Egypt's Suez Canal to hold panel discussion at COP 27 on green solutions, investment opportunities

CAIRO – 5 November 2022: During COP 27, the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) will hold at the Green Zone a panel discussion titled "The Leading Role of the Suez Canal in Maintaining Sustainable Green Supply Chains" on November 11.  

The discussion will tackle the environmental challenges facing the maritime transport industry, and different visions on how to benefit from the development of shipbuilding technology in building new generations of ships that comply with the adequate environmental standards.

The panel will also shed light on the investment opportunities the Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCzone). Those can support global supply chains and trade in an effective and sustainable manner, and are fully aligned with the initiatives adopted by the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

The panel will also highlight the measures to be taken in the future to achieve sustainable development and tackle the risks of climate change.

The panelists will be SCA Chairman Ossama Rabiee; Secretary General of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) Guy Platten; Director of Marine Environment Division at the IMO Arsenio Dominguez; Vice President and Head of Decarbonization at Moller-Maersk Martin Bo Christiansen; and, Vice-President for Global Sustainability at the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) Georgios Plevrakis.

Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli witnessed in March the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to produce green hydrogen that will be used to fuel ships.

The signing parties are Maersk on one hand, and the General Authority for Suez Canal, the Sovereign Fund of Egypt, the New and Renewable Energy Authority, and the Egyptian Company for Electricity Transmission on the other hand.  

The representative of Maersk stated that the company is preparing 12 ships to be powered by green hydrogen, and that it is interested in building a plant that produces green fuel in Ain Sokhna's economic zone. She added that Maersk targets to attain zero carbon emission by 2040.