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European ports must provide electricity to ships by 2030

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Projects to install infrastructure to prove challenging

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Environmentalists say shore power only fixes part of the

problem

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United States and the Caribbean lag Europe

By Catarina Demony, Corina Pons and Doyinsola Oladipo

LISBON/MADRID, July 2 (Reuters) - Residents near the

port of Lisbon and elsewhere hope plug-in infrastructure can

take some of the pain out of sharing their cities with cruise

ships that belch out fumes while pleasure-seeking passengers see

the sights.

European Union rules designed to reduce carbon emissions

have focused attention on the issue by setting a 2030 deadline

for maritime ports to have installed the infrastructure ships

need to use electricity rather than highly-polluting marine fuel

when they are moored.

Residents say switching to electricity could be a boon.

"It is as if a giant car had its engines on in front of us,"

Joao Branco told Reuters as he stood at a viewpoint in Alfama,

one of the city's oldest neighbourhoods, where Lisbon's cruise

terminal was inaugurated in 2017.

Branco, 42, who with his partner, is expecting his first

child, hopes the next generation will be spared some of the

toxins and noise as hundreds of vessels, carrying hundreds of

thousands of passengers every year, leave their engines running

in port to power onboard amenities including lighting and air

conditioning.

Carlos Torres, 48, also a resident of Alfama, said

electrification was essential.

"The activity of the cruise terminal has a huge

environmental impact and it has a negative impact on the health

of those who live here," he said.

Data from Brussels-based NGO Transport & Environment (T&E)

ranked Lisbon as the European city with the fifth highest level

of air pollution from cruise ships, behind the ports of

Barcelona, Civitavecchia, Palma and Piraeus.

Pollution from marine fuels includes sulphur dioxide,

nitrogen oxides and harmful particulate matter as well as carbon

emissions.

Depending on a ship's destination and the regulations in

place there, it could be using a fuel whose sulphur content is

100 to 500 times higher than Europe's sulphur standard for cars,

T&E said.

As the number of travellers continues to grow, adding more

generally to the strain on local economies, electrification is

an imperfect and costly fix.

In Lisbon, the 27-million-euro ($28.97 million) project to

lay cables to connect the port to a power station 4.4 kilometres

(2.73 miles) away, is set to be ready by 2029.

It would allow the three cruise ships the port can

accommodate at once to connect to the grid, the Portuguese

infrastructure ministry said.

Around three quarters of Portugal's electricity supply is

renewable power and the percentage is rising. Replacing marine

fuel as an energy source while ships are moored would reduce 77%

of greenhouse gases emitted annually around the Lisbon port

area, the ministry added.

Carlos Correia, president of Lisbon port, said Portugal's

high percentage of renewable power gave it a major advantage.

"If we had electricity that was produced through fossil

fuels... we would be reducing (emissions) here at the port but

increasing it at the source," he said.

VARYING PACE OF CHANGE

In neighbouring Spain, Barcelona's port, the country's

busiest for cruise ships, plans to provide electricity at one of

its seven cruise terminals by 2026 and at all terminals by 2030.

The smaller port of Palma de Mallorca already supplies power

to ferries and said it expects to extend that to cruise ships by

2030.

Elsewhere, officials were more tentative.

At Civitavecchia, near Rome, and Piraeus in Greece,

operators said they were studying or planning for onshore power

points but cited concerns around electricity capacity.

Beyond Europe, progress is slower, notably in the United

States and the Caribbean, the world's main cruise tourism hub.

Nick Rose, head of environmental, social, and governance at

Royal Caribbean, the world's second largest cruise operator,

said the region represented a "unique challenge", with shore

power unlikely to be feasible on most islands.

Along the U.S. West Coast, cruise ports offer at least one

berth that can provide shore power, while on the East Coast,

Miami's port says it will be able to provide power to a maximum

of three cruise ships at a time by December.

For their part, the cruise ship companies say they are

working on the issue.

Leading operator Carnival Corp ( CCL ) said it aimed to

achieve "100% fleet shore power by 2050", while Royal Caribbean

Group said its full fleet should be retrofitted by

2030.

T&E's Constance Dijkstra referred to the chicken-and-egg

situation often cited with electric vehicle charging, saying

lack of demand had slowed the development of infrastructure.

She said cruise ships often do not plug in because it would

not be compulsory in Europe until 2030, and cost was a major

factor as producing electricity "using dirty fuels" is cheaper.

Lisbon's port president said the operator had not decided on

tariffs but that it was cheaper for ships to rely on engine

power for now.

Industry body Cruise Lines International Association

(CLIA) said governments must step in, just as they have provided

incentives for electric vehicles.

"We are all committed to the green transformation and

obviously we all have to do our part," Alfredo Serrano, the

association's Spanish director said, adding the commitment was

that by 2028 around 80% of the world's cruise ships would be

equipped to use shore power.

That means a great deal of infrastructures needs to be put

in place: only 36 of the 1,200 cruise ports worldwide had the

capacity to supply electricity at least at one of their

terminals, according to CLIA data from March.

($1 = 0.9319 euros)