New Emission Control Rules from 2019 in Hong Kong

Hong Kong will introduce its own regulation to require vessels plying Hong Kong waters to use cleaner fuel from January 2019, UK P&I Club informed. 

The regulation is said to complement the efforts under the PRC’s Ministry of Transport’s action plan for the Hong Kong, Macau and PRD (Pearl River Delta).

“A Clean Air Plan for Hong Kong” published in March 2013, was the first document issued by the Environment Bureau (ENB) which set out an emission control plan to improve the air quality in Hong Kong, Macau and PRD.

The plan looked into emission level and set out the emission reduction targets for various sectors, such as road, marine, power plants and non-road mobile machinery for the future.

The ENB and the Environmental Protection Department (EPD) of Hong Kong updated their publication on “Clean Air Plan for Hong Kong 2013-2017 Progress Report” in June 2017. This updates the 2013 publication and reveals stricter controls measure for Hong Kong’s air quality and its future plans.

From January 1, 2019, onwards, vessels trading within the PRD Domestic Emission Control Areas (DECA) are required to run on low-sulphur fuel with the sulphur content not exceeding 0.5%, according to the plan set out by the PRC’s Ministry of Transport.

However, the penalty violating the 0.5% requirement remains unknown at present.

The boundary of the PRD DECA (excluding the waters of Hong Kong and Macao) is about 12 nautical miles and it includes the ports of Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Zhuhai.