Clean Shipping Index verification exemptions following the pandemic

Society and the maritime sector has been greatly influenced by the current pandemic sweeping over the world. As a result, the Ferry and shipping traffic has been reduced during 2020. For the shipping companies operating on Swedish waters there is a possibility to take part of the environmental incentive from the Swedish Maritime Administration based on the Clean Shipping Index (CSI). In the CSI system there are some yearly updates and visits that need to be performed onboard the ships, which in a pandemic, is not considered neither responsible or wise to perform. As a result, the Swedish Maritime Administration and CSI has decided on some adjustments from the yearly requirements as described below.   

Below points have also been individually communicated to carriers and verifiers through CSI's registered contacts, as well as announced at the website. The exemptions are in force until further notice and applied in the Swedish Maritime Administrations environmental incentive.

No requirements on annual updates

Changes in shipping operations will potentially influence vessel performances, causing non-representative figures. Therefore, Clean Shipping Index has, together with the Swedish maritime administration, decided that, for each individual vessel, the next upcoming annual update will be fulfilled automatically, starting from January 1st, 2021. This means no action is required until the next subsequential annual update (if such exists). A voluntary vessel performance update can of course be carried out as usual.

Office and on-board audits

Due to social distancing procedures applied by authorities, as part of the Covid-19 counteractions, the requirements on both office and onboard audits during verification are removed. Procedures replacing physical inspections are to be determined by the verifier by his/her best ability and could for instance include a round-trip remote meeting with on-board personnel.

Application of CO2 data representing pre-Covid period

For new certificates, CO2 data from the historical period between 24-12 months back in time can be used instead of the past 12 months as described in the original guidelines. This measure is in place to mitigate issues with non-representative CO2 figures affecting CSI classes. 

Further questions should primarily be directed to:

rickard@cleanshippingindex.com (CSI)
sabina.hoppe@sjofartsverket.se (SMA)