New year, new sulphur cap.

The Sulphur cap is here. If you’re a shipowner still running on High Sulphur Fuel Oil (HSFO) you need to trust to your Fuel Oil Non-Availability Report (FONAR), unless you are fitted with scrubbers. If you’re running on Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (LSFO) now you still need to get any HSFO off your vessel by 1 March 2020 due to the Carriage Ban. Apart from increasing the cost of running a vessel, the IMO’s two regulation are likely to see various additional costs being incurred by shipowners: costs of disposal of remaining onboard HSFO including costs of tank and line cleaning to avoid residual HSFO mingling with LSFO and pushing the Sulphur level over 0.5%; time lost in performing such operations; effect of LSFO on owners’ performance warranties under time charters; fines and detention due to inability to get remaining HSFO off the vessel by 1.3.2020 (there is no equivalent of a FONAR to cover this eventuality). A report from S&P Global Platts last week reveals that a lot of debunkering is going to have take place between now and 1.3.2020. https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/shipping/122719-shipowners-rush-to-de-bunker-hsfo-as-imo-2020-looms

Added to that there is the greater risk of engine damage due to use of LSFO. Today Reuters carries a report that testing companies examining newer, low-sulphur marine blends acquired in Antwerp, Belgium, Houston and Singapore have found sediment at levels that could damage the engines of ocean-going vessels. Depressing news with which to welcome in the new year. https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-shipping-imo-fueloil/tests-raise-alarms-over-fuel-blends-coming-for-ocean-going-vessels-idUKKBN1YZ1ED

It is likely that the new decade will see a spate of claims arising out of the sulphur cap and the carriage ban, particularly under time charters, with renewed interest by owners in the indemnity as a means of clawing back costs from time charterers.

Published by

Professor Simon Baughen

Professor Simon Baughen was appointed as Professor of Shipping Law in September 2013 (previously Reader at the University of Bristol Law School). Simon Baughen studied law at Oxford and practised in maritime law for several years before joining academia. His research interests lie mainly in the field of shipping law, but also include the law of trusts and the environmental law implications of the activities of multinational corporations in the developing world. Simon's book on Shipping Law, has run to seven editions (soon to be eight) and is already well-known to academics and students alike as by far the most learned and approachable work on the subject. Furthermore, he is now the author of the very well-established practitioner's work Summerskill on Laytime. He has an extensive list of publications to his name, including International Trade and the Protection of the Environment, and Human Rights and Corporate Wrongs - Closing the Governance Gap. He has also written and taught extensively on commercial law, trusts and environmental law. Simon is a member of the Institute of International Shipping and Trade Law, a University Research Centre within the School of Law, and he currently teaches at Swansea on the LLM in:Carriage of Goods by Sea, Land and Air; Charterparties Law and Practice; International Corporate Governance.

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