (EU) under the Horizon Europe program from 2024 to 2026. With a vision for sustainable shipbuilding on an EU scale, the consortium brings together 15 shipyards, research institutes, suppliers, NGOs and other organisations from 6 European countries.

In all, there are 6 participants that obtained Green Marine Europe certification for the first time: the shipyards Chantier Naval de Marseille, Lisnave Estaleiros Nallais S.A. and Navantia S.A., S.M.E., the ship owners Compagnie Française de Croisières (CFC), SPM Ferries, and the Port of Bordeaux as a ship owner as well.

With the continued opening of the certification to a growing number of European maritime stakeholders, 2024 marks the start of a test phase for the programme’s extension to ports. On the horizon: a first wave of certification in 2026.

• Green Marine Europe, for a better management of the environmental transition

With a global average of 2.5 on a 1-to-5 scale, the annual average results are down slightly compared to 2022 (2.6). This constitutes proof that companies which are sometimes more novice in terms of environmental transition have chosen Green Marine Europe as a powerful lever of action to meet this challenge with all the rigour it requires. It also relates Green Marine Europe’s requirement for transparency: performance never supplants the logic of progression and humility deployed within the programme.

The most significant progress by ship owners was made in waste management efforts, with an overall increase of 8 levels.

Green Marine Europe ship owners are stepping up their efforts to reduce air emissions.
More than half of them have reached Level 3 or higher for NOx, SOx and PM.
In terms of greenhouse gases, nearly 1 ship owner in 3 has done the same (which is more than 30%). This notably means that they have carried out annual inventories; the impact measurement is required at Level 3 to set the reduction targets for Levels 4 and 5. It puts them on the 2050 decarbonisation trajectory.

All the results and a performance analysis for the 2023 year are available in the 2023 Performance Report, published on the website.

• Green Marine International: new governance for global reach

Created in the Spring of 2024, Green Marine International brings together Green Marine Europe and Green Marine in North America within a single organisation under a strong, coherent, and widely recognised brand. The goal: to reflect the expanding global reach of the environmental certification programme while consolidating its governance.

All Green Marine Europe and Green Marine participants are now members of Green Marine International. Their respective certification requirements remain unchanged.

“I am very proud of the leadership of Surfrider Foundation Europe in establishing Green Marine Europe certification in collaboration with Green Marine and the European maritime industry over the last few years. I am confident that Green Marine International will provide a governance framework that ensures GME’s two pillars – continuous improvement and stakeholder engagement – as the number of certified participants continues to increase,” Florent Marcoux, Executive Director, Surfrider Foundation Europe

“This new governance constitutes a real turning point in the history of Green Marine, a certification program started in the Great Lakes and Saint Lawrence region 17 years ago,”  David Bolduc, President and CEO of Green Marine International