EU shipping emissions rose in 2025. The ships did not emit more. The reported increase comes entirely from vessels that entered the reporting rules in 2025; follow the same ships through both years and emissions fell. Below the CO₂ line, methane rose sharply as LNG dual fuel ships reached the water, and from 2026 that methane becomes billable, pushing the maritime EU ETS bill toward 100 million allowances. For owners and charterers, the headline MRV number is only the starting point. The exposure sits behind it.
The full storyWe have joined forces with Global Maritime Forum and leading maritime companies to cut greenhouse gas emissions from vessels through operational efficiency measures. As announced at the Global Maritime Forum's Annual Summit today, signatories agree to take collective action and adopt voyage optimisation strategies that can decrease annual fuel consumption by 20%, reduce annual emissions by more than 200 million tonnes of CO2, and enable the uptake of scalable zero-emission fuels in the long run.
The article series "How a CII approach to chartering can increase emissions and cost" presents common voyage examples highlighting the sometimes unfortunate correlation between CII rating, absolute emissions, and carbon cos. In this example, we compare voyage CII to absolute emissions of thee potential ships for a transatlantic MR voyage.
For charterers and traders, access to the right insights at the right time might halve emissions from single voyages. On a TC2 voyage 1 300 tonnes of CO2 and its related carbon cost could be avoided by making one single data-based decision. A partnership between London Stock Exchange Group and Siglar Carbon provides actionable emissions data to trading desks, where great carbon and cost reduction potential can be unleashed.
