“New York Highway”, a pure car carrier owned by Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, Ltd. (hereinafter called “K” Line) and Taiyo Nippon Kisen Kaisha, Ltd., arrived at the port of Muroran in Hokkaido,

Japan on March 9, 2010 and completed her final duties as a car carrier.
She was built in 1985 by Oshima Shipbuilding Co. Ltd. and has been
employed in the transport of a huge number of completed cars throughout
the world in her 156 voyages. This “swan song” voyage to Muroran was her
157th voyage but without cargo, just to transport herself to the port
for a new duty involving the development of a modern ship recycling
system in Japan. The recycling system is a pilot project organized by
Maritime Bureau of MLITT (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure,
Transportation and Tourism) in Japan,

The Japanese Ship Owners’
Association (JSA) had requested its member companies to offer ships to
the pilot project from an early stage. After the Maritime Bureau’s
official invitation to the project, “K” Line, a member of JSA, nominated
the “New York Highway” and contracted the sale of the vessel to Teraoka
Co., Ltd., a member of Muroran Ship Recycling Study Group which was
awarded the project by Maritime Bureau. The management of the group will
be done by Japan Marine Science Inc. and Teraoka Co. Ltd. with other
members executing the project.

Dismantling of ships tends to be
carried out in developing countries where labor cost is low and demand
for scrap steel is strong. But there has been an argument
internationally that pollution to the environment and labor accidents
due to unsafe operations in developing countries should be corrected. In
May 2009, Hong Kong International Convention for the Safe and
Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships 2009 was adopted by IMO aimed
at protecting the environment and improving the safety of laborers in
ship recycling facilities.

One of the most important requirements of
the convention is keeping an inventory of hazardous and harmful
materials onboard, showing the exact location and quantity, with such
inventory to be submitted to a ship recycling facility with all updated
data once the ship is handed over to such a facility.

In spite of
the new convention not yet having come into effect, “New York Highway”
already has proper inventory in compliance with the guidelines for the
development of the inventory of hazardous materials. Her inventory was
made in advance with the good assistance of the Japan Ship Technology
Research Association and approved by class NK.

It is our inherent
duty as a major shipping company to secure safe and environmentally
friendly facilities for ship recycling after the final safe operation of
our owned vessels. Actually all of the ship recycling facilities we
adopted for our owned vessels have ISO 14001 Certification and are
evaluated as green yards by our own audit according to “K” Line’s
Environmental Policy.

We expect that this experiment of ship
recycling using our “New York Highway” will contribute to further
developing a successful ship recycling system in Japan and produce
environmentally friendly and highly advanced technical information that
can be shared with other ship recycling industries worldwide.

Source:
Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha, Ltd.

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