EUROFER, Recycling Europe and the NGO Shipbreaking Platform are calling on the European Commission to ban beaching and landing methods in ship recycling.
The appeal comes as the Commission reviews technical guidance for third-country ship recycling facilities. These guidelines are used to assess whether non-EU yards can recycle EU-flagged vessels under the EU Ship Recycling Regulation.
The organisations argue that the current system creates double standards between EU yards and approved third-country facilities.
They call for:
- A clear ban on beaching and landing.
- Full containment requirements for dismantling.
- Equivalent environmental permits and impact assessments for third-country yards.
- A clear procedure for suspending or removing non-compliant yards from the EU List.
- Inclusion of Basel Convention obligations.
- Scrutiny of downstream facilities processing secondary raw materials, including steel.
The organisations also repeat their call to remove Turkish yards from the EU List until improvements are made.
They point to ongoing concerns in Aliağa, Turkey, including weak environmental permitting, poor monitoring, unsafe working conditions and waste-management shortcomings.
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