Member countries of the United Nations shipping agency bowed to U.S. pressure on Friday by deciding to postpone by a year a critical vote over a global measure requiring cargo ships to restrict their greenhouse gas emissions or pay what amounts to a pollution tax.
The London-based International Maritime Organization’s motion to delay the approval of the so-called Net-Zero Framework, which was provisionally greenlit in April with the support of American allies such as Britain, Canada, the European Union and Japan, plus that of the World Shipping Council, narrowly passed by a simple majority of 57 countries, with 49 opposing and the remaining absent or abstaining.
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The Intersessional Working Group on the Reduction on Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Ships, which is scheduled to meet this week, will stay the course and work on the guidelines for implementing the NZF. Maritime shipping accounts for roughly 3 percent of human-caused global greenhouse gas emissions.
The move came a day after President Donald Trump expressed his “outrage” over the deal on his Truth Social platform, saying that the United States “would NOT stand for this Global Green New Scam Tax on Shipping, and will not adhere to it in any way, shape or form.”
Writing in a joint statement last week, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said that the United States was mulling possible action against countries that backed the measure, including initiating antitrust probes and sanctions, imposing additional port fees and other penalties on their ships, and perhaps even blocking vessels registered in those countries from U.S. ports.
They said that the agreement would unduly or unfairly burden the United States, harm the interests of the American people and raise global shipping costs by as much as 10 percent. While the United States walked out of April’s deliberations over a draft agreement, Russia and Saudi Arabia joined in its dissent at the time by voting against the measure. All three pressed for the framework’s delayed adoption.
“The United States will be moving to levy these remedies against nations that sponsor this European-led neocolonial export of global climate regulations,” the officials wrote. “We will fight hard to protect our economic interests by imposing costs on countries if they support the NZF. Our fellow IMO members should be on notice.”
In a terse response two days later, the European Commission said that it was in favor of efforts to decarbonize the shipping sector and level the global playing field.
UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told reporters in New York that Secretary-General António Guterres saw Friday’s decision as a “missed opportunity for member states to place the shipping sector on a clear, credible path toward net-zero emissions.”
It was only in September that Trump, a longtime fossil fuel proponent who made “drill, baby, drill” a frequent campaign slogan, told world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly that climate change was the “greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.”
“All of these predictions made by the United Nations and many others, often for bad reasons, were wrong,” he said. “They were made by stupid people that have cost their countries fortunes and given those same countries no chance for success. If you don’t get away from this green scam, your country is going to fail.”
Earlier this month, the White House nixed $7.6 billion in grants that underpinned hundreds of clean energy projects in more than a dozen states—all of which voted for the Democratic opponent, Kamala Harris, in last year’s presidential election.
“President Trump promised to protect taxpayer dollars and expand America’s supply of affordable, reliable, and secure energy,” Wright had said. “Today’s cancellations deliver on that commitment.”
The NZF would require cargo ships weighing 5,000 gross tonnage or more to pay a fee if their carbon emissions exceed a certain mandatory limit, thereby incentivizing cleaner fuels and technologies. Collected revenue would be used to reward low-emissions ships, mitigate negative impacts on vulnerable member states and support innovation and research in developing countries. If the measure had gone through, it would have marked the first time a legally binding global carbon price was levied on any sector.
A missed opportunity aside, the delay is also a “setback” that will derail innovation, deepen inequities and render more difficult and expensive the transition to clean shipping, said Natacha Stamatiou, global shipping and IMO delegation lead at the nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund.
“We know progress is possible when governments act together; now they have the opportunity to prove it,” she said in a statement. “We cannot afford to wait any longer. It is vital that member states return to the negotiating table and deliver a measure that reflects wise ambition—one that delivers a just and effective energy transition to secure a cleaner, more equitable future for generations to come.”
In his closing remarks on Friday, IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez urged member states to work together and arrive at an accord over the next year.
“Even though you have differences of opinion, you all spoke in support of the work of this organization,” he said. “There are no winners and losers in this session. Let us take this moment to learn from it and come back ready to negotiate and take the next steps needed to meet the goals you all agreed to in the 2023 GHG strategy.”
