About Ship Recycling Reducing Human And Environmental Impacts

The ship recycling process reduces the need for mining by recycling the scrap metals obtained from retired vessels. It is essentially reducing the use of natural resources by reusing the old ones hence, saving them for future use. The recycling of ships not only reduces land or water pollution but also reduces air pollution. These reductions are due to the reason that lesser resources are required to produce materials from metal scrap as compared to metal ore.

Turkey being the world’s largest cash buyer and India having the largest responsible ship recycling yards situated on the west coast of Gujarat, gives employment to thousands of workers to recycle the vessels. However, the recycling of ships has some disadvantages too. People working in recycling yards come in contact with hazardous substances that not only affect their health but also the environment.

These harmful and toxic waste materials include asbestos, polychlorinated biphenyls, lead batteries, mercury, and ozone-depleting substances, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and tributyltin. These toxic contaminants can cause severe harm to the health of workers but this is now being taken care of by the authorities by taking precautionary measures like adopting green ship recycling.

The ship recycling industry is helping by giving a meaningful contribution towards the environment and the workforce involved in many ways. It:

Boosts local economy:

The ship recycling industry in South Asian countries like India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka is connected with various stakeholders in the very large downstream market for cast-off or used goods such as furniture, household appliances, décor materials, paints, hardware items, equipment, etc. This supports in increasing the local economy as the parts from the recycled ships are utilized by the small-scale industries working to renew the items, which are then traded in the second-hand market.

The steel of the recycled ships is also utilized in re-rolling mills and steel melting mills which use the ferrous scrap to produce goods such as steel bars, pipes, poles, instruments, etc. The entire local industry which has developed due to ship scrap yards is the main reason that boosts the local economy, as it helps in growing the trade of second-hand goods, as well as ferrous and non-ferrous scrap.

Increases employment:

Ship recycling yards, second-hand shops, re-rolling mills, steel factories, and refurbishing factories is the chain that creates a local industry as a whole that employs thousands of people or workers from below poverty line segments of the society. These tasks include both semi-trained and untrained people working at ship recycling yards disassembling, deconstructing, and cutting retired vessels, and also recycling the waste for other downstream industries.

Reduces the pollution rate:

The recycling of ships reduces the pollution caused by the retired vessels. The beneficial effect of using scrap metal to manufacture refurbished products instead of using metal ore is seen to produce reduced greenhouse gas emissions. This reduction in the emission of greenhouse gases is due to lower energy consumption as compared to the energy used while using iron ore. Moreover, the need to do metal mining is reduced, thus leading to reduced greenhouse gas emissions as well.

Hence, ship recycling is beneficial for both manpower and the environment. This is an important contribution of the ship recycling industry towards a safe, more sustainable future for people. When compared to abandonment, ship recycling is the most safe and sound way to reduce pollution as well as utilize old vessels.