On Thursday, EU co-legislators preliminarily agreed to update EU rules on preventing pollution from ships in European seas and ensuring perpetrators face fines.

Banning more types of spills from ships

According to the deal, the current list of substances banned from being discharged from ships, such as oil and noxious liquid substances, will now include the discharge of sewage, garbage, and residues from scrubbers.

MEPs managed to secure an obligation for the EU to review the rules five years after their transposition into national law to assess if marine plastic litter, loss of containers and plastic pellet spills from ships should also face penalties.

More robust verification

MEPs ensured EU countries and the Commission will communicate more on pollution incidents, best practices to tackle pollution, and follow-up measures, following alerts by the European satellite system for oil spill and vessel detection, CleanSeaNet. To prevent illegal discharge from dispersing and therefore…