Free Foundation

The IMO Net-Zero Framework

What the IMO's approved, but not adopted, mid-term measure would require, and where it actually stands: a declining well-to-wake GHG fuel intensity path for ships of 5,000 GT and above, two target ladders year by year to 2035, two-tier pricing at USD 100 and USD 380 per tonne with a settlement rule that differs between the tiers, surplus units and their two-year life, rewards for zero and near-zero fuels, the 31 March and 30 September reporting dates, and the dated record of two failed adoption attempts, a reopened text and the rival proposals now sitting beside it.

Lessons
6
Quiz questions
52
Time
About 46 min
Who it's for
Shipowners, operators, technical and chartering staff who need the framework's mechanics and cost logic while its fate is still open, and anyone who has to brief management on where IMO decarbonisation policy actually stands.
Assumed knowledge
None. Familiarity with IMO DCS, CII and FuelEU Maritime helps; our free course Maritime Regulations, Explained covers all three.
Taught by

Christos Papandreou

CEO & Founder, Blue Autonomy

  • Naval architect and marine engineer, National Technical University of Athens
  • 15 years of experience in fleet performance and operational data
  • Chief Scientist, NEMO — previously DeepSea Technologies, StormGeo, Athenian Sea Carriers, PwC

Part of the Maritime Decarbonisation & Compliance specialisation.

What you will be able to do

By the end of the course. Each outcome names the lessons that deliver it, and each lesson's quiz checks it.

  1. Place the framework in its policy context: the 2023 IMO GHG Strategy's net-zero ambition by or around 2050, the 2030 (at least 20%) and 2040 (at least 70%) checkpoints against the 2008 baseline, and why EEXI and CII alone could not close the zero-GHG fuel price gap. Lesson 1
  2. Explain the two-part mechanism — a goal-based well-to-wake GHG fuel intensity (GFI) standard with a price attached — its scope (ships over 5,000 GT, on the DCS reporting backbone), and its intended route into law as MARPOL Annex VI amendments under tacit acceptance. Lesson 2
  3. Convert the framework's target ladders into absolute intensities from the 93.3 gCO2eq/MJ reference (e.g. the 2028 base target at 4% below ≈ 89.6), and compute what a deficit costs at the two remedial-unit tiers (USD 100 and USD 380 per tCO2eq for 2028–2030), stating which tier surplus units can settle (Tier 2 only) and what surplus units may be used for (bank two years, cancel, transfer). Lesson 3
  4. Read regulation 39.1's zero/near-zero definition as ceilings (not greater than 19.0 gCO2eq/MJ to end-2034, 14.0 from 2035), judge whether a given fuel pathway can qualify (a certified pathway number, not a fuel family), and describe what the IMO Net-Zero Fund would collect and pay for — including that the ZNZ reward itself is a deadline (1 March 2027), not yet a rate. Lesson 4
  5. Compare a ship's compliance levers — fuel choice and blending, surplus units, remedial contributions — and build an order-of-magnitude cost estimate for a conventional ship, explaining why the choice is year-by-year arithmetic rather than a locked strategy, and how the framework would sit in parallel with FuelEU for EU traders. Lesson 5
  6. Recount the framework's adoption record as dated facts rather than a verdict, state what adoption would trigger on the tacit-acceptance clock, and name the no-regret actions — above all DCS data hygiene — a shipowner takes while the outcome is open. Lesson 6

In April 2025, MEPC 83 approved the most consequential piece of shipping regulation in a generation: draft amendments creating a new Chapter 5 of MARPOL Annex VI that would set a declining well-to-wake GHG fuel intensity path for every ship of 5,000 GT and above and attach a price to missing it. Then came the harder part, and it has gone badly. The extraordinary session convened in October 2025 to adopt the text adjourned instead, on a vote. MEPC 84 closed on 1 May 2026 without agreement. The draft is now formally reopened, with member states free to file amendments and adjustments to it and at least four rival proposals beside it, one of which would replace the framework outright and delete the Net-Zero Fund with it. The next adoption attempt is a one-day resumed session pencilled in for 4 December 2026, subject to confirmation. Entry into force, if everything goes right from there, is April 2028 at the earliest.

This course teaches the framework as exactly what it is, approved, not adopted, and open to amendment again, because the mechanics are worth learning either way. The numbers in the approved draft already shape newbuild specifications, charter negotiations and fuel strategy, and ships trading to Europe live under a close cousin of the same logic today.

Six lessons: where the framework came from (the 2023 IMO GHG Strategy); how the two-part mechanism works, and the compliance calendar it runs on; the actual numbers: the 93.3 gCO2eq/MJ reference, both target ladders year by year to 2035, and remedial units at USD 100 and USD 380 with the rule that says which tier can be settled how; zero and near-zero fuels and the Net-Zero Fund; what compliance would cost and how owners would choose between fuel, units and contributions; and the record as dated facts, the competing proposals included, with a sensible posture while the outcome is open.

Every lesson cites open IMO, class-society and industry sources you can check yourself, and says which figures are fixed, which are ceilings and which the Committee still owes itself. This is the fastest-moving material in the Academy: the closing lesson names the sessions that will decide it and says plainly what to re-check at the IMO before you rely on a number. Where the GFI arithmetic is worked in full rather than explained, that is our forthcoming course Compliance Calculations & Life-Cycle Emissions.

What the course covers

  1. From Strategy to Framework: Why a Mid-Term Measure 6 min
  2. The Two-Part Mechanism: A Fuel Standard With a Price Attached 7 min
  3. The Numbers: One Reference, Two Ladders, Two Prices 9 min
  4. Zero and Near-Zero Fuels and the Net-Zero Fund 7 min
  5. Compliance Strategies and What They Would Cost 7 min
  6. The Road to Adoption: A Dated Record and a Sensible Posture 10 min

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