Greek shipping and ports on an ecological course. EUR 500 million for ports and SSS

By Marek Grzybowski

IMO and EU regulations will cost Greek coastal shipping €420 million a year. Despite this, the Greek Statistical Office ELSTAT recently stated that it sees positive signs for Greek shipping after 2024. In fact, just by observing the traffic in Piraeus, it can be seen that tourist interest in Greece has increased. The market is recovering quickly. According to ELSTAT, in 2019, a total of 19 million passengers boarded ferries in the country’s main ports. In 2021, there were about 13 million of them, and in 2022 about 17.5 million – estimates the analytical company XRTC in the “Annual Report on Greek Ferry Market – 2023”.
If the market grows at such a pace, passenger transport in 2025 may return to the level of 2019, i.e. before the Covid-19 pandemic. But short sea shipping and Greek ports still do not provide the highest standards, such as Stena Line Polska on the Gdynia-Kalskrona connection.
– The largest port in the country, Piraeus, served a total of over 16 million passengers, while in 2022, approximately 15 million people boarded coastal ships and ferries, and in 2021 there were less than 12 million – according to data made available by shipping agents to the portal “Naftemporiki”.
“Naftemporiki” reports that “positive indications for high results in tourism in 2024” The results in the industry are disturbed by “competition from ferry carriers operating on toll-free lines, with approximately 200 ferries operating.” The results of commercial carriers will probably be better in 2024, as there has been an increase in interest on 73 lines.

 

Ferries and Coastal shipping on an expensive route
A significant imperfection of Greek shipping is the outdated fleet. – Coastal shipping will lose about EUR 420 million annually in payments for greenhouse gas emission rights and will have to introduce restrictions on passenger traffic – warns Dionysis Theodoratos, President of the Association of Passenger Shipping Companies (SEEN).
He noted at the conference “The Ecological Transformation of Coastal Shipping: Challenges and Prospects for Insularity”, organized by the University of the Aegean, that “shipping will lose around €420 million a year in pollution rights fees and as a result of reduced passenger numbers.”
The conference noted that Italians had moved quickly to secure funding for their country’s coastal shipping, and Manolis Koutoulakis, secretary general of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Island Policy, said that the Greek government would also respond quickly to upcoming EU regulations.
Short Sea Shipping in Greece is technologically significantly different from the situation in the merchant fleet, whose shipowners are still investing in younger and modern vessels. In addition to coastal shipping, the short sea shipping fleet faces a serious challenge. The president of the Greek Association of Short Sea Shipowners, Charalambos Simantonis, has proposed including the country’s short sea shipping fleet in the recovery fund.

The proposal was accepted because domestic short sea shipping vessels connect the mainland of the country with the islands. The national short sea transport fleet consists of 102 ships, of which 35 are general cargo ships with an average age of 45 years and the rest are tankers with an average age of 35 years.
– Available financial tools are essential to modernize the short sea fleet to make the ship green, as green technologies almost double the price of the ship. At the same time, appropriate infrastructure must be built in ports, because a “green” ship cannot exist without a “green” port. The national legal framework should be modernized and harmonized with new data, Simantonis said, reports “Naftemporiki”.
Short Sea Shipping in Greece complements the ferry fleet, and in many cases constitutes an important base for passenger shipping and island ports. According to Naftemporika’s sources, there is great interest in the Kythira, Western Cyclades and Lemnos connections, but also in smaller services on local routes, such as Aghia Kyriaki – Trikeri – Volos. In tenders, the Ministry of Shipping focuses on attracting shipowners offering newer and more modern ships. But these are still few and far between.

Costly transformation in shipping and ports
Back in spring, Greece presented a package of commitments to ensure that its coastal shipping and port network dramatically reduces its carbon footprint over the next few years. The commitments, announced by Minister of Shipping and Island Policy Christos Stylianides at the Our Ocean conference in Athens, included public spending of up to 860 million euros ($915.6 million).
Stylianides said he was fully aware of the “heavy responsibility to ensure that the Greek maritime sector makes every effort to respond to and satisfy the needs of our oceans and to guarantee their sustainable development,” according to Lloyd’s List.
Greece is determined to “take a leading role” at both European and global levels “as the largest ship-owning country,” he said. To reduce the environmental impact, the government has committed to replacing the country’s passenger shipping fleet of around 200 ships.
The study leading to the development of an overall fleet renewal strategy will be completed by June 2025, Stylianides said. An initial budget of €80 million has been allocated to the introduction of low-emission vessels on coastal services as a public service, including on state-subsidized routes. However, this amount may be increased up to EUR 360 million.

EUR 500 million for ports and shipping
“Today we are creating a public-private partnership to build ecological ships that do not depend on fossil fuels,” said Stylianides, emphasizing that “This is a long-term project, covering a time horizon of “three to four years.”
According to current plans, the largest part of the budget announced so far will be allocated to investments in the greening of Greece’s port infrastructure, for which a budget of EUR 500 million has been allocated.
At least 12 Greek ports on the mainland and islands will be equipped with ship-to-shore power facilities by 2030. At international level, Greece will participate in the Maritime Clean Energy Hubs Initiative, the minister said. And this activity of Greece was already visible at the Posidonia 2024 fair. It was manifested in the topics of conferences and seminars.

Alternative fuels and upgrading the skills of seafarers were the focus of the “Greener Shipping Summit 2024” held at Posidonia 2024. The conference was organized under the slogan “New Technologies and Education” by Newsfront and Naftiliaki and supported by MARTECMA (Marine Technical Managers Association ).
In the introductory speech, Dimitris Fafalios, President of INTERCARGO. He said: “We cannot achieve the IMO goals without ensuring safe navigation. “Shipping is an extremely broad concept covering many sectors: bulk carriers, tankers, gas carriers, ro-ro, car carriers, ferries, cruise ships and others.”

Fuel and seafarer training
– However, maritime transport can be divided into two basic economic models. The first is liner shipping, and the second is tramping and bulk and tanker transport. To develop appropriate decarbonization and safety regulations, we need to help our regulators understand the fundamental difference between the two basic economic models of shipping, Fafalios stressed.
Prof. Kostas Spyrou from Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, National Technical University of Athens, said that “It is difficult to imagine the ship of the future, because everything depends on certain factors that may influence the direction in which technology will take. We can’t be sure what will happen in 15 years, but overall, the direction [of fleet development – MG] must be more ecological.
Prof. Kostas Spyrou noted that fleet operators face the challenge “of having to train approximately half a million seafarers in [the use of ships – MG] alternative fuels that will power the engine rooms of ships around the world.
The subject of heated debate was determining the number of seafarers who would require training, the number of instructors and methods of training, and whether upskilling would be a prerequisite for the energy transition, given that the shift from steam to diesel did not require large-scale upskilling programs in past.
Observing what is happening in Greek short sea shipping and discussions about the energy transformation in maritime transport gives a lot to think about. The Greeks have already calculated the costs and set directions for changes in maritime transport and ports.
It is worth monitoring the progress of changes taking place in Greek shipping and tracking the costs of these changes. They will multiply in the European Union, not only in island countries. We must also prepare for the adaptation of ports and shipping to IMO and EU requirements in the Baltic ports and in Poland. Fleet and port customers must be prepared to share in the costs of the ecological transformation of maritime transport.