ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT: OFFSHORE SHIP-TO SHIP TRANSFER REGULATIONS IN FORCE

ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT: OFFSHORE SHIP-TO SHIP TRANSFER REGULATIONS IN FORCE

• 28 August 2025
• Environmental Law
• SA Legal Academy

The Department of Forestry, Fisheries & the Environment has finalised and gazetted regulations on offshore ship-to-ship transfers under the 2008 National Environmental Management: Integrated Coastal Management Act. This is noting that:

• ‘ship-to-ship transfer’ means ‘the transfer at sea of liquid bulk cargo, including chemicals, oil, petroleum products, liquid petroleum gas or liquified natural gas from one vessel to another outside an operational harbour area, and includes bunkering’
• ‘bunkering’ means ‘the supply of fuel to a vessel at sea outside an operational harbour area’, and that
• the regulations were released in draft form in February 2025 for comment, revised and released again in July 2025 for further input.

Immediately effective, among other things the new regulations:

• prohibit ship-to-ship transfers in:
  • a marine protected area
  • an aquaculture development zone
  • within five nautical miles of such areas, and
  • within three nautical miles of the high water mark
• in certain situations, prescribe the hours within which ship-to-ship transfers may take place outside these areas
• prescribe the marine mammal- and penguin-related wildlife sensitive measures to be taken and procedures followed:
  • before a ship-to-ship transfer takes place, and
  • during the transfer
• make it mandatory for a ship-to-ship transfer operator to:
  • report any marine wildlife injuries and deaths (including oiled, entangled or disoriented mammals), and
  • collect and transport oiled wildlife to the nearest appropriate facility
• prescribe certain weather-related conditions for ship-to-ship transfers in Algoa Bay
• prescribe the measures to be taken by ship-to-ship transfer operators to avoid or mitigate spills
• prescribe training requirements for the crew of ship-to-ship transfer vessels
• make it mandatory for every ship-to-ship transfer operator to carry an authorised environmental management plan, and
• prescribe the issues to be covered by a ship-to-ship transfer environmental management plan.

Please click the links below for more information:

• new regulations

Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch

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