Air pollutants from shipping: Costs of NOx emissions to the Baltic Sea

Abstract

Despite a large body of literature on the calculations of costs of air emissions from shipping, calculations of damages to the marine water are missing. This paper calculated the costs of NOx emissions from shipping entering an environmentally heterogeneous sea by applying the abatement cost approach. The total costs and unit shadow cost of NOx were then calculated by means of the marginal abatement cost for international agreements on targets of nitrogen loads to the sea. This conceptual model highlighted the need to distinguish between direct emissions of NOx on the sea and indirect emissions through deposition of emissions on land in the catchment with subsequent transportation into the sea. Calculated total cost amounted to 240 million euros, where indirect deposition accounted for 23% of the costs. The unit shadow costs ranged between 1.41 and 3.69 euros/kg NOx-N depending on location of the vessel.

Keywords

NOx emissions; Marine environmental damage; Shipping; Shadow pricing; Abatement cost approach; Baltic sea

Published in

Journal of Environmental Management
2021, volume: 300, article number: 113824
Publisher: ACADEMIC PRESS LTD- ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD

SLU Authors

• Gren, Ing-Marie

  • Department of Economics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Global goals (SDG)

SDG9 Industry, innovation and infrastructure
SDG14 Life below water

UKÄ Subject classification

Environmental Sciences

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.113824

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/114129