UK ETS to launch on 1 July

May 13, 2026

3 min read

The UK Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) will expand to include maritime from 1 July, and will affect vessels of at least 5,000GT at berth or sailing between UK ports, after the UK government won a series of key votes in March.

From 1 July shipping companies operating in UK waters will be subject to new regulation as the ETS will expand to cover maritime emissions from voyages between two UK ports and within ports (crown dependencies and overseas territories are excluded).

This is part of the UK’s package of emissions reduction, introduced in the closing days of Theresa May’s stint as British Prime Minister. This package comes from the 2008 Climate Change Act, amended to achieve national net zero by 2050, including key milestones of a 30% reduction by 2030 and an 80% reduction by 2040.

UK ETS is central to the UK’s decarbonisation ambitions, but for maritime operations this is only part of the solution and must include Onshore Power Supply (OPS) and a transition to new fuels, requiring significant investment in ports, new fuels and emissions reduction technology.

The Brexit component

To explain how the UK ETS emerged, we must roll time backwards to 2016, when the UK was a full member of the EU and a participant in its various decarbonisation initiatives, which included the EU MRV (Monitoring, Reporting and Verification) and ETS.

Once Brexit became a reality, with the final schism occurring on 31 January 2020, the UK mirrored existing EU laws and initiatives to preserve the status quo of MRV for maritime and ETS (for fixed installations and aviation only), but now operating with separate IT infrastructure.

As time progressed, the EU and UK schemes have evolved and diverged. Maritime came under the EU ETS in 2023, however the UK only began to consider doing something similar the same year, with consultations running in 2024.

Logistics UK’s Senior Policy Manager Stephanie Haszczyn said: “The expansion of the UK Emissions Trading Scheme to include maritime from 1 July is a significant step towards decarbonising the sector, but it must be delivered in a way that supports, rather than constrains, efficient supply chains.

“Shipping is vital to the UK economy, and operators will now face additional cost and administrative pressures at a time when the industry is already investing heavily in emissions reduction.

“To ensure the policy achieves its environmental goals without unintended consequences, government must work closely with industry to accelerate the development of shore power infrastructure and the availability of alternative fuels, as well as provide clarity and consistency in how the scheme will operate alongside international measures.”

More information can be found here.