Ship Recycling - The Need of A Life Cycle Approach

Having identified the potential hazard during the Ship recycling process, the Hongkong Convention mandates the inventory of hazardous materials for Ships above 500 GT. It also mandates the Ship recycling facility to have a Ship Recycling Plan based on the inventory of hazardous material. The Hongkong convention although addresses most of the issues in the ship recycling industry in the beaching method of ship recycling, it is silent over the issues pertaining to the downstream waste management. India has ratified the Hong Kong convention on 29th November 2019, has enacted the Ship Recycling Act, 2019 in line with the requirements of the Hong Kong convention. This paper analyses the key issues of concern in the ship recycling industry especially which employs the beaching method of recycling and the dire need of a Life cycle assessment approach in ship recycling, the process improvement of hazardous waste handling in the Ship recycling industry to prevent the accident occurrences, reduce the health issues to the workers in the ship recycling industry in addition to the pollution prevention aspects in the adjacent coastal areas.