Ports Unveil First-Ever Green Shipping Corridor Plan — BUT…

On  Sept. 22, the Ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach and Shanghai announced the creation of the first-ever green shipping corridor (designed to accelerate the transition to zero-emissions shipping) across the Pacific, as they unveiled The Green Shipping Corridor Implementation Plan. But—while a huge step forward—there’s just one hitch: the whole plan to accelerate the transition to zero-emission shipping is voluntary, and there are major concerns about implementation, integrity, and oversight necessary for the plan to deliver as promised.

Those concerns have come strikingly to the fore in the last few weeks, with revelations that one of the key shipping companies, Maersk, appears to have violated its promised, non-voluntary, zero-emissions commitments at its APM terminal, that Port of Los Angeles staff appear to have negligently allowed this to happen, and that Port Commission Vice President Diane Middleton, who brought the APM situation to public attention, is being hampered by POLA staff in her public oversight functioning, as she revealed in her commissioner’s report at the Sept. 20 meeting.

“Working together on a voluntary basis these Maritime stakeholders can share best practices and combine resources,” C40 Cities, which supported its development, said in a video announcement, promising they “will all commit to reducing carbon emissions from the origin port to a rival terminal driven by several key goals to phase in reduced life cycle carbon emission.”

But, as Random Lengths has reported, Maersk has already used hybrid Kalmar auto-straddlers, rather than all-electric ones available from the same manufacturer, in violation of its commitment in its 2019 Coastal Development Plan application. This violation of a mandatory zero-emission commitment casts serious doubt on the reliability of voluntary ones—especially without strong, transparent public oversight.

While the Sierra Club first uncovered the problems, with inquiries that began in January and deepened in June, it was Middleton’s visit to the APM terminal in August that first brought them to public awareness, sparking further inquiries from Councilmember Tim McCosker. This is just the sort of oversight that harbor commissioners are supposed to provide, but all to rarely do, in the eyes of port critics. And POLA staff seems to be pushing back.

In her commissioner’s report—provided in writing afterwards—Middleton stated that port staff had ignored two requests to set up site visits and objected to three other public interactions with twisted interpretations of California’s open meetings law, the Brown Act. Specifically, she itemized the following:

• On August 26 I met with Councilwoman Nithya Raman. Reported at BOHC meeting on September 7. On September 12, POLA Administration advised that I could not have any contact or discussions with anyone with reference to the ISR citing Brown Act two-commissioner rule
• On September 18 I was scheduled to attend a tour of the West Harbor Development at the request of Councilman McOsker. That morning I was advised by POLA staff that it would be inappropriate for both Commissioner Williams and I to attend the tour since President Roybal-Allard had visited the property the previous week. Again the Brown Act was cited. I did not attend.
• On September 21, I am scheduled to attend the San Pedro Waterfront Update for the Community. I was advised by POLA Administration that my attendance “should be in an observer capacity and to kindly withhold commenting”.

Middleton, a retired lawyer, went on to explain:

“I believe all of the above constitutes a misinterpretation of the Brown Act. The purpose behind the Brown Act, as originally adopted and as it remains today, is to ensure that actions of local public agencies – including their deliberations – are taken in open and public meetings, with posted agendas, and where all persons are permitted to attend and participate.

“I believe that I have the option to ignore the “advice” of staff but I do not want to pursue this individualistic remedy. The public has the right to know all of the above actions and our Board has the right to participate and express their opinions. The Brown Act should not be used to silence Commissioners. I intend to pursue this matter further and look forward to clarification and amicable resolution.”

Random Lengths has strong reasons to believe Middleton is correct, and has reached out to Brown Act experts at the First Amendment Coalition for their assessment, but has not heard back by press time. Serial attendance, in particular, is clearly not covered by the Brown Act. If staff can prevent the kinds of commissioner-community interactions described above, it seems obvious that oversight of zero-emission efforts will be seriously hampered, if not entirely disabled.

“Port of Los Angeles ignoring Commissioner Middleton comes at no surprise to groups like the Sierra Club,” said the Sierra Club’s California Field Manager, Yassi Kavezade. “The Port continues to put the public’s interest and transparency last, as they carry on with business as usual focusing on what benefits their profit-driven tenants. We support the Commissioner’s efforts to engage directly with the ports and believe she cannot do her job justly if her access to port affairs is being blocked by staff.”

Pacific Environment, which has been a strong advocate of green shipping corridors, and has given both local ports high marks, also weighed in.

“POLA needs to act with more urgency to protect port communities and put shipping routes on mandatory decarbonization timelines. Backpedaling on commitments to decarbonization is not an option and players like Maersk must be held accountable for using fossil-fueled equipment,”  said Dawny’all Heydari, Climate Campaign Manager, Advocacy, Pacific Environment. 

“We must act now to peak the shipping sector’s global greenhouse gas emissions by Dec. 31, 2024 and halve emissions by 2030 from 2019 levels, if we hope to remain within our planetary boundary of 1.5 degrees Celsius of global temperature rise.”