Professor Johan Woxenius and Lighthouse postdoctor Anastasia Christodoulou, both at the Department of Business Administration, University of Gothenburg, are the editors for a special issue on sustainable short sea shipping in the open access journal Sustainability. They now invite expertise in the domain to submit a manuscript to be reviewed for inclusion in this special issue.

More information here: http://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability/special_issues/Sustainable_Sh...

Sustainability in maritime transport has been an issue of major concern during the last few decades, mainly due to the global nature of shipping that makes it difficult to allocate responsibility by country and complicates its inclusion in global agreements for the abatement of global warming and climate change. Various operational and market-based policy instruments targeting the reduction of maritime greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have been developed by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), in addition to fiscal and economic incentives introduced in national or regional level for the stimulation of the employment of these policies. Nevertheless, evidence and literature review clearly suggest that the implementation of these measures alone could not result in sufficient emissions reductions, given the expected growth of shipping, but innovative technical and operational solutions as well as combinations need to be developed.

Short Sea Shipping (SSS), here simply defined as maritime transport that does not cross oceans, is less researched than deep sea shipping and it deserves more scientific attention. This is particularly true for the SSS signature market segment of RoRo and RoPax but SSS also includes dry and wet bulk, ferry services and, with the operational definition of this special issue, also transport on inland waterways.

This Special Issue intends to look into innovative ideas, trends and efforts, especially applications, with good potentials to increase the sustainability of SSS. Special emphasis is given to the operational measures and economic incentives with potential to reduce GHG emissions and air pollution from SOx, NOx and particles. Articles with a strong empirical content, such as case studies that provide critical overview and reflect the cutting-edge progress in this field are particularly sought after.

Topics of interest of this Special Issue on sustainable SSS include, but are not limited to:

• Operational issues for energy efficient maritime transport
• Fiscal/economic incentives for sustainable shipping
• Sustainable maritime-based transport chains
• Maritime logistics operations and emissions/energy consumption
• Private firm strategies and public interventions targeting maritime GHG emissions and air pollution
• Role of policies/regulations for sustainable maritime growth

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2019