EUROPEAN COMMISSION

Brussels, 1.6.2023

SWD(2023) 159 final

COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT

EVALUATION

Accompanying the document

PROPOSAL FOR A DIRECTIVE OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL

amending Directive 2005/35/EC on shop-source pollution and on the introduction of penalties, including criminal penalties, for pollution offences

{COM(2023) 273 final} - {SEC(2023) 209 final} - {SWD(2023) 164 final}

Table of contents OF THE eVALUATION

1.Introduction

2.What was the expected outcome of the intervention?

2.1.Description of the intervention and its objectives

2.2.Points of comparison

3.How has the situation evolved over the evaluation period?

3.1. Current state of play

4.Evaluation findings

4.1.To what extent was the intervention successful and why?

4.2.How did the EU intervention make a difference?

4.3.Is the intervention still relevant?

5.What are the conclusions and lessons learned?

5.1.Conclusions

5.2.Lessons learned

Annex I: Procedural Information

Annex II. Methodology and Analytical models used

Annex III. Evaluation matrix and, where relevant, Details on answers to the evaluation questions (by criterion)

3.1Effectiveness

3.2Efficiency

3.3Coherence

3.4EU Added Value

3.5Relevance

Annex IV. Overview of benefits and costs

Annex V. Stakeholders consultation - Synopsis report

Glossary

1.    Introduction

This report presents the findings of the first evaluation of “Directive 2005/35/EC on ship-source pollution and on the introduction of penalties, including criminal penalties, for pollution offences as amended by Directive 2009/123/EC” (hereinafter “the SSP Directive” or “the Directive”). The evaluation is performed “back-to-back” with an Impact Assessment for the review of the Directive. The Directive is one of EU’s initiatives aiming at less pollution to the sea from maritime transport.

Context

Directive 2005/35/EC on ship-source pollution and on the introduction of penalties for pollution offences (amended by Directive 2009/123/EC to include criminal penalties) deals with penalties for illegal discharges of oil and noxious substances from ships into the sea. In this context, illegal means anything that does not meet the relevant International Maritime Organization (IMO) International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL) standards 1 .

As with other maritime legislation, incorporating such international obligations into an EU directive made the provisions actionable before the Court of Justice of the European Union (EU) and provided the conditions for better enforcement within the EU and for European seas. The text of the Directive stipulates that any discharges above the thresholds set in MARPOL Annexes I and II (the political priority in the wake of the Erika accident) are infringements under the SSP Directive leading to penalties. Prosecution and penalising of the offender rests with the EU Member States and is carried out in accordance with their judicial system.

The imposition of penalties for pollution offences from ships finds its origin in international law. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS 2 ) specifies that a State can impose penalties for pollution committed by a foreign vessel in case of major damage to the coastal state or if the flag state in question has repeatedly disregarded its obligations of enforcement.

The SSP Directive has a requirement that penalties must be “effective, proportionate, and dissuasive”. Such requirement is often set in EU legislation. It also provides for a clearer liability regime than the one laid down at international level as it specifies when a person can be convicted – for example, the master of the ship responsible for an illegal discharge committed carelessly.

The SSP Directive was the impetus behind the creation of the CleanSeaNet service (CleanSeaNet), which is the Earth observation, satellite oil spill detection service hosted by the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA). Combined with the EMSA vessel traffic monitoring capability, it helps Member States carry out their duty of identifying ship-source pollution at sea. CleanSeaNet sends an alert to a Member State when a possible spill is detected by satellite surveillance. Member States are responsible for confirming if the spill actually took place and for identifying the polluter. Approximately, 5% of possible spills alerted by CleanSeaNet were subsequently confirmed to be mineral oil spills when verified by Member States. 3 CleanSeaNet has also offered effective assistance to Member States for the monitoring of accidental pollution during emergencies, such as when spills occur during a rescue operation in bad weather.

Illegal discharges from ships however are only one of the sources of pollution to the marine environment. Globally, around 35% of oil that enters the sea comes from regular shipping operations. Around 45% of oil is input from land-based sources with municipal/industrial effluents and from routine oil rig operations, 10% from accidents of oil tankers, 5% natural sources, 5% undefined sources. 4

In line with the SSP Directive, illegal discharges committed with intent, recklessly or serious negligence which lead to the deterioration of the quality of the seawater are classified as criminal offences. The Directive does not require that all infringements must follow the criminal regime. Administrative penalties are used more often for cases of ship-source pollution. Member States apply administrative penalties in most (approximately 80%) of their cases. 5

The SSP Directive was the first piece of EU legislation regulating criminal penalties for environmental offences. Later in 2008, the EU adopted a horizontal instrument, the Environmental Crime Directive 6 which did not cover ship-source pollution. A new Environmental Crime Directive has been proposed by the European Commission in 2021 that is currently being discussed by the co-legislators. 7 The revision includes – for the first time – ship-source pollution as a criminal offence. This is a legal requirement stemming from specific provisions on the harmonisation of criminal law in the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU. Consequently, ship-source pollution administrative penalties will remain within the scope of the SSP Directive but criminal penalties will be covered by the new Environmental Crime Directive. 

The SSP Directive is closely linked with the Directive on Port Reception Facilities 8 for ship waste. When the directive on Port Reception Facilities was revised in 2019 with stronger rules and better monitoring of ships’ waste delivery at ports, there was a call by the co-legislators to review the SSP Directive, to avoid a situation whereby more illegal discharges would be found at sea if nothing was done to expand the scope of the SSP Directive to match the scope of the Port Reception Facilities Directive and make the penalties proportionate in this context.

The SSP Directive incorporates international standards for ship-source pollution stipulating that any discharges above standards set out in MARPOL Annexes I and II are infringements. The SSP Directive also supplements the international framework with elements that complement the MARPOL regime. More specifically:

·It established EU competence in criminal matters for ship-source pollution as international law does not specify the type of penalties to be applied (UNCLOS Art 230).

·It offers an EU liability regime 9 for ship-source pollution penalties across the EU.

·It was the impetus behind the creation of an EU tool for satellite surveillance (CleanSeaNet).

Purpose and scope of the evaluation

The purpose of the evaluation is an assessment of the performance of all substantive provisions of the SSP Directive across the European Union. There is no legal requirement to evaluate the legislation included in the Directive. However, there was an explicit call by the co-legislators 10 to review the SSP Directive in the Port Reception Facilities Directive. This is the first evaluation performed for this Directive.

The Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy 11  underlined the importance of a sustainable maritime transport sector. The Communication on the European Green Deal 12 , followed by the 2021 Communication on the Zero Pollution Action Plan 13 , stressed the need for preventing pollution. The revision of the SSP Directive is included in the Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy (action 14).

As mentioned in the roadmap combined evaluation /Inception Impact Assessment 14 , the evaluation work examines the effect that the SSP Directive has had in terms of reducing illegal discharges from ships and how it contributed to the number of convictions or the level of imposed penalties in the Member States. The focus is on potential problems encountered with the implementation and application of the Directive and whether illegal discharges/pollution offences related to polluting substances covered by this Directive have been subject to effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties in Member States, and what the effect has been on overall ship-source pollution in the EU.

Against this background, the Commission has carried out an evaluation of the SSP Directive, in a back-to-back manner with the Impact Assessment for the review of this Directive. More specifically and in line with the Better Regulation Guidelines, this evaluation analyses:

·effectiveness, to assess the actual changes the Directive has triggered, particularly in view of its original objectives;

·efficiency, to assess the actual costs relative to the actual benefits of the implementation, and whether there is potential for simplification and increasing cost-efficiency;

·relevance, to assess whether the overall problem analysis and related objectives are still adequate and how the policy context has evolved;

·added value to the EU, its impact beyond what reasonably could have been achieved by national and regional policies; and

·coherence of the regulatory framework, regarding both the internal coherence and the coherence with other key legislation and policy initiatives at EU level.

The methodology used to carry out the evaluation was developed with the support of an external study and in line with the Better Regulation Guidelines and Toolbox 15 . The methodology is detailed in Annex II of this report. An evaluation matrix (provided in Annex III of this report) was elaborated to answer the evaluation questions. It identified relevant operational questions, indicators, research tools and data sources. Figure 1 provides a summary of the scope of the evaluation and of the Directive.

Figure 1. Scope of the evaluation of the SSP Directive

The following sources of information were used for this evaluation:

·Information from stakeholder consultation activities. These included an online public consultation, targeted surveys, interviews, stakeholder meetings and a dedicated stakeholder workshop;

·A review of existing literature including relevant EMSA reports and datasets; and

·Member States implementation reports i.e. reporting under Article 12 of the Directive.

The limitations inherent to the methodology were:

·serious data gaps on the verification and prosecution of ship-source pollution incidents;

·no centrally collected data concerning the number of infringements and penalties imposed at national level. When available, the data is fragmented, not collected according to uniform standards or inaccurate. It presents several gaps and some conflicting information;

·lack of consistently reported data concerning the period prior to the introduction of the Directive;

·lack of consistently reported data on the implementation of the Directive i.e. reporting under Article 12 of the Directive;

·low rate of feedback logged by Member States in CleanSeaNet;

·scarce data on costs and no quantitative information on benefits; and

·little stakeholder feedback on the implementation of the Directive. The response rate has been low and information received very limited 16 .

The Commission chose a “back-to-back” approach (i.e. the evaluation and impact assessment have been launched at the same time) in order to: (i) provide an overview on the existing poor evidence-base, (ii) signal the limitations caused by the data gap and, in parallel, to (iii) provide the basis for more robust reporting arrangements in the future as well as (iv) pragmatic measures to address the existing and still relevant problem addressed by the Directive.

The data available for this evaluation was not sufficiently robust to make a complete ex-post assessment for all Member States. There is no representative data available on the indicators to measure the success of the Directive (e.g. the increased proportion of identified pollution incidents of Annex I and II type subject to penalties). However, despite the limitations, this evaluation gives a comprehensive snapshot of the existing information and provides a consistent analysis of the implementation of the Directive. For some evaluation criteria, in particular relevance and coherence, the evidence gathered was satisfactory. Availability and quality of data was a challenge affecting in particular the assessment of the effectiveness and efficiency criteria. Where quantitative data was available, it was used to make estimations and was complemented by stakeholder opinions and positions, although stakeholders were not very responsive to the various consultation activities. Information gathered from different sources, including input from stakeholders were compared and triangulated whenever possible. In the case when available data and literature was limited (e.g. linked to the assessment of efficiency and efficiency criteria), consultation responses were relied upon to answer the evaluation questions and are indicated throughout this report.

2.    What was the expected outcome of the intervention?

2.1.    Description of the intervention and its objectives

The purpose and general objective of the Directive was to incorporate international standards for ship-source pollution into Community law and to ensure that persons responsible for discharges of polluting substances to sea are subject to penalties, including criminal penalties. Addressing oil spills from ships was the main environmental priority in the wider policy framework in the 80-90s and continued in years 2000-2005. The underlying reason for the Directive was the public concern caused by two significant accidents involving the tankers Erika (1999) and Prestige (2002), shown in  Figure 2 as well as the frequent occurrence of tarballs on the EU’s beaches in the 1990s.

Figure 2. The trigger of the intervention

Source: EMSA and EEA. The European Maritime Transport Environmental Report (EMTER)  (2021)

There was a need to prevent marine pollution caused by ships especially to prevent oil spills. The key problem that the intervention was intended to solve was that many ships discharging pollutants illegally did not face penalties. Such situation, therefore, did not discourage other ships from polluting EU waters. One of the reasons why polluters were rarely penalised was that Member States had limited capacity to effectively detect and verify cases of ship-source pollution.

The objectives of the intervention are in line with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 which covers safeguarding marine and coastal ecosystems by preventing and reducing marine pollution. SDG 14.1 includes the goal of preventing and significantly reducing marine pollution of all kinds. The Directive also contributes towards SDG 3 (“Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages”) and SDG 16 (“Peace justice and strong institutions”).

The Directive was designed to address the missing link between the cause of the pollution into the sea and the accountability of the persons responsible for it. To address the needs and solve the problem, the following specific objectives were pursued:

·harmonise among Member States the enforcement of the international rules i.e. the MARPOL Convention;

·ensure that Member States effectively prosecute persons responsible for illegal discharges to the sea and apply effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties;

·ensure cooperation and exchange of relevant information in the context of the detection, verification and prosecution of ship-source pollution.

To achieve the objectives, actions were needed across the law enforcement chain as depicted in Figure 4 .

Figure 3. Law enforcement chain for the SSP Directive

The expected achievements of the Directive were the improvements in the response of Member States:

·detection of the illegal discharges from ships; 

·identification of offenders; and 

·prosecution leading to penalties.

The success of the Directive was seen as developing a harmonised approach in all Member States towards the infringement definition and penalties. This could bring increased coordination and cooperation of Member States by exchange of information on the verification of incidents and better support for collecting the necessary evidence. The intention was also to provide the legal basis for the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) to engage in monitoring/surveillance activities for ship-source pollution.

In practice, the above-mentioned actions were ultimately expected to ensure that Member States:

·treat illegal discharges as infringements in a harmonised way (i.e. imposing effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties); 

·have in place strong surveillance processes with modern technical solutions and information exchange mechanisms supported by EMSA.

The expected outputs were changes to the national legislations i.e. harmonising natural or legal person liability and penalty provisions and improved response i.e. law enforcement activities in Member States (detection, verification and prosecution of polluter). It was also intended to increase the cooperation between Member States by institutional capacity building (e.g. knowledge exchange and training for authorities) and by offering EU-wide technical solutions and the support of EMSA. Those outputs should be achieved on a consistent basis across the EU while taking into account the specific characteristics of the judicial systems of the Member States.

The intervention logic is presented in Figure 4 . The implementation of the Directive (measures) should lead to specific outputs as well as impacts, reflecting the objectives of the Directive. The identified outputs represent the expected direct outcomes of the measures and obligations of Member States as defined in the Directive. The results and their impacts should be in line with the specific and general objectives of the Directive.

To sum up, the actions taken as a result of this intervention should support Member States in timely detection of illegal discharges and identification of polluters. It should foster verification (e.g. evidence collection) and principally increase effective prosecution and penalising.

Figure 4: Intervention Logic of Directive 2005/35/EC

Source: Ricardo (2023), Evaluation support study

2.2.    Points of comparison 

The counter-factual scenario estimates the likely developments in absence of this Directive over the evaluation period (2007-2021) and takes into account the methodological limitations mentioned in Annex III and section 1, including no centrally collected key data concerning the number of prosecutions.

When proposed, the Directive was not accompanied by an Impact Assessment. Therefore, the definition of the relevant points of comparison and the counter-factual scenario cannot be based on an Impact Assessment baseline. The definitions are consequently based on multiple sources (described in Annex II) that provide an assessment of the situation at the time of the adoption of the Directive and the expected outcomes.

The counter-factual scenario estimates the following developments:

·Member States would continue implementing the international rules for Annex I and II of the MARPOL Convention to varying extent with regional and national differences. Some Member States would have taken less action within their legal frameworks. See more details under the point of comparison on ‘Provisions on infringement and penalties in national legislation’.

·There would have been less technical means for surveillance as well as less electronic tools available for Member States to use. Cross-border communication, information collection and sharing would have been limited. See more details below under the point of comparison on ‘Detection’.

·In the absence of the Directive that mandates Member States to ensure that an appropriate inspection is undertaken in port 19  in case of suspicion that illegal discharge took place (Article 6), the usage of the existing EMSA-managed tools:  SafeSeaNet (maritime surveillance) and THETIS (vessel inspection) would have been more limited. See more details below under the point of comparison ‘Verification’.

·The types of penalties imposed by Member States would have been similar to the current situation. See more details below under the point of comparison on ‘Penalties’.

Prior to the adoption on the Directive, the situation could be described as follows.

Provisions on infringement and penalties in national legislation: Prior to the adoption of the Directive, Member States defined infringements differently in each country even if all were parties to MARPOL.

The situation was characterised as follows:

·There was less emphasis on criminal penalties, as international law does not specify the type of penalties to be applied (UNCLOS 20 Art 230);

·The focus was on illegal discharges in territorial waters, as international law supports non-monetary penalties for foreign vessels if wilful and serious pollution was committed in territorial waters (UNCLOS Art 230);

·Limited efforts were made on prosecuting foreign vessels as international rules stipulate that the flag State of the polluting ship shall be given priority in the investigation and penalty process (UNCLOS Art 228);

·Unintentional discharges committed with serious negligence were not explicitly included as being subject to administrative nor criminal offences.

Detection: Member States mostly used aerial and coastal surveillance (e.g. surveillance aircrafts and Coast Guard patrol boats) to monitor pollution at sea because satellite surveillance was not well developed, costly and provided limited data. Prior to the adoption of the Directive in 2005, there were limited satellite services to support surveillance of the sea. In the Baltic and North Sea, partial satellite surveillance was performed and in the Mediterranean Sea, there were research pilot projects with limited timeframes. 21  

Verification: At the time the Directive was adopted, Member States already cooperated to help each other in ship-source pollution verification. Member States used the existing maritime safety legislation and related tools: SafeSeaNet (maritime surveillance) and THETIS (vessel inspection) information exchange services developed by EMSA (see Figure 9 ). However, in the absence of the Directive, there was less coordinated pollution detection and less information exchange between Member States on pollution incidents leading, most likely, to less verification activities:

·the number of pollution incident reports (POLREPs) notified through SafeSeaNet would have most likely been smaller;

·the number of inspection requests submitted through THETIS related to suspected MARPOL infringements would have most likely been fewer.

Penalties: In the EU, there is a strong legal tradition to use administrative penalties for cases of ship-source pollution. Therefore, it is assumed that most convictions prior to 2005 were of administrative nature. There is insufficient data available, including from Member State interviews, on the proportion of administrative and criminal penalties imposed before the adoption of the Directive. Working under the assumption that the legal framework for the majority of Member States did not have the possibility to accommodate both administrative and criminal convictions, the share of criminal convictions most likely was lower across the Member States before the adoption of the Directive.

3.    How has the situation evolved over the evaluation period?

3.1. Current state of play

The black lumps of oil, often washed up on beaches in the 1980s, are rarely seen in Europe nowadays. Oil pollution of European seas has decreased over the years as presented in the example in Figure 5 .

Figure 5. The number of confirmed oil spills in the Baltic Sea during aerial surveillance by Member States (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Sweden).

Source: HELCOM “Annual report on discharges observed during aerial surveillance in the Baltic Sea 2021”

NB. The MARPOL Convention brought the number of oil tanker disasters down worldwide in the 1980s. MARPOL paved the way for the introduction of double hull tankers. It is now mandatory for all new tankers to be fitted with a double hull, so that once a vessel is involved in a collision which penetrates the outer hull, the tanks inside generally remain intact and oil does not spill. Globally, the number of oil spills from tanker incidents or caused by technical failures or explosions on tankers has fallen in recent decades, despite a steady growth in the seaborne oil trade 22 . Other factors that contributed to the downward trend are improved safety procedures, increased awareness of ship operators and reputational risk that can occur to the ship owners when a ship is caught for illegal discharge.

The facts above on the reduction of oil pollution at sea sets the scene for the state of play in implementing the Directive. The evaluation could not answer the question on how the decrease of oil spills is related to the dissuasive effect of penalties for ship-source pollution. This could not be quantified due to serious data limitations and is not discussed in this evaluation report. However, it is expected that the Directive contributed to the reduction of oil spills in European seas to some extent by increasing the chances of a ship being caught when discharging illegally in European seas because of (i) satellite surveillance and (ii) other tools available to all Member States supporting cooperation between the Member States, (iii) by strengthening the national legislation – all leading to the end result of (iv) penalties being imposed and their dissuasive effect.

Provisions on infringement and penalties in national legislation

The current state of play in implementing the Directive’s legal provisions across the EU has been analysed with view to highlight the differences between Member States. With the Directive in place, all Member States transposed the provisions on infringements and penalties to their national legislation. All Member States adopted procedures for holding natural and legal persons responsible for illegal discharges. There were two cases of nonconformity investigated by the Commission - in 2009 (infringement against Greece 23 ) and in 2010 (infringement against Ireland 24 ). Both cases were closed in 2011. An overview on how each Member State transposed the provisions on infringement and penalties is presented in Figure 6 . Due to different legal systems, some Member States do not provide for criminal liability for legal persons in their legislation e.g. in Belgium, Cyprus, Romania 25 .

Figure 6. Implementation of the SSP Directive by the Member States - differences in penalty procedures foreseen for ship-source pollution in the European Union.

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

The levels of penalties are an approximation summarised for the purpose of providing an overview on the scale.

Detection – state of play

The Directive (Article 10) was the legal basis for the creation of the CleanSeaNet service - the European satellite-based oil spill monitoring and vessel detection service, as summarised in Figure 7 . It allowed Member States to perform pollution detection activities using a combination of satellite and aerial surveillance.

Figure 7. CleanSeaNet service developed for the purpose of the SSP Directive

Source: EMSA CleanSeaNet service portal

CleanSeaNet provides information when a potential spill is detected, although it cannot confirm the spill, nor identify the polluter. The steady increase in the quality and quantity of satellite images has resulted in an increased number of spill alerts. Figure 8 shows that the number of CleanSeaNet alerts reported to Member States tripled over the last decade. This does not mean, however, that the pollution tripled.

Figure 8. The increase in CleanSeaNet alerts notifying the Member State authorities of a possible pollution event 

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study, based on EMSA CleanSeaNet services data. Alert reports sent to Member States and Norway and Iceland.

The accuracy of the CleanSeaNet service has improved thanks to semi-automatic data quality checks and better algorithms, so smaller spills can now be detected. With more information on potential spills, Member States can better target their verification activities. Upon receiving a CleanSeaNet alert, the national authority decides how to respond to a possible spill (e.g. whether to send an aircraft or patrol vessel to verify it and confirm that it was in fact a pollution incident).

Verification – state of play

National enforcement practices for verification vary across EU Member States depending on resources allocated to the sector. Aerial surveillance capacity (helicopters and sensor aircraft - manned or unmanned) differs - some Member States record high numbers of flight hours e.g. France, while others do not have aerial surveillance means e.g. Romania. Specialised national bodies perform aerial surveillance activities e.g. the Maritime Police, the coastguard, the Military/Armed Forces. Surveillance activities reported by Member States include deployment of military or coastguard patrol boats for coastal and port surveillance and use of multi-purpose monitoring flights. Also, merchant vessels or commercial airlines report to the authorities on potential incidents e.g. in Italy, France and Cyprus, supplementing national verification. 26  Data from the North Sea 27 and Baltic Sea 28  show that a high number of flight hours and verification activities result in more information on whether an oil spill occurred. As presented in Figure 5 based on the example of the Baltic Sea, verification activities are carried out systematically by Member States. This data does not go as far as providing information on the offender, however it shows the number of pollution incidents detected and confirmed. The verification capacity of the Member States of the North Sea and Baltic Sea are higher than those for the Mediterranean or Black Sea areas. There is no relevant data available for the latter and the verification efforts presented above are not representative for the whole of the EU. Nevertheless, the supporting evidence shows that verification activities are being undertaken and national assets are being deployed for this purpose.

The data shown in the figures below ( Figure 10 and Figure 11 ) indicates that Member States exchange information between each other, with the use of THETIS and SafeSeaNet. More information on the two tools is provided in Figure 9 . This supports the verification process and facilitates collecting the evidence to identify the polluter as to ultimately impose a dissuasive penalty. Thanks to combining information from CleanSeaNet on the location of the possible pollution and SafeSeaNet on the vessels that were in the vicinity, the Member State obtains information on possible polluters.

Figure 9. EMSA-managed tools relevant to ship-source pollution incidents

Source: EMSA  THETIS and EMSA  SafeSeaNet

The use of pollution incident reports (POLREPs) to communicate pollution events of common interest is not fully exploited by Member States. As seen in  Figure 10 , the majority of pollution incident reports submitted in SafeSeaNet comes from one Member State.

Figure 10. Number of pollution incident reports (POLREPs) issued in SafeSeaNet by Member States

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

Next, despite the increased number of CleanSeaNet alerts ( CleanSeaNet   provides information when a potential spill is detected, although it cannot confirm the spill, nor identify the polluter .   The steady increase in the quality and quantity of satellite images has result ed in a n   increase d number of spill alerts .   Figure 8 shows that the number of CleanSeaNet alerts reported to Member States tripled over the last decade. This does not mean ,   however, that the pollution tripled.

Figure 8 ), the number of inspection requests in ports was relatively constant over time, in case of suspicion that a discharge of Annex I or II pollutants took place ( Figure 11 ).

Figure 11. Number of inspection requests registered in THETIS by Member States with regard to MARPOL Annex I and II incidents

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

NB. Priority 1 triggers in THETIS the request for an inspection at the next port of call for the suspected ship. Priority 2 means that the ship is targeted for an inspection but not necessarily at the next port of call. It will be inspected within a certain time window depending on the ship's profile.

National verification activities (e.g. port state control inspections or checks on spot by means of aircraft) and their achievements in identifying the offenders is not evaluated in this report because such activities of Member States fall outside of the scope of the evaluation (i.e. were already carried out before the Directive was adopted). The evaluation thus focuses on the EU angle of cooperation and data exchange by presenting the activity of Member States in using SafeSeaNet and THETIS for ship-source pollution incidents.

Penalties – state of play

Infringements which lead to the deterioration of the quality of the seawater are classified as criminal offences if committed with intent, recklessness, or serious negligence (Article 5a and 5b). The Directive however does not specify that all infringements must follow the criminal regime. Administrative penalties are also possible under the SSP Directive. There are no centrally collected data concerning the type of procedures followed when imposing penalties, however, based on the interviews with Member States conducted as part of the evaluation, it was estimated that the majority of penalties imposed are administrative, as presented in  Figure 12 .

Figure 12. Estimated share of administrative and criminal penalties for ship-source pollution in the EU.

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study; NB. Estimation based on data and qualitative input on the frequency of administrative and criminal penalties applied over the period 2012-2021 from 8 Member States (PL, NL, IT, RO, EL, LV, FI, CY, DE) and Norway. This figure is indicative and points to the facts that the requirement of the Directive to impose criminal penalties is not fulfilled in the EU.

Currently, most Member States rarely take the criminal route.

·Criminal cases are frequently considered burdensome as they usually involve lengthy and resource-consuming processes, which Member State authorities cannot always undertake due to a lack of resources and expertise.

·Administrative penalties are often considered by Member States authorities to provide timely outcomes with reduced resource allocation.

Although the Directive includes provisions on criminal penalties, the practices in Member States did not change as compared to prior the adoption of the Directive. Administrative penalties were and are used more often than criminal penalties.

4.    Evaluation findings

This chapter presents the assessment of the five criteria (effectiveness, efficiency, coherence, EU added value and relevance) as to understand if the SSP Directive met the expectations of 2005, achieving EU-wide benefits.

4.1.    To what extent was the intervention successful and why? 

In this section, the success of the Directive over the evaluation period is assessed in terms of the extent to which it achieved its objectives effectively, efficiently, and in coherent way. The evidence provided is based on the detailed analysis by criterion in the evaluation matrix and answers to the evaluation questions documented in Annex III.

As concerns effectiveness, we investigated if the SSP Directive has been successful in achieving its intended objectives and present it under three headings following the law enforcement chain (detection, verification and prosecution).

Detection - findings

The starting point (to reach the objective of ensuring that persons responsible for illegal discharges are subject to penalties) is an effective system to support Member States in detecting the polluting substances at sea.

Satellite surveillance provides information on possible spills and is available to all Member States thanks to the EU-wide CleanSeaNet service. CleanSeaNet does not inform the Member State that a spill occurred nor does it indicate which ship is the offender. Member States identify the pollution, collect the evidence on the incident and confirm the offender. The satellite surveillance tool offers timely, yet limited information on the possibility of a spill based on which national authorities make a decision on the need for verification.

Member States do not always verify the CleanSeaNet alerts. An authority may decide that it is not operationally relevant to follow up the alert or does not have the means to perform the verification. The feedback of national authorities to information provided in CleanSeaNet is limited. It is uncertain whether Member States do not verify the possible spill or verify it and do not log the result of their verification in CleanSeaNet. As shown in Figure 13 , only a few Member States log their feedback data in CleanSeaNet for most of the alerts they receive. 

Figure 13. Percentage of verification feedback for CleanSeaNet alerts 2021

Source: CleanSeaNet data https://emsa.europa.eu/csn-menu/detections-feedback-data.html

The confirmation of an oil spill based on an alert received (or rate of logging feedback in CleanSeaNet) is limited. Figure 14 shows that Member States log feedback data in CleanSeaNet for approximately 40% of all alerts (1/3 of all cases is a record that verification did not take place providing the reason why there was no verification). Out of all cases verified, a mineral oil spill was confirmed for 5% of the cases and in 37% of cases, actual polluting substances have been confirmed on-scene when checked by Member States. This shows that although satellite surveillance is an effective tool informing about a possible pollution incident, it leads to only some confirmed cases.

Figure 14. Feedback to CleanSeaNet alerts in 2021

Source: Based on data from CleanSeaNet service

Summing up, if more Member States verified of their CleanSeaNet alerts then most likely the deterrent effect would be higher. The limited Member States feedback in CleanSeaNet makes it difficult to analyse the reliability of the tool.

Verification- findings

This section focuses on the EU angle of cooperation and data exchange on verification by presenting the achievements of Member States in using SafeSeaNet and THETIS for ship-source pollution incidents. It also explores the processes and practices related to national verification including the inspection and control regimes. The national approaches to verification are (i) analysis of ship-based information to identify the suspected offenders (SafeSeaNet), (ii) checks on spot by means of aircraft or patrol boats (national assets), (iii) inspecting ships in port to obtain evidence on non-compliance with the MARPOL (THETIS and THETIS EU).

Inspections of ships in ports happen within the regime of the Port State Control Directive (2009/16/EC) (reported in THETIS) and Port Reception Facilities Directive (2019/883/EU) (reported in THETIS EU). The tools developed by EMSA i.e. CleanSeaNet, SafeSeaNet 29 , THETIS 30  and THETIS EU have worked together to support Member State collaboration and to improve their capability to follow up possible pollution events and attribute them to specific ships/offenders. Thanks to the SSP Directive and the use of CleanSeaNet, there is more information available for the Member States and more opportunities to use SafeSeaNet and THETIS systems for following up pollution events. In the period 2011-2021, on average over 100 inspection requests were logged annually in THETIS arising from suspicions of possible illegal discharges of MARPOL Annex I and II substances, pointing to the cooperation of Member States in inspections of pollution incidents ( Figure 11 ). 

There is a general consensus among Member State authorities interviewed (12 respondents) that cooperation and information exchange activities led to improved capacity towards the identification of the pollution. Also, seven of the industry responses (out of 13) to the public consultation indicated that the Directive has contributed to some extent to increased cross-border cooperation between Member States law enforcement and judicial authorities. On the other hand, it was noted during the interviews that Member State authorities do not use the existing EMSA tools to their full extent. Not all Member States record their activities in CleanSeaNet, SafeSeaNet and THETIS. If more Member States provided their records then most likely the effectiveness of discouraging ship-source pollution would be higher.

Penalties- findings

The Directive regulates penalties hence the core measure of success for this Directive is captured based on Article 8 - Member States ensuring that an infringement/ pollution offence is punishable by effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties. This section concentrates on the trends and extent to which the objectives of the Directive were achieved from the perspective of penalties issued by Member States for illegal discharges at sea. The increased proportion of illegal discharges subject to penalties should be analysed to report the success of the Directive. Such analysis is however restricted as there is a serious information gap relating to penalties applied by courts in Member States and no tangible evidence nor centralised statistics on the number and type of penalties imposed. This information is not always collected by Member States, and is often decentralised especially with regards to criminal penalties (i.e. individual courts within a Member State). Furthermore, although Member States have a general reporting obligation (Article 12), they rarely report on penalties to the Commission.

The data available to the Commission is not representative. Only eight Member States reported within the past five years to the Commission ( Figure 15 ). The limited data shows that not more than 50 cases of ship-source pollution are identified annually per Member State and not more than 12 are prosecuted. It can be therefore assumed that the requirement of the Directive to impose penalties is rarely met. Most of the Member State authorities interviewed agreed that pollution incidents rarely or never result in penalties 31 . This suggests deficiencies in the effectiveness of the penalty procedures in place.

Figure 15. Summary of data reported by Member States in the period 2015-2020

Source: Reports submitted to the European Commission under Article 12 reporting obligation by Member States in 2015-2020.

The reason for the limited information on the number of prosecutions is not a result of the lack of a common definition of infringement. On contrary, one of the successes of the Directive is providing a common legal framework for infringements.

Ten (out of 16) Member State representatives, who took part in the interviews and surveys, indicated that the definition of infringement in the Directive is appropriate. It leaves flexibility for national authorities. The assessment on the type of offence (criminal or administrative) is usually done on a case-by-case basis in accordance with national rules, as each case has different circumstances of offence to consider. In practice, both regimes (criminal or administrative) work together to complement each other.

Although the definition of infringement is perceived as non-problematic, deficiencies in effectiveness may originate from the lack of the definition of “deterioration of the quality of water” in the Directive which marks when criminal prosecution applies and when to trigger the administrative procedure. Based on literature analysis and interviews with the Member States, concepts of “minor cases” (Art 4(1) and 5a(2)) and the “deterioration in the quality of water” (Art 5a(2-3)) are not interpreted in the same way by all Member States.

To conclude on penalties, there are divergent approaches among Member States in the types of penalties applied and not enough data on the number of prosecutions and penalties imposed. There is limited information on whether the penalties applied are effective, proportionate and dissuasive.

Conclusion on effectiveness. The success of the Directive in achieving its intended objectives has been limited. Although it incorporated international rules for ship-source pollution into EU law and Member States prosecute SSP offenders, there is limited data to show how effective the system is. The Directive resulted in the implementation of a successful tool for satellite surveillance (CleanSeaNet). This however does not solve the problem entirely because satellite surveillance accuracy is limited (to around 40%). Some aspects relating to verification could have been managed more effectively e.g. Member States could have been logging more feedback data in CleanSeaNet. The Directive has not achieved the anticipated outcome to its full when it comes to the prosecution of offenders.

Efficiency

Costs

As concerns efficiency, the costs produced by the Directive can be divided into the following categories 32 :

·Adjustment costs: costs incurred to adjust stakeholder activities to the requirements of the Directive.

·Administrative costs: costs borne as a result of administrative activities performed to comply with administrative obligations included in legal rules.

·Enforcement costs: costs of activities linked to the implementation of an initiative such as monitoring, verification and prosecution.

Figure 16  below summarises these costs.

Figure 16. Summary of costs of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study.

* The assumption for the purpose of the efficiency analysis is that costs of national verification and prosecution are not attributed to the Directive. The justification for this assumption is: 1) these costs existed before the adoption of the Directive, 2) to focus the evaluation on the added value of the Directive and 3) in order not to create a duplication with costs occurring for Member States as parties to MARPOL. For reference, Member States’ annual verification costs are estimated at around EUR 10 million. Ship inspection annual costs by Member States are estimated at around EUR 4.5 million 33 .

The initiative did not impose administrative burden on citizens. For businesses (ship owners and operators), the administrative burden remained the same since it concerns the enforcement of existing rules set out at international level (by the MARPOL Convention) and the obligations of parties in this respect.

The implementation of the SSP Directive represents extra workload for the Member States. However, the costs for authorities and the level of administrative burden arising from the Directive are rather limited and appear to be justified by the benefits yielded in improved information exchange and cooperation between Member States. Eight Member State authorities (out of 14 interviewed) indicated that no change associated with costs have been observed. There has been no evidence of significant inefficiencies found in this evaluation.

The delivery of the CleanSeaNet service performed by EMSA is the main cost of the Directive. It would however be difficult to deliver the same results with lower costs of satellite surveillance services. Estimates show that market prices for similar satellite images can be between 2.7 and 7 times 34 more expensive than what EMSA is paying for them, considering:

·economies of scale - procurement of a system with common technical specifications for all EU Member States is less costly as EMSA, acting on behalf of the EU, has a strong negotiating power with commercial providers and the total cost of managing the service at EU level is lower than for national operators;

·no additional costs for the exchange of information between national databases to adapt to the transboundary nature of pollution monitoring;

·sharing of satellite imaging with all Member States via one system reduces the number of images needed and avoids duplications, therefore reduces costs.

Nine survey respondents (out of 11 as shown in Figure 17 ) have indicated efficiency gains in surveillance activities through the information obtained from the CleanSeaNet service and the use of the other EMSA information tools.

Figure 17. Targeted survey answer to question: To what extent do you agree that the CleanSeaNet service has increased effectiveness and efficiency of oil spill monitoring compared to the use of multiple national/regional systems?

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study, based on the evaluation targeted survey.

Ten Member State authorities interviewed (out of 14) agreed that CleanSeaNet has increased the efficiency of the process. Moreover, 13 out of the 30 respondents who in the public consultation answered this question, viewed CleanSeaNet as an efficient tool (most remaining respondents, including all industry representatives responded ‘I don’t know’) as shown in Figure 18 .

Figure 18. Open public consultation on CleanSeaNet

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study, based on open public consultation results

Based on input from Member States in the interviews, resources saved are however reported to be redirected to more targeted surveillance and enforcement activities, leading thus to increased benefits rather than reduced costs.

Benefits

The benefits of the Directive include an indirect impact on the improvement in marine environment protection from ship-source pollution as shown in Figure 19 . This is achieved thanks to the deterrent effect of the penalties imposed and the surveillance activities which lead to enhanced detection of possible pollution incidents.

Figure 19. Summary of benefits of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive

Source: Ricardo (2022) Evaluation support study

The benefits could not be quantified due to the lack of data on the extent to which the Directive provided for the dissuasive effect which in turn prevented ship-source pollution. With the lack of data on the proportion of identified pollution incidents of Annex I and II type subject to penalties and lack of data on the level of illegal discharges, the benefits were evaluated qualitatively.

An example of a potential, indirect benefit might be increased bathing water quality in the EU with an increase of bathing sites classified as excellent quality 35 . It is, however, not possible to estimate the impact of the Directive to this improvement due to the complex dynamics of pollutants and the various other existing sources of pollution.

In the absence of statistical data, the evaluation relies on consultation responses. Member States that took part in the interviews indicated that the Directive has prompted a reduction in the number of incidents of illegal discharges of substances regulated by MARPOL (11 out of 16 respondents interviewed). This confirms the qualitative conclusion that the Directive brought environmental benefits.

Conclusion on efficiency. The data on costs is scarce and no quantitative information on benefits is available. The benefits seem to overweigh the costs of the Directive, although they could not be quantified and thus the uncertainty associated to them is acknowledged. The EMSA tools proved to be efficient and beneficial for Member States in the context of achieving the objectives of the Directive. Increased satellite surveillance contributes to enhanced illegal discharge detection and indirectly to the prevention of ship-source pollution of the marine environment.

Coherence with EU pollution prevention legislation

As concerns coherence, the Directive is internally coherent and, in principle, coherent with other pieces of EU pollution prevention legislation. 36  A number of directives relate to prevention of ship-source pollution at seas. The details are presented in Annex III and an overview in  Figure 20 Error! Reference source not found. .

Figure 20. The framework of the existing legislation and initiatives relevant to ship-source pollution

·The SSP Directive is linked with the Marine Strategy Framework Directive 37  (MSFD) as it facilitates reaching the objective of Good Environmental Status of EU Marine Waters which is measured by descriptors. Ship-source pollution links to the descriptor 8 on contaminants. The MSFD is the main European legal instrument for protecting and conserving the marine environment and ecosystems. The MSFD enshrines in its rules the ecosystem approach to the management of human activities having an impact on the marine environment, integrating the concepts of environmental protection and sustainable use. Discharge of polluting substances from ships is one of the sources of pollution to the marine environment and there is a need to prevent it. The SSP Directive contributes to reaching the objectives of the MSFD by introducing dissuasive penalties for illegal discharge of polluting substances to sea.

·The SSP Directive works in synergy with the Directive on Port Reception Facilities 38  (PRF) for the delivery of waste from ships. Port reception facilities cannot work properly without a good instrument to discourage illegal discharge. When the PRF directive was revised in 2019 with stronger rules and higher monitoring of ships’ waste delivery at ports, there was a call by the co-legislators to review the SSP Directive 39 , which underlines the need for the extension of the SSP Directive’s scope. In other words, an incoherence has been identified between the SSP Directive and the PRF Directive. The PRF Directive covers MARPOL Annex I-II and IV-VI waste and cannot be fully effective in the case that the SSP Directive covers only MARPOL Annex I-II, consequently an incoherence has been identified.

·The Environmental Crime Directive 40 (ECD), aims to protect the environment through criminal law and appropriate sanctioning providing for harmonisation of environmental offences in the case when Member States impose criminal sanctions. The ECD ensures that serious offences for pollution are addressed in a coherent way. The proposed new ECD will include for the first time in its scope ship-source pollution (i.e. it will cover those offences of ships that lead to the deterioration of the quality of water) and therefore coherence between the two is key. The SSP Directive will still remain relevant because it will cover administrative penalties for those offences that do not lead to the serious case of the deterioration of the quality of water and it will continue to provide the sectorial provisions on MARPOL. In parallel, criminal law enforcement and criminal penalties will apply through the ECD to most serious cases of ship-source pollution. For enforcement to be effective, the administrative and criminal enforcement regimes must be seen as interlinked parts of one system, which would consequently result in proportionate and dissuasive criminal and administrative penalties. The ECD and the SSP Directive would therefore be complementary. In other words, an incoherence has been identified between the SSP Directive and the new ECD Directive because the criminal provisions in the SSP Directive cease to be applicable and must be removed from the legal text.

·The Environmental Liability Directive 41  (ELD) is not relevant for items covered under the SSP Directive. The ELD covers obligations to prevent ex ante or remedy environmental damage caused, whereas the SSP Directive deals with ex post imposition of penalties to the person responsible for an illegal discharge. The SSP Directive does not deal with environmental compensation costs. The ELD does not deal with penalisation of behaviour. As such, the two instruments work separately from each other.

·The Port State Control Directive 42  (PSC) sets out common criteria for control of ships by the port State. The EMSA database for recording inspections (THETIS) is based on this directive. Ships that are suspected of safety or pollution infringement can be inspected based on the rules set in the PSC Directive. Therefore, the PSC Directive is a necessary element for the SSP Directive to be effective and for the inspections in ports to take place.

·The Flag State Control Directive 43 provides rules for ship inspections and fleet oversight for Union flag State administrations which is relevant for preventing pollution of the marine environment in and outside of the Union. When stronger environmental rules become effective under the international conventions, the flag State responsibility to enforce them is automatically extended.

·The Accident Investigation Directive 44  provides rules on procedures to follow when investigating an accident of a vessel. With reference to maritime accidents, they do not only cause casualties and economic losses but can have a direct impact on the environment e.g. oil pollution hence link to the SSP Directive because such pollution is addressed through the SSP Directive.

·The Vessel Traffic Monitoring and Information System Directive 45 ’s (VTMIS) purpose was to establish SafeSeaNet, the vessel traffic monitoring and information system with a view of enhancing the safety of maritime traffic and to contribute to a better prevention and detection of pollution by ships. Information from SafeSeaNet feeds into CleanSeaNet and therefore, the VTMIS Directive is a necessary element for the SSP Directive to work properly and for potential polluters to be identified effectively.

·The Whistleblowing Directive 46  lays down standards for reporting channels and the protection of persons reporting the breaches of Union law, including breaches on protection of the environment. There are synergies with the SSP Directive as whistle-blowers can be a relevant source of information on ship-source pollution.

With respect to the international regime, the scope of the SSP Directive relating to the groups of polluting substances covered is narrower than the scope of the MARPOL Convention. In other words, an incoherence has been identified between the SSP Directive and the MARPOL Convention in the evaluation. The SSP Directive covers only two out of six MARPOL Annexes.

Conclusion on coherence. No major inconsistencies have been identified between the Directive and other interventions in place at EU level, however there is a need to update the Directive, in particular due to the revision of the Port Reception Facilities Directive, in the context of the extended scope of the directive (to add the remaining MARPOL Annexes) and due to the revision of the Environmental Crime Directive in the context of removing criminal penalties. As for coherence with the international regime, a Directive covering all MARPOL Annexes would have been a better fit to meet the international objectives and expand the enforcement regime at EU level to penalise illicit conducts other than those covered under Annexes I and II of MARPOL. Such approach would be coherent with the objectives of the wider policy framework as reflected in the European Green Deal.

4.2.    How did the EU intervention make a difference?

The key findings presented in this section are based on the detailed analysis of criterion “EU added value” documented in Annex III. Although international standards are in place, there are not enough mechanisms to enforce the MARPOL Convention. MARPOL outlines the rules to follow but enforcement responsibilities and the development of tools for dealing with non-complying ships is left to the IMO parties. If masters or ship-owners choose to ignore MARPOL provisions, the international community as such has few enforcement measures and heavily relies on national or regional enforcement. Hence, there is a need for the EU intervention. All respondents to the public consultation (22 respondents) agreed that EU action is important to have a framework for effective cross-border cooperation with regard to ship-source pollution. The serious data limitations of the evaluative work did not allow to quantify the added value of the SSP Directive because the data on the number of infringements and penalties imposed for ship-source pollution is limited.

The shipping industry questions the added-value of the Directive, given that the MARPOL Convention has already been ratified by all Member States. They raise concerns about the possibility to apply criminal offences to ships (e.g. criminal prosecution for accidental pollution caused by natural persons with serious negligence). In their opinion, it is sufficient that illegal discharges are subject to MARPOL rules. To analyse this stakeholder opinion, we searched for evidence concerning criminalisation and did not identify any case of unfair treatment of seafarers due to the implementation of the SSP Directive.

The SSP Directive was the political priority in the wake of the Erika and Prestige accidents. Such accidents and black lumps of oil, often washed up on beaches in the 1980s, are rarely seen in Europe since the adoption of the Directive. Therefore, the Directive has contributed to the improved situation to some extent.

In principle, Member States would be able to achieve the objective of incorporating the international standards for ships on their own because all of them have ratified the MARPOL Convention. However, the Directive offers more than MARPOL standards by (i) setting an EU liability regime to facilitate penalising the polluters and (ii) supporting the Member States in identifying the offenders through supplying information on possible spills (CleanSeaNet satellite surveillance). It also (iii) established EU competence in criminal matters for ship-source pollution as international law does not specify the type of penalties to be applied (UNCLOS Art 230).

For the purpose of this report the ‘EU liability regime’ relates to persons (natural or legal) being held accountable for an illegal discharge - for example, the company or master of the ship is responsible for an illegal discharge, if committed carelessly or with intention to cause damage, subject to the exceptions from liability provided by MARPOL. The Directive made a difference because it made it easier to prosecute an identified polluter in the EU.

CleanSeaNet made a difference because satellite surveillance capabilities would not have developed to the same extent without it. There would have most likely been more expensive versions of satellite surveillance in some Member States or regions and no satellite surveillance in other Member States, leading to discrepancies and enforcement gaps in the EU. Moreover, cooperation between Member States would be more difficult without the common legal framework and systems offered by EMSA, facilitating the effective exchange and common visualisation of data. The EU law allows to create such entities and systems (SafeSeaNet, CleanSeaNet and THETIS). In particular, benefits are present for those Member States that have less surveillance tools for pollution prevention as well as weaker enforcement responses.

The opinions gathered during the open public consultation suggest some added value of the Directive: 9 respondents (out of 19) are of the opinion that, to some extent, compliance with MARPOL in the EU is higher thanks to the Directive; 7 respondents (out of 13) are of the opinion that, to some extent, cross-border cooperation in their county is higher thanks to the Directive.

Conclusion on EU added-value. The Directive, as an EU-level intervention, brought benefits, which would have not been possible at national or international level alone. The Directive was more efficient and effective in addressing ship-source pollution than MARPOL requirements and its implementing measures alone. The Directive offers added value by the additional elements to support the prevention of ship-source pollution. Specifically, the Directive clarified the regime for pollution penalties (i.e. EU liability regime) and introduced a common tool to all Member States to inform on possible spills (CleanSeaNet). The difference the SSP Directive made is minimising both the discrepancies in the EU as well as the enforcement gap for the implementation of the MARPOL Convention.

4.3.    Is the intervention still relevant?

The findings presented in this section are based on the analysis of criterion “relevance” documented in Annex III (Evaluation matrix and answers to the evaluation questions). The consideration of the needs identified at the time of the adoption of the Directive and the assessment of its objectives has revealed that the problems still exist and the objectives of the Directive are still relevant. The objective of ensuring that persons responsible for discharges of polluting substances to the sea are subject to adequate penalties is still relevant. The consulted stakeholders agreed that the need for improved maritime transport safety and ship-source pollution prevention is still relevant, supported by 24 (out of 31) stakeholders interviewed and 23 (out of 25) responses to the survey. The Directive provides more consistency in the regulatory framework across Member States and the enforceable application of international standards in a more uniform and harmonised way.

As shown in section 4.1, the SSP Directive has achieved its intended objectives to a limited extent. The Directive has not achieved the anticipated outcome when it comes to the prosecution of offenders. Ships illegally discharging polluting substances to the sea still rarely face effective and dissuasive penalties. This conclusion has been made based on weak evidence mostly relying on stakeholder views obtained during the consultation exercise for this evaluation as well as scarce data reported by Member States to the Commission on the number of prosecutions.

This conclusion can be also supported to a certain extent by modelling results on waste delivered by ships to Port Reception Facilities. Regarding volumes of Annex I discharges, around 31,000 m3 of oily waste (2.5% of the total for oily waste from ships) was likely illegally discharged in EU waters over 2011-2015 period. 47  Regarding volumes of Annex II discharges, the quantities of substances transported and spilled are not available. Reported data shows that hazardous and noxious substance spills happen in European seas (e.g. HELCOM data of 2017 48 ; OSPAR data of 2020 49 ; REMPEC data of 2021 50 ) but there is little overview on the extent and frequency of those spills at sea.

Moreover, there is a range of substances discharged by ships and not covered by the SSP Directive, which impact the Directive’s relevance. These were discussed in the analysis of coherence (section 4.1) and include the remaining MARPOL Annexes for polluting substances discharged into sea as shown in Figure 21 . 

Figure 21. List of MARPOL Annexes

Source: IMO . 

The relevant substances which are currently not covered by the Directive are:

·Annex III for harmful substances carried by sea in package form,

·Annex IV for sewage,

·Annex V for garbage and

·Annex VI discharge water from scrubbers to the sea.

Annex IV-VI substances have been identified as a rising concern in recent years. Figure 22  gives insight on the amounts of polluting substances associated with the shipping sector per group by showing how much is collected in Port Reception Facilities in the EU. The percentages in the figure show that the SSP Directive already covers the largest stream of polluting substances/waste (i.e. Annex I), however, the remaining types of waste (e.g. Annex V) are generated by ships in considerable amounts.

Figure 22. Types of waste collected in the EU port reception facilities in 2019

Source: Reported by Euroshore members in 2021 and presented in EMSA and EEA report EMTER (2021)

The Directive is largely in line with the increasing prioritisation by EU citizens of protection of marine environment. The stakeholders consulted during the public and targeted consultations were generally in favour of broadening the scope of the Directive. In addition, 26 respondents (out of 51) in a stakeholder workshop organised on 22 September 2022 voted for the extension of the scope to cover Annex I-VI discharges into sea. In the public consultation, 23 (out of 28) respondents saw the need to expand the list of pollutants covered by the Directive (including 4 Member State authorities, 8 citizens, 7 NGOs, 2 academia and 2 industry stakeholder), while 5 respondents (all but one representing maritime industry) disagreed. The lack of Annex VI air emissions in the Directive has not been raised in any intervention at the stakeholder workshop organised as part of this evaluation. In contrast, one NGO emphasised in their position paper that discharge water from scrubbers is the major concern related to MARPOL Annex VI.

Conclusion on relevance. The overall problem addressed by the Directive and related objectives are still adequate. In addition, the policy context has evolved and adjustments are needed to adapt to the more ambitious agenda on pollution prevention. The substances covered by MARPOL Annex III-VI discharged into the sea are harmful to the environment and need attention as to deliver on EU policy objectives. The objective of the EU citizens and Member States “to combat […] ocean pollution, including through […] promoting of environmentally friendly shipping by using best available technologies […]” has been underlined in the outcomes of the Conference on the Future of Europe. The needs and objectives of the wider policy framework and the EU goal towards zero pollution, as reflected in the European Green Deal must be considered in this context.

5.    What are the conclusions and lessons learned?

5.1.    Conclusions

The Commission has carried out an evaluation of the SSP Directive and has at the same time launched the impact assessment. The evaluation acknowledges that the data available was not sufficiently robust to make a complete ex-post assessment. It also acknowledges that the availability and quality of data was a challenge affecting, in particular, the assessment of the effectiveness and efficiency criteria. Stakeholders were also not very responsive to the various consultation activities. However, despite these limitations, the evaluation is a comprehensive snapshot of the existing information and provides a consistent analysis of the implementation of the Directive.

The evaluation identified a number of issues as problematic:

·The current scope of the SPP Directive (i.e. MARPOL Annex I-II) does not cover all relevant polluting substances of the international regime e.g. garbage (Annex V) or sewage (Annex IV). The SSP Directive’s scope is also not coherent with the scope of its sister directive - the Port Reception Facilities Directive.

·Member States do not always make use of the available EU tools (CleanSeaNet, SafeSeaNet, THETIS, THETIS EU) when carrying out their duties of verifying the pollution. They do not always use the information supplied by the digital tools or do not record their results in these tools. Information exchange between Member States is therefore incomplete.

·There is an unbalanced dissuasive effect of the penalties currently applied across the EU for ship-source pollution and the Directive’s provisions on criminal penalties have become obsolete (due to the new Environmental Crime Directive).

·The reporting requirements are too general to allow for the collection of robust data on the implementation of the SSP Directive and to allow sharing them with a wider audience. The reporting provision is not adapted to the possibilities offered by digitalisation.

Figure 23 provides a summary of the conclusions per evaluation criterion.

Figure 23. Conclusions of the ex-post evaluation per criterion

This first evaluation of the SSP Directive indicates that the same problem still exists in the EU. Ships illegally discharging polluting substances to the sea rarely face penalties. There is therefore the same need (as before the adoption of the Directive) to prevent illegal discharges of polluting substances from ships. Shipping is an international sector, operating in national, EU and international waters and regulated at the international as well as regional and national instances. Therefore, it has by nature a strong cross-border dimension. Further EU action could bring more cooperation between Member States on incidents of ship-source pollution as well as more modern digital solutions to support the detection of the pollution. Consequently, there could be more information at EU level to share with the public and policy makers as well as for the next evaluation of the SSP Directive.

5.2.    Lessons learned

The key lessons learned of this evaluation support the need for strengthening of the policy framework at EU level by:

·Strengthening the common approach towards penalising the polluter for ship-source pollution;

·Accurate and timely support to the Member States by means of platforms for cooperation, digital tools and by providing reliable information on the detection of possible pollution - all for the purpose to support the verification by Member States and their identification of the offender;

·The continuous improvement in collection and exchange of data to inform the public, assess the effectiveness of this Directive and ultimately encourage ships to deliver waste to Port Reception Facilities and discourage ships from discharging pollutants to European seas.

Lead DG, Decide Planning/CWP references

The lead DG is Directorate General for Mobility and Transport (MOVE), Unit D2: Maritime Safety

DECIDE reference number: PLAN/2019/5432

This initiative was announced under item Action 14 in Action Plan to the Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy.

Organisation and timing

The impact assessment and the ex-post evaluation of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive were performed in a back-to-back manner (i.e. the evaluation and impact assessment have been launched at the same time) in 2021-2022.

The impact assessment and evaluation started in 2021, with a combined evaluation roadmap/ inception impact assessment published on 19 May 2021 51 .

The impact assessment on a possible review of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive and the ex-post evaluation were coordinated by an Inter-Service Steering Group (ISG). The Commission Services participating in the ISG were: Secretariat-General, Legal Service, DG Environment, DG Climate Action, DG for Justice and Consumers, DG Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, DG for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations, the European External Action Service and the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA).

The Inter-Service Steering Group met 6 times: on 12 March 2021, 10 November 2021, 29 April 2022 and 21 June 2022, 14 September 2022 and 27 October 2022. It was consulted throughout the different steps of the evaluation and impact assessment process: notably on stakeholder consultation questionnaire and deliverables and on the draft Staff Working Documents. When necessary bilateral discussions were organised with the concerned services.

The revised draft Staff Working Documents, following the first opinion of the RSB, were consulted with the group during 17-28 February 2023 and comments from DG ENV and EMSA were received and taken into consideration when possible.

Consultation of the RSB

The draft impact assessment and evaluation reports were submitted to the RSB on 3 November 2022. They were discussed by the Board on 30 November 2022. Following a negative opinion of the RSB on 1 December 2022, a revised version of the two reports was submitted to the Board on 3 March 2023, followed by a positive opinion (with reservations) on 27 March 2023.

The table below presents an overview of the RSB's comments and how these have been addressed.

Evidence, sources and quality

The impact assessment and evaluation are based on several sources, using both quantitative and qualitative data. This includes:

•    Stakeholder consultation activities (see Annex 2);

•    External support studies carried out by an independent consortium (lead by Ricardo). The external support studies will be published alongside this report.

•    Commission experience in monitoring and implementing the Directive;

•    Reports and information sourced by databases managed by EMSA.

The baseline scenario builds on the EU Reference scenario 2020 developed by E3Modelling with the PRIMES-TREMOVE transport model but also reflects the ‘Fit for 55’ package. This report also draws on the activities of the European Sustainable Shipping Forum, Waste from Ships subgroup, a temporary Commission’s expert groups with Member States representation and industry stakeholders, which was established for the purpose of the revision of the Port Reception Facilities and SSP Directives.

Process

This evaluation was performed back-to-back with an impact assessment for the revision of the Ship Source Pollution Directive and was based on a methodology consistent with the Better Regulation Guidelines and Toolbox, with the support of an external study 52 . Further to publication of the combined evaluation roadmap/inception impact assessment 53 in May 2021, the Commission launched the process for contracting the external study. The terms of reference provided a draft intervention logic and draft evaluation questions to address the five evaluation criteria: relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and coherence and European added value, developing the approach proposed in the evaluation roadmap.

This annex describes the methodology applied for the evaluation.

Methodological framework

The external study further developed the initial intervention logic following feedback received by the Commission in the inception phase of the study. The final intervention logic diagram (see  Figure 4 ) helps capture the logic of the Directive and the causal chain linking objectives, activities, inputs and expected outcomes. It provides the basis for the development of the evaluation matrix and the specific criteria, indicators and data identified as relevant for each evaluation question. 

An evaluation matrix (see Annex 3) was developed that sets out the following aspects for each evaluation question:

-Operational sub-questions: These break down the evaluation questions into smaller, measurable aspects.

-Indicators: Identifies the measures/metrics that correspond to each operational sub-question. These may be qualitative or quantitative.

-Evaluation approach and success/judgement criteria: Outlines the methodology used to answer the evaluation questions and form the conclusions. The success criteria indicate how the indicators were used to assess the performance of the Directive positively or negatively. These were used to answer the evaluation questions and form the conclusions.

-Potential data sources: Sources of data and information used to inform the indicators. As far as data was available, information was triangulated from several sources for each indicator aiming to have at least input from two different sources for cross-checking.

The evaluation matrix was reviewed several times during the study, taking into account Commission inputs as well as evidence collection activities (desk research, interview programme, survey responses and data requests), to reflect the identification and review of data sources, as well as updated evidence needs and gaps and the improved understanding of the mechanisms and structures leading to better targeted questions.

Following the conclusion of the evidence collection activities (i.e. interview programme, targeted survey, open public consultation, case studies and desk research) and the analysis of the findings the intervention logic was updated. Further, the evaluation matrix was expanded to produce a final version of the matrix integrating with the updated understanding of evidence sources and gaps. These was used to inform the selection success criteria and indicators used for each evaluation question.

Evidence collection

Desk research was used throughout the course of the evaluation to address the following objectives:

-Identify and collect qualitative and quantitative evidence to support the analysis of the evaluation questions.

-Identify any information gaps and propose how to manage these gaps through targeted consultation activities.

-Identify and collect data used as input to the evidence analysis, and for the other indicators identified in the evaluation matrix that are used to support the analysis.

The field research has been structured within the context of a stakeholder consultation strategy, which relies on a combination of stakeholder engagement tools, including targeted surveys and interviews, direct information requests and an analysis of other Commission-led consultation activities (Open Public Consultation - OPC). The approach to the targeted surveys and interviews was refined following the undertaking of exploratory interviews which took place during the inception phase of the evaluation. More details on the stakeholders’ consultation are provided in Annex V.

Evidence analysis

The data collected was analysed with the aim to respond to the evaluation questions, using with the following approach.

Description of the implementation of the Directive

The evaluation study 54 provides a comprehensive description of the evolution and current status of the implementation of the Directive that allows to assess whether the Directive has been fully and properly implemented as intended or whether there are limitations in its implementation that can also limit its effectiveness. It provides a reference point for answering the evaluation questions.

Development of the points of comparison for the evaluation

In the absence of an impact assessment on the initial proposal of the Directive – that typically provides the starting point for the development of such points of comparison – the evaluation relies on other sources and inputs from stakeholders (primarily national authorities and regional bodies) to describe what was the situation at the time of the adoption of the Directive in 2005 and at the time of its revision in 2009 and how it should be expected to evolve in the absence of the Directive in terms of:

·Legal framework across Member States in terms of implementation of MARPOL convention including of the procedures adopted for holding those responsible for illegal discharges liable (i.e. the option for criminal charges and for holding legal persons liable), the type and level of penalties applicable (i.e. in the context of the implementation of MARPOL).

·Approach towards surveillance and enforcement (at national, regional and EU level) and cooperation at regional and international level, with the purpose to identify how such activities would have been performed in the absence of the Directive e.g. the satellite surveillance activities via the CSN, and whether alternative satellite-based surveillance solutions might have been adopted at a national or regional (sea basin) level. 

·Level (number and volume) of detected spills at sea for the substances covered by MARPOL Annex I and II and effectiveness of enforcement activities in identifying the attributing illegal discharges to specific perpetrators. In developing the points of comparison for this aspect, it was acknowledged that although some datasets are available from global or regional monitoring of spills (such as the aerial surveillance data from specific regional or national sources), these datasets are not covering the whole of the EU and are usually not coherent in the type of spills included. Moreover, such datasets rarely extent to the period before the adoption of the Directive, making it difficult to clearly identify pre-existing trends. Therefore, in concluding on what would have been the expected development for this, it was taken into account not only the quantitative data available, but also the qualitative inputs from the stakeholders.

·Number (share) of administrative penalties and criminal convictions imposed at the time of the adoption of the Directive and expected evolution over time (this relies heavily on the availability of such data by national authorities in sufficient time series and depth and on stakeholders’ consultation activities).

The evaluation also takes into consideration the developments in the relevant EU legal framework (based on the findings of the coherence analysis) since the adoption of the Directive as well as in terms of the evolution of level and type marine traffic to develop a combination of qualitative and quantitative elements that provides the relevant points of comparison.

It is not always possible to tell with certainty whether Member States would have taken additional action and how enforcement or the eventual level of discharges would evolve. Thus, a series of assumptions were used also based on feedback from stakeholders (including authorities, regional bodies, environmental NGOs and the maritime sector) to develop the points of comparison.

Analysis of evidence – evaluation questions

The evaluation brought together the evidence collected in the desk and field research, the description of the implementation of the Directive and the development of the points of comparison to develop the answers to the evaluation questions included in the evaluation matrix. It checked that the answers refer back to the intervention logic and the points of comparison, and then summarised the level of confidence of the findings, based on the robustness of available evidence and providing clear identification of where they have stemmed from (e.g. combination of desk research, field research and other evidence analysis) and what assumptions have been made.

3.1    Effectiveness

1. What implementation measures have been introduced by Member States in order to ensure the effectiveness of the Directive? Are there any significant differences in implementation measures and effectiveness across the Member States? Is national transposition law sufficiently clear and enforceable to work in practice? (EQ3)

Member States introduced implementation measures in the following key areas:

a)provisions to ensure that illegal discharges are treated as infringements (Articles 4 and 5)

b)provisions establishing that infringements are treated as criminal offences (Articles 5a and 5b)

c)provisions to ensure that natural and legal persons are held liable and the penalties for them are effective, proportionate and dissuasive (Article 8, 8a, 8b, and 8c)

d)Enforcement provisions (Articles 6, 7 and 10) including information exchange and cooperation between Member States.

There are many differences in the types and effectiveness of implementation measures across the Member States. However, the national law is seen as sufficiently clear to be enforceable in the Member States (based on prevailing opinion of stakeholders as seen in Figure 24 below) and on the analysis of the Commission when checking the transposition and conformity with the SSP Directive. Measures are perceived to be effective, but the evaluation results show that they are not the same in all Member States.

Figure 24. Stakeholder views on the clarity of the implementation measure on treating illegal discharge as infringements introduced by Member States to comply in the SSP Directive.

There are some differences in the definition of infringement

Infringements covered by the Directive are punishable by penalties but the approach of Member States to defining infringement slightly varies. Member States have put in place part of the provisions to define infringements already prior to the adoption of the Directive to meet MARPOL requirements. Three approaches to establishing the definition of infringements were identified amongst the Member States consulted in targeted evaluation interviews or from other sources of information and are presented in Figure 25 .

Figure 25: Different definitions of infringements used by Member States

In brief, the transposition of the Directive was generally successful and brought a considerable level of harmonisation to the definition of the conditions under which the discharge of pollutants by ships constitutes an infringement, although it did not lead to one common interpretation across the EU - this is the nature of a directive, as compared to a regulation.

There are divergences on when criminal offences are applied

In line with Article 8 of the Directive, all Member States have introduced in their national legislation penalties applicable to the various types of infringements. These include minimum and maximum levels of penalties that can be imposed for administrative and criminal proceedings as well as, maximum levels of imprisonment sentences for criminal proceedings. Most Member States impose administrative penalties to ship-source pollution incidents (as seen in Figure 26 ). Although this figure is not representative for the situation across the EU, it points to the fact that administrative penalties prevail.

Figure 26. Estimated share of administrative and criminal penalties for ship-source pollution

NB. Estimation based on data and qualitative input on the frequency of administrative and criminal penalties applied over the period 2012-2021 from 8 Member States and Norway (PL, NL, IT, RO, EL, LV, FI, CY, DE, NO). Although this figure is not representative for the situation across the EU, it indicates the trend.

Based on stakeholder views from interviews, the administrative procedure is usually activated in the first instance, as it is more efficient in terms of time, resources and results achieved. Only a few Members States 55  launch a criminal investigation. One Member State authority 56  indicated that if the illegal discharge does not meet certain criteria, it does not qualify as a criminal offence and the procedure is transferred to the administrative authorities.

The overall preference of Member States for administrative penalties supports the conclusion that administrative penalties are used in the majority of cases.

There are differences in the level of penalties applied to the liable natural and legal persons

The Directive, through its amendment in 2009, extends the scope of liability to cover both natural and legal persons. There are differences in the scope of liability foreseen in Member States. Relevant provisions have been introduced across the EU in national legislation to ensure that natural and legal persons are held liable (transposition of Article 8). A natural person or a company (legal entity) can be held liable for a violation of MARPOL rules in all the Member States and can be charged with penalties. Furthermore, in all Member States natural persons are liable under the criminal code. However, certain Member States 57 do not have provisions for criminal liability for legal persons, since their legal systems and legal traditions do not foresee this option.

Member States have established minimum and maximum level of penalties for natural and legal persons and for administrative and criminal penalties. The levels of penalties differ between Member States. The effectiveness of these measures and the level of harmonisation of penalties are further elaborated in the response to Evaluation Question 5 (EQ5) below.

There are differences in the approach towards enforcement

The means used for the verification of polluting substances by Member States are aerial and coastal surveillance activities. The resources devoted to surveillance activities differs between Member States. The measures applied for the identification of the offenders and collecting evidence for their prosecution varies among Member States. These differences in approaches are further elaborated in the response to Evaluation Question 6 (EQ6).

To sum up on EQ3, there are differences in implementation measures applied by Member States. Some national provisions in place, were already introduced prior to the adoption of the Directive, to meet MARPOL requirements. The introduction of the SSP Directive brought a more convergent approach, yet there are gaps in the harmonisation of implementing measures (i.e. differences in definitions, types and levels of penalties) that make the rules less enforceable. Regardless of the marked differences, Member States tend to perceive the measures applied nationally as effective.

 2. To what extent has the Directive had a dissuasive effect as regards reducing the number of incidents of discharges of substances covered by MARPOL Annexes I and II and thus contributed to the overall objectives of improving maritime safety and enhancing protection of the marine environment from pollution by ships? (EQ4)

There is insufficient evidence to confirm the extent to which the Directive (penalties applied for ship-source pollution) had a dissuasive effect i.e. how much did these penalties discourage ships from illegal intentional discharge. More information is provided in EQ5.

There is no data, at global nor EU level, on the number of incidents of discharges of substances covered by MARPOL Annex II.

As for the number of incidents of discharges of substances covered by MARPOL Annex I, the data is scarce for the EU. Globally, as shown in Figure 27 , there has been a decrease of oil spills over time. The global downward trend in oil spills means that the decrease is not directly a result of the EU SSP Directive. 

Figure 27. The global trend in accident-generated medium and large spills (more than 7 tonnes) from 1970-2020.

Source: Report on Global trends in oil spills from tankers (ITOPF, 2021)

Analysing data on oils spills from aerial surveillance activities reported by HELCOM and the Bonn Agreement for the Baltic and North Sea respectively, a long-term decrease in the number of spills was confirmed for these European seas. Additionally, the average size of discharges has reduced based on the data gathered by the CleanSeaNet service showing an increased share of small and medium-sized potential spills in Europe.

The results of the evaluation survey confirm that there is insufficient knowledge on the extent to which the Directive had a dissuasive effect. The stakeholders mostly responded in the evaluation survey that the Directive did not impact the number of illegal discharges or that they do not know about the impact (see  Figure 28 ). On the other hand, stakeholders participating in the targeted interviews largely acknowledged that the Directive contributed to reducing illegal discharges from ships (11 out of 16 respondents) 58 .

Figure 28. Stakeholder views from evaluation survey on the impact of the measures introduced by the Directive increase (green) or decrease (red) illegal discharges from ships. The predominant view is that there was no change (orange) and no opinion (grey).

To sum up EQ4, it was not possible in this evaluation to extrapolate to what extent the Directive contributed to protecting the marine environment and improving maritime safety as a result of reducing the number of incidents of illegal discharges. This is because stakeholder views are divided, the number of incidents for EU waters is not known and because the impacts on the marine environment are indirect and have complex dynamics with various sources of pollution (e.g. direct discharges from land, run-off, atmospheric deposition or other activities at sea, such as the exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbons offshore or deep-sea mining). Beyond the stakeholder views on the effectiveness of the Directive (presented above), it was not possible to collect evidence on how far the reduction in oil spills can be attributed to the Directive and to what extent other factors played a role e.g. the safety requirement of a double-hull for ships or improvements in port state control processes.

3. To what extent has the Directive been effective in terms of ensuring that infringements covered by the Directive have been made punishable by effective, proportionate and dissuasive penalties? To what extent has the Directive been conducive to a harmonisation at EU level of penalties for such infringements? (EQ5)

Effectiveness of penalties

Based on stakeholder input, incidents of illegal discharges rarely result in penalties to either natural or legal persons identified as offenders. Figure 29  and Figure 30  indicate the results of the survey in this respect. Thirteen respondents answered that criminal penalties are rarely or never applied to natural persons (out of 25) or legal persons (11 out of 25 respondents) when the incident is confirmed, linked to a specific ship and proved to be illegal. Furthermore, ten respondents answered that administrative penalties are rarely or never applied both to natural persons (out of 25 respondents) and legal persons (8 out of 25 respondents).

Figure 29. Stakeholder answers to survey questions  

Question: How often incidents of discharges (linked to specific ships) result in administrative or criminal penalties for natural persons

Source: Survey analytical summary

Figure 30. Stakeholder answers to survey questions  

Question: How often incidents of discharges (linked to specific ships) result in administrative or criminal penalties for legal persons

Source: Survey analytical summary

This suggests that the reduced (rare) likelihood of penalties for ship-source pollution, reduces the effectiveness of such penalties, however, not enough data (no statistics for the EU on the number of penalties imposed) is available to draw conclusive statements in this respect.

Proportionality of the penalties (harmonising the levels of penalties)

The analysis of minimum and maximum penalty levels shows considerable differences between Member States. As the Directive provides flexibility to the Member States to define the size, methods of calculation and applicability of penalties, the minimum and maximum thresholds for administrative penalties identified vary substantially between Member States. As seen in  Figure   31 , the minimum level of fines applicable to natural persons can range from 10 EUR (Estonia) to 150,000 EUR (Portugal) while minimum penalties for legal persons may range from 32 EUR (Estonia) to 500,000 (Germany). Similarly, large deviations can be seen in the levels of maximum penalties. Additionally, significant variations also exist in the mechanisms for the allocation and methods of calculation of penalties. An attempt to promote the use of harmonised penalties for the Baltic Sea countries did not deliver the expected results as can be seen by the deviations in penalty levels adopted by Baltic Sea Member States. 59

Figure 31: Minimum and maximum levels of penalties foreseen for infringements for natural and legal persons (in EUR) – and indication of the Member State applying them.

Dissuasiveness of the penalties

Based on information from the targeted interviews, in some Member States, penalties can be considered high enough to have a dissuasive effect on the ship operator when coupled with effective enforcement and increased probability of being caught (mostly the Baltic Sea and North Sea Member States). However, in other Member States (mostly ones located in the Black Sea and to certain extent in the Mediterranean Sea) penalties are too low to be proportionate and thus when coupled with the low probability of being imposed, they may not be sufficiently dissuasive.

The results of the stakeholder consultations confirm that there is insufficient knowledge on the extent to which the penalties had a dissuasive effect. Eight of the Member States authorities interviewed 60  (out of 16) and half of the stakeholders participating in the survey (as seen in  Figure 32 ) considered criminal penalties proportionate and dissuasive whereas the other half not. 

Figure 32. Survey results on stakeholder views on the proportionality and dissuasiveness of criminal penalties

As seen in  Figure 32 , criminal penalties are not the preferred regime for most Member States. As for administrative penalties, on one hand, 11 Member State authorities interviewed 61 (out of 16) agree that current administrative penalties are proportionate and act as a deterrent. On the other hand, 12 of the responses to the survey (out of 22) indicated that administrative penalties are proportionate and dissuasive whereas the other half not (see  Figure 33 ).

Figure 33. Survey results on the proportionality and dissuasiveness of administrative penalties

To conclude, the data collected suggests that the Directive has not been effective in harmonising the level of penalties for infringements across the EU. While the levels of penalties differ significantly amongst Member States, stakeholders seem to be divided, with half considering current penalty levels proportionate and dissuasive and the other half considering them not to be sufficiently proportionate and dissuasive. Stakeholders consider the probability of penalties being imposed low (rare) and this impacts the actual deterrent potential of these penalties. Overall, there are no statistics for the EU on the number of penalties imposed and divergent views of stakeholders on the proportionality of the penalties and therefore, insufficient evidence to confirm the extent to which the penalties applied for ship-source pollution are effective, proportionate and dissuasive.

4. To what extent has the Directive improved the cooperation between Member States in matters of: a. improving Member State capability to timely detect discharges? B. improving Member State capacity to attribute discharges to specific ships? (EQ6)

The EU legislative framework, including this Directive has largely improved the cooperation between Member States thanks to a number of dedicated functionalities for EU surveillance, monitoring and reporting systems, such as SafeSeaNet, THETIS and CleanSeaNet.

The enhanced surveillance capacity brought by the CleanSeaNet service is viewed by many Member State authorities 62 as effective in discouraging illegal discharges as there is a higher probability of getting caught 63 .

This has led to an improved capacity of Member States to identify illegal discharges as manifested by the increased identification of possible polluters reported in the feedback provided to the CleanSeaNet alerts as can be seen in the two figures below ( Figure 34  and  Figure 36 Figure 35 . Percentage of verification feedback for CleanSeaNet alerts 2015-2020

Figure 36 ). This increase largely follows the increase in CleanSeaNet alerts recorded over the same period. It is unclear from this evidence basis whether the increase in the identification of polluters originates from the increase in the total number of possible oil spills that have been followed up and feedback has been collected or whether this is indicative of increased capabilities of Member States in identifying potential polluters, potentially boosted by improved cooperation. Data from the Baltic Sea 64 seem to suggest that the increase in the number of identified polluters is less steep than the increase in the number of potential pollution incidents.

Figure 34. Member State verification and possible pollution detection in the Baltic Sea (for HELCOM Contracting Parties: Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Sweden)

Figure 35. Percentage of verification feedback for CleanSeaNet alerts 2015-2020

Figure 36. Identification of possible polluters as reported by Member States in feedback to CleanSeaNet alerts as a result of verification.

NB. The number of “feedbacks provided” corresponds to the verification results of in-situ observation carried out by the Member States. This number does not include the possible oil spills for which a reason for no verification was included in the CleanSeaNet feedback form.

Member States adopt different approaches in order to identify potential offenders and have different evidence collection mechanisms and requirements in order to prosecute a potential offender. Authorities of different Member States may require physical or scientific evidence, including pollution samples, and visual evidence (e.g. surveillance footage, photographs, etc.) along this process. Other requirements may include ships inspection findings, witnesses’ statements, and identification of irregularities through the inspection of statutory and other ship documentation (e.g. oil logbook).

Through ship inspections, authorities often aim to match the substances identified in confirmed discharges with the cargo or fuel carried by the specific ship. The trigger for ship inspections to check compliance with MARPOL may differ between Member States. While some Member States do not require ship inspections to build up the necessary evidence for a case (such is the case of the Netherlands), others consistently perform ship inspections in response to the identification of potential pollution incidents 65 .

Looking at the level of use of the EMSA cooperation tools by Member States, one can see that the use of pollution incident reports (POLREPs) to communicate pollution events of common interest is potentially not fully exploited by Member States. As seen in  Figure 37 , despite the steady increase in recent years, the majority of pollution incident reports submitted comes from a single Member State 66 . At the same time, and despite the increased detection of potential illegal discharges and the identification of polluters, the level of cooperation with regard to inspection requests submitted in THETIS seems to remain relatively constant, or even decline in recent years (see  Figure 38 ).

Figure 37. Number of pollution incident reports (POLREPs) issued in SafeSeaNet by Member States

Figure 38. Number of inspection requests registered in THETIS by Member States (with regard to MARPOL Annex I and II incidents) - overriding factor messages (priority 1) and unexpected factor messages (priority 2)

Priority 1 alerts trigger for the ship the request for an inspection at the next port of call. Priority 2 alerts trigger that the ship is targeted for an inspection but not necessarily at the next port of call. It will be inspected within a certain time window depending on the ship's profile. Thus, both types of alerts will trigger an inspection request in one way or another, within a shorter or longer time frame.

Overall, the data shown in the figures above and the development of these parameters indicate that there is cross-border cooperation and information exchange between Member States (e.g. by THETIS and SafeSeaNet).

5. To what extent has the geographical scope of the Directive contributed to its effectiveness? (EQ7)

According to Article 3, the geographical scope of the Directive covers internal waters, the territorial seas, straits used for international navigation (subject to the regime of transit passage), the EEZ or equivalent zone of a Member State, and the high seas. An initial study on the implementation of the Directive conducted by EMSA 67 identified that there are some potential disparities across Members States in the implementation of the geographical scope as not all of the Members States have defined the high seas as being within the scope of their transposing legislation 68 .

The Directive provisions can be applied in all areas where ship-source pollution may be found providing a comprehensive coverage and a tool that can potentially be used by Member States in all relevant cases. This allows Member States to investigate infringements across different territories and ensure, subject to international law, that regardless of the location of the illegal discharge, there is a legal basis for it to be detectable.

The Directive introduces criminal penalties for infringements in all sea territories. In the transposition of the Directive, Member States have defined both monetary as well as imprisonment penalties in case of criminal penalties. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS, Article 230) defines that States can impose only monetary penalties to foreign vessels in their territorial sea and beyond. This limitation does not apply within the territorial sea only if it concerns a case of wilful and serious act pollution. The Directive is not contradicting UNCLOS Art. 230 in this respect, as criminal penalties may also be of monetary nature.

Stakeholder consultation suggests that the wide geographical scope of the Directive is supported by six Member State authorities interviewed (out of 14) and respondents to the survey (12 out of 20). There are incidents identified in which Member State authorities have imposed penalties for infringements occurring on the high seas 69 .

Nevertheless, according to the views of certain stakeholders 70 there have also been legal challenges related to implementing the Directive beyond territorial waters in accordance with international law, as can be seen also by the cases presented in Box 1.

Box 1. Summary of legal challenges

According to some Member State authorities interviewed 71 there are limitations to the enforcement of the Directive in areas distant from the coast. The challenges are mainly related to the level of resources required to reach and investigate potential discharges in such areas, including those required for evidence collection (aerial surveillance, patrol boats etc.), as well as other operational and technical limitations, such as not enough time to reach the site and verify the potential detection before it disperses. The response to Evaluation Question 13 provides further information on the bottlenecks related to identifying, verifying and following up on incidents.

In conclusion, the broad geographical scope of the Directive is appropriate to ensure that, at least in principle, all infringements are detectable and can provide an effective deterrent. However, there are practical challenges identified when enforcing the Directive in the event of a ship-source pollution incident in areas outside a Member State’s territorial waters and, particularly, in the high seas. These mostly relate to verification capacity constraints for Member States to confirm a potential pollution in areas far from the coast, and to the resources required to identify the polluter in a timely and effective manner. Further, legal challenges have been identified in enforcing the Directive outside territorial waters, due to the fact that, amongst others, the jurisdictional clauses enshrined in the Directive apply in parallel with those enshrined in UNCLOS, which has primacy over secondary EU legislation, since the Union is itself a party to UNCLOS 72 .

3.2    Efficiency

1. To what extent has the Directive generated costs and benefits for the relevant national authorities? (EQ9a)

This section provides and overview on the costs and benefits of the Directive and specifies which costs are bared by the relevant national authorities. The benefits produced by the Directive for the authorities are increased satellite surveillance and enforcement capacity offered to national authorities, as described in EQ6.

The key benefit of the Directive is an indirect improvement in the protection of the marine environment from ship-source pollution. While there is a gradual reduction in the number of accidents resulting in oil spills, this trend was pre-existing the Directive’s adoption and is global so it is difficult to indicate what part of the benefit can be attributed to the Directive as compared to other initiatives. With regards to benefits at EU level, as reported by the European Environment Agency, in the 2006-2021 period, bathing water quality in the EU has improved, as there is an increase in the number of sites classified as being of excellent quality. 73 Still, as elaborated in EQ4, it is not possible in to extrapolate the exact contribution of the Directive to this improvement of water quality due to the complex dynamics of pollutants and the various other existing sources of pollution and the fact that the impact of other initiatives is interwoven in reaching improvements at bathing sites.

Examining the costs produced by the Directive, these can be divided in the following categories 74 :

·Adjustment costs: These include the costs incurred to adjust stakeholder activities to the requirements of the legislation.

·Administrative costs: These are costs borne as a result of administrative activities performed to comply with administrative obligations included in legal rules.

·Enforcement costs: These are costs of activities linked to the implementation of an initiative such as monitoring, inspections and prosecution.

Enforcement costs

An area where the Directive is considered to generate enforcement costs, is the requirement of Article 10 for Member State authorities “to closely collaborate with the European Maritime Safety Agency to respond to the accidental or deliberate marine pollution…in order to develop the necessary information systems required for the effective implementation of this Directive. 

The submission of feedback in CleanSeaNet on the verification of potential pollution detections as a result of a CleanSeaNet alert generates recurrent enforcement costs for maritime authorities. The time required to insert feedback for each pollution incident has been estimated by five Member States authorities 75 to be between 10 minutes and 6 person-hours per alert. The difference in the estimations can be attributed to differences in the understanding of what activities are included in this activity. The consideration of the efforts of the authorities for the collection and preparing of the relevant data could have been included in the higher estimates. The lower estimate of 10 minutes is likely to include only the time needed to log the data in the CleanSeaNet system for each alert. For this assessment, the median value of one hour per alert has been used. To estimate the costs for verifying the additional CSN pollution alerts, an average hourly labour cost of 39.8 EUR has been assumed for professional, technical and scientific services at EU level (in 2020 prices) 76 . This means that for the approximately 2,650 CleanSeaNet alerts submitted in 2020, the enforcement costs can be estimated to be roughly EUR 105,470 annually 77 .

Additionally, costs related to information exchange between Member States through the SafeSeaNet and THETIS platform are also considered to contribute to the total enforcement costs. Regarding sharing a pollution incident report (POLREP) through SafeSeaNet, feedback received by three Member States 78 point to approximately of half an hour per report. Accounting for the approximately 200 pollution incident reports submitted annually 79 , this results in an approximate cost of EUR 8,000 annually. Following the same logic, the time needed to log a ship-source pollution inspection request in THETIS would also qualify as enforcement costs. In the absence of data on the time needed to log a THETIS inspection request, a similar assumption as that for the pollution incident reports (POLREPs) was made. For the 120 THETIS requests submitted in 2020 this would amount to approximately EUR 5,000 annually 80 . Thus, the total costs for submitting pollution incident reports (POLREPs) in SafeSeaNet and inspection requests issued through THETIS are estimated at EUR 13,000 per year.

Competent authorities responsible for surveillance and enforcement activities are also required to devote resources and undertake costs relevant to surveillance activities (aerial or patrol boats). These requirements are derived from international (i.e. MARPOL) and national legislation pre-existing the Directive and thus no additional costs can be attributed to the Directive.

Survey and interview respondents have indicated the efficiency gains in national surveillance activities through the information obtained from the CleanSeaNet service (and the use of the other EMSA information tools), however any resources saved are reported to be redirected to more targeted national surveillance and enforcement activities, leading thus to increased benefits rather than reduced costs.

Furthermore, although the Directive establishes the obligation of Member States to inspect/verify ships suspected of illegal discharge (Article 6) or to collaborate for the inspection of ships in transit suspect for potential infringements (Article 7), these are not new requirements as they are foreseen already in the MARPOL Convention and other EU legislation 81 .

Administrative costs

In relation to administrative costs of the Directive, Article 12 introduces reporting requirements to the Commission relevant to pollution detection as each Member State is required to report on this once every three years. The assessment of this cost element is detailed in the response to EQ9b and amounts roughly EUR 70,048 annually 82 .

Adjustment costs

This category includes costs incurred by EMSA, in line with Article 10, to “work with the Member States in developing technical solutions and providing technical assistance in relation to the implementation of this Directive, in actions such as tracing discharges by satellite monitoring and surveillance”.

The most significant adjustment costs generated by the Directive are related to the development and maintenance of a state-of-art system for satellite surveillance in the CleanSeaNet service. The costs associated to this are further elaborated in EQ10. The average annual cost of operating the CleanSeaNet service (2009-2020) were estimated at the level of EUR 5.17 million.

Training and knowledge sharing activities performed by EMSA for the Member States authorities in order to improve the surveillance and enforcement capabilities across the EU are estimated as being roughly EUR 200,000 per year.  83

Figure 39: Cost of EMSA organised activities

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

An overview of the costs and benefits identified in this evaluation exercise is presented in Figure   40  and Figure   41  below, indicating the types of costs and benefits, and the stakeholders affected.

Figure 40. Costs of the Directive

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

Figure 41: Benefits of the Directive

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

Summing up, the adoption of the Directive reinforced some provisions that were already part of pre-existing requirements for Member States and as such relevant costs are not attributed to the Directive. Such provisions could include requirement for Member States already existent from the MARPOL Convention or their participation in regional cooperation agreements. The main cost is EMSA satellite surveillance services, roughly EUR 5.17 million annually, plus training and knowledge sharing activities estimated at EUR 200,000 annually.

The costs generated by the Directive for relevant national authorities are rather limited (as seen in  Figure   40 ) and sum up to EUR 188,518 annually. The Directive is also seen as having generated benefits in terms improved surveillance and enforcement capabilities although the exact extent of these benefits is difficult to qualify.

Overall, the total costs can be justified by the benefits yielded in terms of improved environmental protection due to the enhancement of the satellite surveillance capacity.

2. What is the administrative burden generated by the Directive (EQ9b)

The administrative costs of the Directive affect the relevant national authorities. Article 12 introduces reporting requirements on pollution incidents. Member States are required to report to the Commission once every three years. This reporting requirement is very general and although broadly aligned with the requirements put forward by regional sea agreements and the IMO, is a duplication of effort. Depending on the level of data availability, digitalisation and automation of the data collection methods used, this may result in significantly different costs for national authorities, with more sophisticated approaches (potentially requiring more investment in IT infrastructure) minimising the effort needed 84 . Only a small number of Member States (5 out of 27) have partially complied with the Article 12 reporting requirements. The resulting cost is of a recurring nature as it needs to take place every three years. Participants to an ESSF Waste from Ships subgroup meeting discussing this issue in May 2022 were asked about the cost of the reporting requirement. 15 out of 18 participants indicated this would require up to or more than 10 days while the other three indicated this would require less than 5 days. For this assessment, we assume the median cost of 10 person-days annually for reporting to the Commission under Article 12. Accounting for 22 EU coastal Member States this amounts to approximately EUR 70,048 annually 85 .

3. Could the same results have been achieved with less funding/lower cost? (EQ10)

The category of costs examined in the context of the same result with lower costs is CleanSeaNet service (development and operation).

CleanSeaNet service could not have achieved the same results with lower costs. For satellite surveillance, EMSA in 2020 purchased 8,267 images at a cost of EUR 4.58 million 86 , which is around EUR 550 per image. The average market prices for SAR stripmap images of very high resolution can range from EUR 1,475 to EUR 3,875 87 depending on the SAR sensors used 88 . This means that the market price for similar images can be between 2.7 and 7 times more expensive than what EMSA is paying for them. Economies of scale are achieved with an EU-level wide service due to the larger scale of procurement and the improved negotiating power for delivering the service centrally by EMSA. 

Next, it has been assessed if the same results could have been achieved by 22 independent services of the coastal Member State. There is no national service to compare with as to understand this cost. On average, Member States may have been procuring images at the lower band of the market price i.e. EUR 1,475 per image which is 2.7 times the cost achieved by EMSA. With this assumption, as seen in  Figure   42 , the approach of having a one EU-level service resulted in lower annual costs of approximately EUR 7.7 million 89 .

Figure 42: Annual costs savings of having one satellite surveillance service compared to 22 Member State services

Source: Ricardo (2023) Evaluation support study

The costs of 22 individual systems could have been higher than presented in the table above because of the overlap of images on areas of common interest for different Member States. Such approach would also entail more information exchange costs to deal with detections of transboundary relevance. Even if Member States could procure images at a price lower than market prices 92 , this would still not include the additional services included in the CleanSeaNet service. The service uses modern satellite technology, to provide a broad level of coverage, image frequency, quality and an array of services supporting the identification of potential pollution incidents. It also covers transboundary areas delivering information to all Member States in a systematic and common format. Further savings are achieved by the centralised processing of data by 6 dedicated EMSA staff, as compared to staffing 22 individual coastal services.

4. To what extent have the accompanying measures listed in Article 10 of the Directive been relevant to the overall objectives of improving maritime safety and enhancing protection of the marine environment from pollution by ships? (EQ11)

Article 10 of the Directive states that “Member States and the Commission shall cooperate, where appropriate, in close collaboration with the European Maritime Safety Agency and taking account of the action programme to respond to accidental or deliberate marine pollution”.

In Article 10, two accompanying measures are introduced:

a)develop the necessary information systems required for the effective implementation of this Directive;

b)establish common practices and guidelines on the basis of those existing at international level, in particular for:

— The monitoring and early identification of ships discharging polluting substances in violation of this Directive, including, where appropriate, on-board monitoring equipment,

— Reliable methods of tracing polluting substances in the sea to a particular ship, and

— The effective enforcement of this Directive.

The introduction and use of EMSA information systems, including the CleanSeaNet service, has had an important role in achieving the overall objectives of improving maritime safety and enhancing protection of the marine environment from pollution by ships because it enhanced surveillance capacity and improved the likelihood of identifying ships discharging polluting substances in violation of this Directive.

The CleanSeaNet alert system is a source of information valued by Member States authorities and used by them to identify potential illegal discharges and polluters 93 . As shown in EQ6, more than 7,000 pollution alerts are sent to Member States annually (2019-2020). On average, almost 18% of the alerts (sent and for which feedback as a result of verification has been logged by Member States) have resulted in the identification of a potential polluter 94 , as shown in  Figure 43 .

Figure 43. CleanSeaNet alerts verified by Member States (blue) for which Member States recorded that the potential polluter was identified (red).

Sources: Compiled from EMSA CSN services data

The CleanSeaNet service is valued especially by Member States where less resources are deployed for aerial surveillance because, by utilising CleanSeaNet alerts, they can perform more targeted follow-up activities. As seen in  Figure 44 , the increase in the number of verification activities performed by Member States might be a result of greater capacity and resource to perform verification or the improved detection capabilities of CleanSeaNet.  Figure 45 , based on the example of the North Sea (Bonn Agreement) and the Baltic Sea (HELCOM), Member State authorities have been deploying less aerial surveillance resources since the introduction of CleanSeaNet in 2007.

Figure 44. Aerial surveillance activity by competent authorities in the North Sea (Bonn Agreement) and the Baltic Sea (HELCOM) after the deployment of CleanSeaNet (CSN).

Source: Ricardo evaluation support study; NB. In 2007, CleanSeaNet started operation. In 2016, the CleanSeaNet service began gradually acquiring more images from the European Space Agency Sentinel-1 mission. This improved satellite surveillance capacity. The S-1B mission improved the level of satellite coverage over European waters, the number of satellite overpasses and enlargement of the monitored area.

Figure 45. Average number of surveillance flight hours in the Baltic Sea (HELCOM: Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Sweden) before and after the deployment of CleanSeaNet (CSN)

It is worth noting that such services were not available to all Member States before the introduction of CleanSeaNet and it is not expected that all Member States would have had similar capacity in the absence of the Directive. As described in EQ10, CleanSeaNet has provided a cost-efficient way for the detection of potential illegal discharges and polluters.

The other strand of actions foreseen within Article 10 is the development of common practices and guidance. Trainings and workshops of EMSA enhanced knowledge exchange, as well as improved the surveillance and enforcement capacity of Member States. Based on stakeholder consultations 95 , Member State authorities value EMSA workshops, in particular the workshops for exchange of experience on ‘the use of surveillance systems for marine pollution detection and assessment’ regularly held under the work programme of the Consultative Technical Group for Marine Pollution Preparedness and Response (CTG MPPR). Specifically, what these workshops are appreciated for:

·the evaluation of case studies;

·experience sharing; 

·knowledge exchange on state-of-the art tools for pollution monitoring; and

·knowledge exchange on work done for the improvement of the legal basis for data sharing.

There was also positive feedback provided during stakeholder consultations 96  on meetings of the CleanSeaNet User Group and the SafeSeaNet Users Training. These were valued for experience and good practice sharing on the use of the satellite-monitoring service. The majority of stakeholders responding to the survey (10 out of 18) have confirmed that knowledge sharing and EMSA training activities increased Member State capacity to identify incidents of illegal discharges (see  Figure 46 ).

Figure 46. Survey results on stakeholder views on impact of knowledge sharing and EMSA training activities

Source: based on survey and targeted interviews. DK/NA means that the respondent did not know or the question was not applicable.

To sum up, Article 10 activities are relevant to the achievement of the objectives of the Directive. Both the introduction of the CleanSeaNet service and activities promoting EU-wide exchange of experience have been particularly relevant when it comes to strengthening and targeting surveillance and enforcement activities, particularly for Member States with limited resources. Given the cross-border nature of maritime shipping, the information and experience exchange as well as cooperation activities with the support of EMSA are considered as a cost-effective way of action and a clear benefit of the Directive.

5. To what extent has the information and support provided by EMSA’s maritime surveillance and reporting systems (CSN service, SSN and THETIS) been used to achieve the objective of the Directive and proved beneficial for Member States and what have been the benefits of the CleanSeaNet service compared to having multiple national systems for oil spill monitoring? (EQ12a, b and c)

The information and support provided by EMSA’s maritime surveillance and reporting systems have been used to a large extent to support the objective of the Directive of enhancing maritime environment protection. They do so by assisting Member State authorities in identifying potential polluters. CleanSeaNet, SafeSeaNet and THETIS have proved to be beneficial for Member States with a view of enhancing their surveillance and enforcement capabilities although they have not been optimally used.

CleanSeaNet has led to an improvement and better targeting of the surveillance capabilities of Member State authorities. See EQ6 and EQ11. Nevertheless, the following bottlenecks are considered to reduce the efficient identification, verification and follow up on potential incidents of illegal discharges alerted by CleanSeaNet:

-There is a time lag in between the actual discharge and the verification of a discharge. This often jeopardizes the identification of the polluter. The likelihood of identifying the polluter depends on the time passed between the potential discharge (and the satellite image acquisition) and the verification activities taking place. The longer this interval, the higher the likelihood of 'nothing observed'. Aerial surveillance or sampling may take place several hours after the CleanSeaNet alert was sent e.g. because of limited surveillance resources available to Member States 97 . Moreover, the level of resources needed to collect information on an incident occurring far from the territorial seas 98 of a Member State can be a limitation to enforcing the Directive in its full geographical scope and especially on the high seas.

-Spills in high traffic intensity areas may make AIS backtracking and the identification of the polluting ship challenging despite modern replay tools and the contribution of Integrated Maritime Services e.g. automated ship behaviour monitoring tools 99 .

-There is a time lag in between the actual discharge and the detection by CleanSeaNet. The fact that certain areas of interest are scanned up to 20 times a month, increases the probability of detection, but it is still likely that when the image is taken, a potential discharge may have already been in the water for many hours.

SafeSeaNet and THETIS also contribute towards the achievement of objectives of the Directive and were perceived as useful by the majority of respondents in the stakeholder survey (11 out of 17 respondents).

SafeSeaNet is used to exchange information when pollution of the sea has occurred or when a threat of such is present and communication between Member States is needed. However, only few Member States are submitting pollution incident reports (POLREPs) to alert other Member States on possible pollution cases. Whilst there is an increasing number of reports submitted in SafeSeaNet (118 reports in 2018 and 210 in 2020), 87% of them came from one single Member State.

The THETIS system improved the cooperation of Member States in pollution verification. There were on average (in 2011-2021) over 100 inspection requests (i.e. overriding or unexpected factor messages) logged annually in THETIS arising from suspicions of possible illegal discharges of MARPOL Annex I and II substances .

The use of all three EMSA tools can have a further possible deterrent effect, by increasing awareness of their existence. If seafarers are aware of these tools and the increased risk of illegal discharges being identified, then they could be discouraged from intentional disposal the illegal polluting substances at sea.

Finally, as seen in the response to EQ11, the benefits of the CSN service use at an EU level come at a cost advantage compared to the establishment and operation of parallel systems by the 22 coastal Member States. Under the assumption that the same level of service would be pursued, an annual cost saving of EUR 7.7 million annually is estimated.

3.3    Coherence

1. How does the Directive contribute to the objectives of relevant EU maritime and environmental legislation, in particular: Directive on Port Reception Facilities (EU) 2019/883, the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (Directive 2008/56/EC), the Directive on the sulphur content of marine fuels (Directive 2016/802/EU), the Waste Framework Directive (Directive 2008/98/EC) and other relevant EU waste legislation, as well as the Commission initiative on marine litter (SWD(2012) 365 final)? (EQ13)

To answer this question, we examined if and how the SSP Directive objectives and provisions are consistent with the key EU maritime and environmental legislation and policy initiatives mentioned in the question.

The Directive contributes to the objectives of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) (Directive 2008/56/EC) to ‘protect and preserve the marine environment [and] prevent its deterioration’ and ‘prevent and reduce inputs in the marine environment’. The SSP Directive contributes by addressing the disposal at sea of oil and noxious substances. However, the contribution is partial due to differences in scope of the two instruments. The MSFD defines pollution as the “direct or indirect introduction into the marine environment, as a result of human activity, of substances or energy, including human-induced marine underwater noise, which results or is likely to result in deleterious effects such as harm to living resources and marine ecosystems, including loss of biodiversity, hazards to human health, the hindering of marine activities, including fishing, tourism and recreation and other legitimate uses of the sea, impairment of the quality for use of sea water and reduction of amenities or, in general, impairment of the sustainable use of marine goods and services” (Article 3(8)). This definition is much broader than the scope of the Directive (that includes only substances identified in MARPOL Annexes I & II). It includes all hazardous substances, marine litter, energy and underwater noise. In brief, the SSP Directive only partly contributes to the Marine Strategy Framework Directive objectives.

The Directive also contributes to the objectives of the Port Reception Facilities Directive (PRF) (Directive (EU) 2019/883) to ‘protect the marine environment against the negative effects from discharges of waste from ships that use ports located in the Union, while ensuring the smooth operation of maritime traffic’, by addressing the disposal at sea of oil and noxious substances (Annexes I and II of MARPOL). With this regard, both Directives are complementary in targeting waste generated by ships. However, the complementarity is only partial due to the narrower scope of the SSP Directive with regards to polluting substances. The PRF addresses, also, MARPOL Annexes IV (sewage), V (garbage) and VI (waste including discharge water from scrubbers). This means that the Directives do not fully complement each other since disposing at sea of the Annex IV, V and VI substances within the scope of the PRF is not considered as an offence under the SSP Directive. If a ship was to discharge polluting substances covered by Annex IV-VI at sea, the infringement would fall on international legislation, i.e. MARPOL as well as any relevant national laws. It is noteworthy that the preamble (recital 13) of the Port Reception Facilities Directive encourages an assessment of the desirability to extend the scope of the SSP Directive to align it with MARPOL.

The Directive on the sulphur content of marine fuels (Sulphur Directive) (Directive 2016/802/EU) sets as an objective the reduction in the sulphur content of certain liquid fuels. It introduced limits for the sulphur content of fuels used in the European seas, in alignment with Annex VI of MARPOL, to reduce SOx exhaust gases deriving from the ship engine combustion of the said fuels 100 . Directive (EU) 2016/802 allows the use of exhaust gas cleaning systems (EGCSs) or scrubbers as an alternative compliance method with the low sulphur in fuel requirements under the directive. The scope of the SSP Directive does not cover SOx emissions to air, which are regulated under Annex VI of MARPOL, and so the two Directives work in parallel as they cover different aspects of the MARPOL Annexes. Due to the diverging scope, the SSP Directive does not contribute to the objectives of Directive (EU) 2016/802 as it does not cover air pollution.

Marine litter is addressed in several EU Directives. It is in scope of the Waste Framework Directive (WFD) (Directive 2008/98/EC) that applies to all wastes, with several exceptions, including emissions to air and sewage. The WFD outlines a framework for the prevention, recycling and disposal of waste, including marine litter while the SSP Directive aims to discourage the illegal discharge of waste into the sea. In this respect, the two instruments complement each other.

Furthermore, marine litter is addressed by the Single-use Plastics Directive (EU) 2019/904 which regulates the use, production, consumption and waste management of single use plastics and fishing gear and includes market restrictions for certain products and targets for collection and recycling. The Commission is also assessing possible measures for the reduction of microplastics intentionally added in products but unintentionally released to the environment during their life cycle 101 . In principle, these EU policies and initiatives aim to prevent and reduce the environmental impact of (micro-) plastics on the environment, and in particular, on marine environment and are thus aligned with the objective of the SSP Directive to enhance environmental protection. Nevertheless, they are not expected to act complementary to the SSP Directive due to the scope difference as plastic pollution is not covered by the SSP Directive.

2. Are there any inconsistencies/overlaps/gaps between the Directive and other interventions at EU/national/international level which have similar objectives? (EQ14)

Beyond the EU initiatives addressed in EQ13, the coherence of the Directive with other relevant EU legislations with similar objectives is further assessed.

The Environmental Crime Directive (ECD) (Directive 2008/99/EC) supports the protection of the maritime environment as its focus is on defining serious offences that harm the environment and requires Member States to introduce harmonised criminal penalties for these offences. The ECD currently does not cover ship-source pollution. However, based on the legislative proposal of the Commission of 2021 the scope of the ECD is to be extended to cover ship-source pollution. Once the new ECD is adopted, it will set the framework under which criminal offences will no longer be addressed in the SSP Directive. In such case, the SSP Directive will be a sectoral instrument for ship-source pollution complementary to the ECD.

The Environmental Liability Directive (ELD) (Directive 2004/35/EC) establishes a framework of environmental liability based on the ‘polluter-pays' principle, to prevent and remedy environmental damage. Pursuant to the ELD, damage or imminent threat of such damage to protected species and natural habitats, as those are designated by relevant EU and national legislation, water damage to inland surface waters, transitional waters, coastal waters (at a distance of one nautical mile on the seaward side from the nearest point of the baseline from which the breadth of territorial waters is measured) and groundwater and land damage from, amongst others, transport activities by sea of dangerous goods or polluting goods as defined in Council Directive 93/75/EEC concerning minimum requirements for vessels bound for or leaving Community ports and carrying dangerous or polluting goods (repealed by Directive 2002/59/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 June 2002 establishing a Community vessel traffic monitoring and information system and repealing Council Directive 93/75/EEC) are subject to the provisions of the ELD. These provisions prescribe, amongst others, that, where there is an imminent threat of such damage occurring, the operator shall, without delay, take the necessary preventive measures. In this context, ‘preventive measures' means any measures taken in response to an event, act or omission that has created an imminent threat of environmental damage, with a view to preventing or minimising that damage. The competent authority shall require that the preventive measures are taken by the operator. If the operator fails to comply, the competent authority may take these measures itself. Although the SSPD does not directly regulate ex ante ship-source pollution, but only deals with ex-post imposition of penalties, preventive measures may be relevant in determining whether a discharge is considered an infringement. As such, SSPD transposes Regulation 4.2 of MAPROL Annex I and Regulation 3.1.2 of MARPOL Annex II, which provide that, amongst other conditions, if all reasonable precautions have been taken after the occurrence of the damage or discovery of the discharge for the purpose of preventing or minimizing the discharge, then discharge may not be considered as an infringement. Nevertheless, seeing as the ELD delineates, amongst others, the powers of the competent authorities in such scenario of imminent threat to the environment, whereas the SSP Directive prescribes the conditions upon if penalties would be imposed when that scenario has indeed materialised in a discharge, it is concluded that the ELD and SSP Directive are complementary to one another. With regards to ‘remedial measures' prescribed by the ELD and the obligation of the polluter to pay the remediation costs, the ELD and SSPD do not coincide, since the SSP Directive imposes penalties to the responsible actor for a polluting event, whereas the ELD regulates the costs of restoration, rehabilitation or replacement of damage caused by a polluting event.

The Port State Control Directive (PSCD) (2009/16/EC) aims to reduce substandard shipping in the waters under the jurisdiction of Member States. This includes substandard performance in the area of the application of environmental legislation. It aims to align Member State compliance with international and relevant EU legislation, and it works in the same direction as the SSP Directive in view of targeting an improved enforcement of MARPOL. Nevertheless, the PSCD scope is broader than that of the SSP Directive as it covers also waste included in Annexes IV, V and VI from MARPOL which are outside the scope of the Directive.

The European Mission, “Restore our Ocean and Waters by 2030” launched within the Horizon Europe 2021-2027 programme sets, amongst others, the goal to “Prevent and eliminate pollution”. Through this Mission, research and innovation activities are funded through the Horizon Europe programme with the aim to prevent, minimise, eliminate and monitor and control pollution of EU waters. In this respect, this Mission’s objective aligns with that of the SSP Directive as it aims to improve environmental protection of the seas. Nevertheless, the Mission has a broader scope, dealing not only with ship-source pollution but also with other substances (including micro-plastic waste, chemical and nutrient pollution) that goes beyond what is targeted by the Directive. The Mission has launched 11 research projects under this objective, however the majority of them are targeting (micro-) plastic pollution and pollution from fishing gears while no direct reference is made to MARPOL Annex I and II substances. Thus, to date this initiative has little relevance to the SSP Directive. The Mission has launched two sets of calls, one in 2021 addressing in particular plastics and microplastics (relevant to MARPOL Annex V), for which projects have already been selected and a second one in 2022 addressing chemicals (relevant to MARPOL Annex II), for which projects are still under evaluation. Nutrients are expected to be covered in the future (relevant to MARPOL Annex IV).

With reference to regional level, inconsistencies were found between the SSP Directive and international or regional conventions related to differences in scope, whether this related to the range of discharges covered, the geographical scope and/or the types of ships/activities covered. Marine environmental protection is coordinated regionally through the EU’s engagement in the Regional Sea Conventions, through the strong links with the EU’s own implementation of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive, thereby ensuring that both EU Member States and third countries aspire to an equivalent ambition of protection of the seas and ocean. A number of regional sea conventions cover EU marine waters: the Helsinki Convention – HELCOM (Baltic Sea), Oslo-Paris Convention – OSPAR (North-east Atlantic), the Bonn Agreement (North Sea), the Barcelona Convention – UNEP-MAP (the Mediterranean) and the Bucharest Convention (Black Sea). The EU is a contracting party to the first three. There are differences in the scope of substances covered. More specifically, the Helsinki convention applies to substances listed in Annex I-V of MARPOL, and the Bucharest convention applies to substances listed in Annex I-IV. The OSPAR convention applies to all wastes with narrow exceptions, and the Bonn Agreement and the Barcelona convention apply, on top, to emissions to air which are covered in Annex VI of MARPOL.

With reference to international level, a first key point relates to the narrow scope of the SSP Directive (Article 2) compared to the MARPOL Convention concerning the discharges covered, focusing only on the discharges covered by Annex I and Annex II of MARPOL but not including harmful substances in packaged form, sewage, garbage and emissions to air (Annexes III, IV, V and VI respectively).

In addition, plastic pellets are not classified as harmful substances in packaged form but discussions are ongoing in IMO to assess the best possible solution to tackle the environmental risks associated with the maritime transport of pellets, starting with their classification as harmful substances.

3.4    EU Added Value

1. What is the additional value of the Directive compared to what has been or what could have been achieved by Member States at national and/or regional and international level, for example with a view to the cross-border impacts of ship source pollution? (EQ15)

The adoption and implementation of the Directive has resulted in significantly improved spill detection capabilities (see EQ6 and EQ12) compared to what could have been achieved with actions at a national, regional or international level only. This has been achieved mainly with the enhanced satellite surveillance capabilities and the improved cooperation with the use of EMSA-developed systems and tools. The CleanSeaNet service has been a key driver to achieving economies of scale in implementing otherwise costly surveillance activities which have benefited mostly Member States with weaker pre-existing surveillance regimes and less resources in their disposal perform the required surveillance activities (see EQ10 and EQ11). Ultimately, the improved detection capabilities have supported a more effective deterrence of illegal discharges resulting in an improved environmental protection status (see EQ4).

The enhanced surveillance activities might be linked to a certain extent with the increase in the identification of potential polluters by Member States (See EQ6). While this may be attributed to the increased number of potential detections/ alerts, the improved identification capabilities introduced by the use of EMSA systems might have led to at least a certain level of improvement of Member State capabilities to identify potential polluters, although the results of this process depend also heavily on the verification activities undertaken and the resources devoted to them.

Nevertheless, despite leading to a more harmonised legal framework, the Directive has not been able to deliver a harmonised approach in the way Member States prosecute infringements and impose penalties on verified offenders. The approach followed is still highly dependent on the legal tradition of each Member State and the Directive has brought little change to pre-exiting practices (see EQ5).

2. Would it have been possible to achieve the same results without the Directive? (EQ16)

The introduction of the EMSA-developed systems and services has led to an enhanced and more targeted verification by Member States, which could have not been achieved in their absence. This has been particularly the case with the introduction and use of CleanSeaNet that has enhanced the targeting of Member State authorities (see EQ4, EQ10 and EQ11). Although SafeSeaNet and THETIS tools would have still been in place without the Directive, the Directive has, to a certain extent, prompted their use by Member State authorities. Although the current use levels appear to have room for improvement, it is considered likely that their use would have been even lower in the absence of the Directive (see EQ12).

As mentioned also in EQ3, the adoption of the Directive has led to some action towards harmonising the legal framework of Member States, however the Directive did not achieve a practical shift in the proportion of cases treated criminally as the prevalence of existing legal traditions in Member States has prevented relevant change (see EQ3 and EQ5). This mean that the Directive has not been conductive in delivering results in this respect that would not be achieved in its absence.

3.5    Relevance 

1. To what extent is the transposition into EU law of standards introduced by the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL), related to the prohibition to discharge polluting substances into the sea and to the specification of the penalties to be imposed, still required and appropriate? (EQ1)

Two key problems and needs were identified by stakeholders (see  Figure 47 ) which are considered in more detail below.

Issue 1 - ‘Maritime transport safety and ship-source pollution prevention’: while the number of medium and large oil spills of over 7 tonnes has been in decline since the 1990s. As discussed in more detail in EQ4, ship-related pollution incidents continue to occur. Stakeholders (consulted in the survey and interviews) largely agree that this issue is still relevant (15 out of 23 agreed and 8 out of 23 strongly agreed). It was acknowledged by Member State authorities, international bodies and the maritime sector 102 that whilst shipping is considerably safer and there are fewer spill incidents, in part due to improvements in technology and training standards, ship-source pollution is still occurring, and further improvements are still required. Member State authorities 103 and maritime sector stakeholders 104 also pointed to the recent adoption of more ambitious target at EU level to work towards ‘zero pollution’, including EU Action Plan: ‘Towards a Zero Pollution for Air, Water and Soil’ (European Commission, 2021) pointing to the ongoing relevance of action in this area (see also EQ2). This indicated that the issue/problem still required action.

Issue 2 - ‘MARPOL 73/78 Convention rules and standards systematically ignored due to limited detection and prosecution’: The effectiveness section revealed that although there has been increased satellite surveillance capacity (since 2015 via CleanSeaNet) allowing the identification of more/smaller spills and demonstrating increased detection, there is limited data/information available on prosecution activities. The majority of stakeholders interviewed agreed that the incorporation of international rules into EU law is still relevant (9 Member State authorities and a regional body). In conclusion, although detection has improved, prosecution of infringements is uncertain, and most stakeholders agree that the issue is relevant.

Figure 47. Considering the issues identified at the time of the Directive adoption, to what extent do you agree that these issues are still relevant in the current context?

Source: Stakeholder survey

Concluding, consideration of the issues/problems identified by stakeholders and assessment of the Directive’s objectives reveal that despite progress made in pollution detection and enforcement, pollution still occurs – the transposition of MARPOL standards into EU law is therefore still required and relevant.

2. To what extent is the Directive still relevant for the EU wider policy goals and priorities and for EU citizens? (EQ2)

The extent to which objectives and provisions of the Directive are still relevant in view of EU wider policy goals and priorities and for EU citizens were reflected upon in order to answer EQ2.

Wider EU policy goals are set out in a number of key policy initiatives.

The European Green Deal and the EU Action Plan: ‘Towards a Zero Pollution for Air, Water and Soil’ (European Commission, 2021) set out a target of zero pollution ambition by 2050 for ‘air, water and soil pollution to be reduced to levels no longer considered harmful to health and natural ecosystems, that respect the boundaries with which our planet can cope, thereby creating a toxic-free environment’. Under the Zero Pollution Action Plan (ZPZP), specific targets have been set for 2030 to speed up reducing pollution at source, including those aimed at water, which are: “improving water quality by reducing waste, plastic litter at sea (by 50%) and microplastics released into the environment (30%)”.

The Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy (SSMS) aims to significantly reduce emissions from the transport sector and to become more sustainable. Relevant flagships include ‘Flagship 1: Boosting uptake o zero-emission vehicles, renewable & low-carbon fuels and related infrastructure’ (including use of sustainable maritime fuels); ‘Flagship 2: Creating zero-emission airports and ports’; ‘Flagship 4: Greening freight Transport’ (including making European Maritime areas sustainable, smart and resilient); and ‘Flagship 1: Enhancing transport safety and security’.

The UN’s Agenda for Sustainable Development (adopted by all UN Member States in 2015) (United Nations, 2015) provides a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and planet, now and in the future, and is supported by 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). SDG 14 focused on water, in particular to “Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development”, and is supported by ten targets to achieve this goal. Of particular relevance is target 14.1: “by 2025, prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution of all kinds, in particular from land-based activities, including marine debris and nutrient pollution”.

The Directive’s objectives are relevant in general terms, as they support and contribute towards the objectives of the EU’s wider policy goals. However, these goals tend to be more ambitious in relation to environmental protection, with EU political priorities focusing on addressing climate change and pollution prevention.

Stakeholder input also supports the conclusion that the Directives objectives only partially support the EU’s objectives and priorities of achieving zero pollution for marine waters in the context of the Green Deal, with just over half of stakeholders (of the survey) agreeing that objectives would need to be modified to remain consistent with the need to achieve zero pollution for marine waters in the context of the European Green Deal (13 out of 25 – see  Figure 48 ).

Figure 48. To what extent do you agree that objectives need to be modified in order to be consistent with the need to achieve zero pollution for marine waters in the context of the European Green Deal?

Source: Stakeholder survey

In terms of EU citizens’ priorities, marine pollution was identified as important by 40% of EU citizens in 2019 (ranked 4th, increased from 33% in 2017 105 ) in the latest Eurobarometer on environmental issues. While marine pollution does not only cover pollution resulting from ships, it can be argued that, in general, the Directive objectives reflect the EU citizen’s environmental priorities.

On the basis of the analysis above, the Directive appears to be only partially relevant, with the needs and objectives of the EU wider policy goals being more ambitious in terms of environmental protection. However, it is largely in line with what appears to be an increasing prioritisation of EU citizens towards the protection of the marine environment.

The evaluation matrix is provided in the Figure 49 to Figure 53 .

Figure 49: Evaluation matrix - effectiveness

Figure 50: Evaluation matrix - efficiency

Figure 51: Evaluation matrix - Coherence

Figure 52: Evaluation matrix – EU added value

Figure 53: Evaluation matrix - Relevance

This annex provides a summary of the outcomes of the consultation activities, which have been carried out for the evaluation and Impact Assessment of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive, including in the context of the external support study. The impact assessment and the ex-post evaluation of the Ship-Source Pollution Directive were performed in a back-to-back manner (i.e. the evaluation and impact assessment have been launched at the same time) in 2021-2022.

This annex provides the range of stakeholders consulted, describes the main consultation activities and also provides a succinct analysis of their views and the main issues they raised.

The aim of the consultation activities was to collect information and opinions from stakeholders on the achievements of the Directive, its added-value, key problems and associated drivers, definition of relevant policy objectives linked to those problem areas and the identification, definition and screening of policy measures that could eventually be incorporated into policy options for the Impact Assessment, as well as gather information and opinions on their likely impacts.

1.    Overview of consultation activities

A consultation strategy, covering all stakeholder consultation activities, including those carried out as part of the support study, was developed early in the process. The consultation activities were aimed at a range of stakeholders dealing with the identification, verification and prosecution of ship-source pollution in EU and industry representatives (including relevant associations of ship-owners and port operators), as well as non-EU players (e.g. flag States). The objective of the consultation activities was to collect information and opinions on the current implementation and enforcement of rules on illegal discharges from ships as well as gather evidence on expected costs and benefits of draft policy measures.

Consultation activities have taken place since the publication of the combined evaluation roadmap/ inception impact assessment published in May 2021 and continued until the stakeholder validation workshop in September 2022.

As part of the initial feedback mechanism, stakeholders had the opportunity to provide feedback on the combined evaluation roadmap/ inception impact assessment 106 via the relevant website. The Commission received eight responses, during June 2021. Six responses were provided by NGOs and two by business representatives.

Afterwards, the following consultation activities were carried out:

–An Open Public Consultation (OPC), organised by the European Commission, which ran from 9 December 2021 to 3 March 2021. The OPC put forward questions on both the Impact Assessment and the evaluation of this Directive.

–Three rounds of interviews with EU level representatives of key stakeholders organised by the consultant in charge of the external support study, running intermittently from November 2021 to September 2022, to fill specific information requests, in support of the evaluation and to refine the overall problem definition and possible policy options.

–Two targeted stakeholder surveys to gather specific information, one for the evaluation and one for the Impact Assessment, organised by the consultant in charge of the external support study, running, respectively, from December 2021 until February 2022 and June until July 2022.

–Additional targeted consultation activities organised by DG MOVE in order to consult the Member States and key stakeholders on the different policy measures and to validate the emerging and final results of the support study to the Impact Assessment in terms of the quantification of impacts. These activities took place in the context of a meeting of the EU Committee on Safe Seas and the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (2 June 2022), meetings of the European Sustainable Shipping Forum (18 May 2022) and its subgroup: Waste from Ships (22 March 2022 and 4 June 2022), the EU/EEA Maritime Transport Directors (3 October 2022), the North Sea Network of Investigators and Prosecutors (25 April 2022), HELCOM (8 June 2022) and BONN Agreement meetings (21 September 2022), an informal meeting with the Regional Sea Conventions (29 June 2022) and an informal meeting with ECSA (21 September 2022). A final workshop to validate the conclusions of the support study attended by Member State, NGOs and industry representatives was also organised (22 September 2022).

The information collected from stakeholders was key in allowing the Commission to evaluate the Directive, define the policy options and assess and compare their economic, social and environmental impacts. As result, the consultations informed on which policy option is likely to maximize the benefits/costs ratio for the society and achieve a more effective and efficient mechanism to discourage ship-source pollution in the EU. Findings from those processes complemented the desk research carried out in the context of the external support study.

Methods have been adapted to take account of the development of the COVID-19 pandemic. For this reason, interviews and meetings were held by videoconference.

Table 1. Overview of responses to different stakeholder consultation activities