2) The Shipbuilders' Association of Japan (SAJ), ahead of its fellow traders in the world, in 1991 decided to refrain from using anti-fouling paints for ship bottoms containing tributyl tin (TBT) compounds, and Japanese paint manufactures in January 1993 stopped selling such products.
In the meantime, shipbuilders and paint manufacturers worked together to develop tin-free alternatives, and their R&D efforts to work out superior pollution-free anti-fouling paints are still continuing.
In November 1998, the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC) of the IMO adopted a resolution prohibiting the use of anti-fouling paints containing TBT compounds. The resolution calls for a total ban on the use of such paints from January 1, 2008 onward, heralding a global drive to eliminate harmful hull coating.
3) The extensive oil spills ensuing from the wreckage of the Russian flag tanker NAKHODKA, which occurred in January 1997 in the Japan Sea, had disastrous impacts on the marine environment and fishing in the coastal waters. As a directly affected nation, Japan investigated the cause of the accident, and found it attributable to insufficient strength due to heavily worn out structural members of the hull. Japan pointed out the inadequacy of the systems of inspection by the flag state, classification society and port state, which all allowed the tanker to sail. At the same time, Japan con-ducted extensive strength analyses, and proposed to the IMO to include longitudinal strength evaluation, based on plate thickness measurement, in flag state inspection of existing tankers and at the same time to strengthen the authority of port state inspection. In 2000, the IMO decided to incorporate these points into an enhanced inspection program to be elaborated upon later in this article.
When the Russian tanker wrecked, Japan had neither a ship nor an oil skimmer which could successfully retrieve oil spills of high viscosity against high waves. In view of this bitter experience, ASIS carried out a four-year R&D project from fiscal 1998 to work out an oil skimmer and an oil fence which could serve practical purposes in rough weather even if the spilt oil is very viscous.
4) The sinking of the ERIKA in December 1999 off the French coast motivated the EU to take a unilateral action to accelerate the phasing-out of single-hull tankers, but the issue was referred to the IMO's MEPC with a view to discussing it as a matter of international, instead of regional, regulation. The findings of Japan's study were presented to the MEPC 45 in October 2000, and it was agreed to address the matter in a more gradual way, in-stead of the drastic acceleration advocated by some EU member countries, so that the supply-demand balance in world shipbuilding may not be disturbed. The final decision is scheduled to come about in April 2001.
2-2 Prevention of Air Pollution
Of all air pollutants, SOx and NOx are now attracting global concern. At the meeting of the IMO-MEPC in 1990, it was discussed to reduce the current levels of SOx and NOx by 50% and 30%, respectively, by 2000. Subsequent debates took up halon, fluorochlorocarbon and VOC emissions from ships as subjects of control in addition to SOx and NOx, and the 40th meeting of the IMO-MEPC in September 1998 adopted a new set of rules incorporating the outcomes of these debates as Annex VI "Regulations Regarding the Prevention of Air Polluting Emissions from Ships" to the MARPOL 73 / 78 Convention.
