Most of us know how our household waste is recycled, some of us know how commercial waste is recycled, but how many people know how end-of-life ships are recycled?

The answer is: not many – but with the European Parliament gathering this summer to discuss new regulations on ship recycling, this is set to change.

According to the EC, around 1,000 end-of-life ships (usually around 35 years old) are scrapped every year, with the vast majority of material from them being recycled or recovered for energy.

Andy King, Contracts Director at ship recyclers Able UK walks me through the recycling process as it happens in this country: “Once the ship is dry docked [which is considered environmental best practice], we carry out an inspection to see that all the information that we’ve been given (if any) about hazardous materials on the ship is correct, by surveying where all the hazardous materials are on the ship – such as asbestos. We’d then start writing method statements and risk assessments to carry out the work.”

After a ‘soft strip’ of furniture and wood, removal of hazardous waste is first priority. Once safely removed, all materials are sent for processing at licensed facilities within the EU. The only thing that would potentially be sent abroad, King tells me, would be radioactive waste – which would be sent to the country of origin.

After hazardous waste is removed, the ship is then demolished by machine work (such as special demolition equipment) and manual work (workers armed with oxy-propane burning equipment).

“Between 96-98 per cent of a ship is recycled or used for energy from waste”, King tells me. “The majority of the recyclable materials are steel and non-ferrous materials such as propellers (made from brass or bronze), but there’s also rubber and plastics too. The rest goes to landfill or, if it’s hazardous waste, is disposed of appropriately.”

Under the International Maritime Organization’s 2009 Hong Kong Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships (which has not yet been ratified by enough member states to come into effect), ships must hold a ‘Green Passport’ or Inventory of Hazardous Materials (IHM) to help recycling yards understand what methods will be needed to safely recycle the ship. The passport should list any materials on board that require special handling (such as asbestos or mineral oils) and identify where these materials are located.

But, as King tells me, these inventories come with differing levels of accuracy, if ships come with one at all: “Ships should all have a green passport, but sometimes they don’t have them. Some people ring up and don’t even know about green passports. There’s a lack of general enforcement to ensure this is done correctly.”

The lack of enforcement is propagated by a lack of clear legal regulations, Lucinda Hall, Principal Consultant at environmental consultancy Enzygo Ltd, says: “In 2005, parties of the Basel Convention invited the International Maritime Organization to develop and establish mandatory requirements for a ‘new legally binding instrument for ship recycling’. However, the adoption and bringing into force a new convention can take a long time (up to 30 years).” And, in the meantime, the international ship recycling community is ‘encouraged’ to follow the aforementioned Hong Kong International Convention, which is yet to be ratified.

“Although some legal obligations exist for certain types of ships (fishing vessels and single-hull tankers, for example), the majority of guidelines remain simply guidelines. As such, there are few legal tools available to ensure countries apply best practice when decommissioning their nations’ fleets”, Hall adds.

At European level, the European Waste Shipment Regulation (No 1013/2006) prohibits the export of hazardous waste, including end-of-life European flagged ships, to non-Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. But a lack of enforcement (coupled with a lack of adequate ship recycling infrastructure in the EU) has seen the majority of ships sent outside of the OECD to be illegally broken on the beaches of Southeast Asia, where there are fewer costs of environmental clean-up (due to less restrictive environmental laws), and where prices for recycled steel are high.

Indeed, according to Hall, between 65 and 70 per cent of the world’s entire ship recycling capacity relies on the ‘beaching’ method, which, though cheap, has some serious health and environmental impacts. Further, the World Bank has found that Bangladesh alone is forecast to see 79,000 tonnes of asbestos and 240,000 tonnes of the cancer-causing chemicals polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) inadequately disposed of from first-world ships in the next 20 years.

King notes: “Breaking ships on beaches is risky. Aside from the human risk, if there’s a leak, oil or hazardous materials leach straight into the water – and who’s responsible for cleaning up the seas? But if it’s on a dry dock [as is the preferred choice in the EU], it’s captured and can be dealt with immediately and safely.”

Europe’s tight environmental regulations seem to have pushed ship recycling out of the region, though. Until the 1970s, almost all European ships were scrapped within the EU – but when the EC introduced tighter environmental regulations to prevent hazardous waste pollution, ship recycling became more expensive and many European facilities closed – with Asian companies taking advantage of the sudden market influx.

The EC is now proposing to declassify ships as hazardous waste, which Patrizia Heidegger warns could lead to more ships being disposed of illegally on Asia’s beaches.

Heidegger, who’s Executive Director of NGO Shipbreaking Platform, a human and labour rights organisation promoting safe ship recycling, says: “The European Commission publicly declared that it was aware of the European flagged vessels ending up on the beaches of South Asia and that it needed to act and come up with legislation.

“Originally, they had been discussing how the existing legal framework (based on the Basel Convention) could be reinforced and spoke about providing a financial mechanism to give shipowners an incentive to choose cleaner and safer ship recycling.

“So we were very much disappointed that, when the commission came out with the proposal in March 2012, they had omitted both of these things and released a completely different set of proposals. These said that end-of-life ships should be removed from the Waste Shipment Regulation in order to make it possible to send them to non-OECD/developing countries. They argued that the changes were needed because the existing legal framework has not worked and could not be properly enforced.”

Heidegger adds that though shipowners aren’t openly breaking the law, they are taking advantage of what is a legal ‘grey zone’ to circumvent it, as the EC never defined what the ‘exporting state’ of an end-of-life vessel is and how far obligations go. Thus, she asserts, “because this law is difficult to enforce, the commission has decided to get rid of it”.

Indeed, practices to get around the ban on hazardous waste law abound, most notably in the reflagging ships – listing ships on another country’s register to remove oneself from being bound by the laws of the country of origin – known as adopting a ‘flag of convenience’.

According to the NGO, out of all ships sent for breaking every year, 40 per cent are owned by European companies while only eight per cent are flagged in the EU – making it hard for the EU to keep track of exactly how many European ships are being sent to Asia for breaking.

Heidegger is now urging the EC to strengthen the current regulations, rather than get rid of them: “The EU and EU members states could enforce the export ban by checking the vessels and making the shipowners prove that they have documentation when they make the decision to sell the ship, but they usually don’t do that.

“Member states are usually not aware of any illegal exportation because they don’t monitor end-of-life ship activity. If a ship is in an OECD port and is being sent off for scrapping, no one asks to see the contract of its end destination, so it’s easy for shipowners to circumvent the existing legal framework. There’s a lack of resources – of people who are aware of EU shipping industry regulations and how the business works and of money to provide that.”

But, when commentators are asked if Europe and the OECD area could cope with recycling demand should these regulations crack down on the export of EU-flagged ships, there is marked scepticism.

Hall says: “In simple terms, no. Currently, there is insufficient capacity in UK and OECD countries – in particular facilities that could handle large vessels over 40,000 GT. The capacity in the EU for safe recycling is insufficient for the potential phase-out volume of member state flagged merchant ships expected over the coming years.” (The IMO’s decision to phase out single-hulled tankers by 2015 will see around 400 EU flagged vessels requiring disposal.)

“OECD countries should lead by example and make it a requirement for MOD and flag state ships to be recycled ‘in-house’, or at least within OECD member states”, she adds.

But the NGO Shipbreaking Platform argues that though there are issues with capacity in the OECD, if North American capacity is included in the picture, available breaking capacity for the EU-flagged end-of life fleet will ‘by 2015 equate to 132 per cent of the total EU ship inventory’.

“The commission has been arguing that there wouldn’t be enough capacity within the EU, but we are in contact with most EU ship recyclers, and all of them tell us that they would love to enlarge their businesses by taking more large commercial vessels, if the vessels were available for them”, Heidegger says.

“Why would they invest in equipment or facilities to break larger commercial vessels now if they can’t get them? It’s a question of the market… The capacity could be there quite quickly, if only the EU came out with a regulation saying that end-of-life vessels containing hazardous materials could only be scrapped in the EU/OECD.”

Governments are slowly testing the waters: the UK’s Disposal Services Authority (DSA) is currently inviting expressions of interest in tendering for four frigates – HMS Chatham, Campbeltown, Cumberland and Cornwall – from European breakers, and has even said that it wants to award at least one to a UK recycler to determine the UK’s capacity to recycle such vessels.

Heidegger suggests that the EC should be working to provide a financial mechanism to promote the European breaking of ships with the finance coming from the shipping industry, not the taxpayer. This includes making it mandatory for every ship calling into a European port to prove that it has a financial guarantee (paid for by the shipowner) for the ship’s environmentally-sound recycling at the end of its life.

“In all other industries – automobile, electronic devices, etc – there is a consensus that producers are responsible for recycling, and proper recycling costs have to be internalised. Why is the shipping industry not held responsible? There should be more to encourage responsibility and help procure green ship design”, she says.

If shipowners won’t make the ‘responsible’ choice themselves, says Heidegger, it’s up to the EC to make sure that better mechanisms are in place to prevent circumvention of the law: “There are so many discussions going on at UN and EU level, but none of the solutions have included suggestions from the shipping industry. Shipowners should be included in the financial solution for the problem, as a lot of the time, they are the cause of the problem.”

The EC gathers for the indicative plenary sitting for the ship recycling regulations on 11 June – let’s hope they listen.

All images courtesy of NGO Shipbreaking Platform