Shipping emissions report 2025
Every large ship calling European ports must report its verified fuel consumption and CO₂ emissions yearly under the EU MRV regulation. This report aggregates the entire dataset.
Verified data reported under the EU MRV regulation (source: EMSA / THETIS-MRV).
CO₂ emissions since 2018
Total verified CO₂ of all reporting ships per year. The reporting scope widened in 2025, which lifts the total independently of traffic.
The curve tells three stories at once. The dip of 2020 is the pandemic: fewer sailings, slower steaming, blanked voyages. The rebound of 2021-2022 is the freight boom, when congested ports kept ships waiting and burning fuel while every available hull was pressed into service. And the jump of the latest year is regulatory, not economic: the reporting scope widened, bringing thousands of additional ships into the dataset — which is why the honest way to read this chart is through carbon intensity per transported tonne, not the absolute total.
Emissions by ship type
Latest-year CO₂ and reporting ships per vessel category.
| Ship type | Ships | CO₂ 2025 (Mt) |
|---|---|---|
| Container ship | 3,533 | 51.6 |
| Oil tanker | 3,631 | 16.6 |
| Bulk carrier | 8,407 | 14.3 |
| Ro-pax ship | 496 | 13.5 |
| LNG carrier | 591 | 9.8 |
| General cargo ship | 3,438 | 9.2 |
| Chemical tanker | 2,387 | 8.7 |
| Passenger ship (Cruise Passenger ship) | 207 | 7.1 |
| Ro-ro ship | 312 | 5.3 |
| Vehicle carrier | 716 | 4.3 |
| Gas carrier | 712 | 2.8 |
| Other ship types (Offshore) | 540 | 2.8 |
| Other ship types | 524 | 2.3 |
| Refrigerated cargo carrier | 206 | 0.9 |
Totals by ship type mislead if read naively. Bulk carriers are the most numerous fleet yet emit moderately per ship — they sail slowly and spend long periods idle or loading. Container ships dominate absolute emissions because they are large, fast and intensely utilised on fixed schedules. At the other extreme, ferries and cruise ships post the highest emissions per vessel: they run near-continuous rotations and carry a hotel load that burns fuel even at berth. Comparing a ship against its own type, as our rankings do, is the only fair frame.