More than 30 emissions trading systems are now in force or under development worldwide, according to the International Carbon Action Partnership, and the maritime sector is increasingly caught between overlapping carbon regimes.
What began as regionally driven climate policy is hardening into a compliance maze, with shipowners facing parallel obligations under the EU Emissions Trading System, FuelEU Maritime, and a delayed net zero framework under the International Maritime Organization, alongside emerging greenhouse gas fuel intensity standards in multiple jurisdictions.
For BAR Technologies, the concern is not the existence of carbon pricing itself, but the cumulative effect of unaligned schemes. The company warns that fragmented regulation is inflating compliance costs while diverting capital away from emissions reducing technologies. Different baselines, reporting rules, and cost mechanisms mean shipping companies must design compliance strategies around regulatory risk rather than operational efficiency.
The scale of policy divergence extends beyond shipping. Research from the Grantham Research Institute identified more than 900 climate adaptation laws and policies adopted across 35 countries since the Paris Agreement. While this expansion reflects political momentum, it also illustrates how rapidly climate governance has become fragmented, particularly for globally traded sectors such as maritime transport where vessels cross multiple regulatory regimes in a single voyage.
BAR Technologies argues that this fragmentation risks delaying decarbonization rather than accelerating it. Compliance teams are growing faster than engineering budgets, and uncertainty around future carbon liabilities makes long term investment decisions harder to justify. According to the company, shipowners are increasingly forced to hedge against regulatory outcomes instead of committing to technologies that deliver predictable emissions reductions over a vessel’s lifetime.
The challenge is compounded by trade related instruments such as the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, which entered into force on January 1, 2026. While CBAM does not directly price shipping emissions, it embeds carbon costs into traded goods including steel, aluminum, cement, and fertilizers, all of which rely heavily on maritime transport. For shipping companies, this introduces indirect exposure to carbon pricing through cargo demand, routing decisions, and customer cost sensitivity.
BAR Technologies is calling for a unified global carbon framework that applies consistently across borders and is administered transparently. The company supports a bunker level carbon collection mechanism that would avoid duplication across regional schemes while generating funds for climate positive reinvestment. In its view, a single global approach would lower administrative overhead and provide clearer price signals for investment in low carbon technologies.
In the absence of regulatory convergence, the company is urging shipowners to prioritize solutions that deliver immediate emissions reductions regardless of policy geography. Wind assisted propulsion, it argues, fits that criterion by reducing fuel consumption and exposure to carbon costs across all regulatory zones. BAR Technologies’ WindWings systems are already operating on commercial vessels, cutting fuel demand and improving the economics of alternative fuels such as methanol and ammonia by lowering overall energy requirements.
