Cruise lines and Dade mayor say pollution-fighting shore power is coming to PortMiami
Polluting cruise ships might finally be able to plug in at PortMiami, slashing emissions that harm humans and contribute to climate change.
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava signed a letter of intent Wednesday with the CEOs of six cruise companies and the CEO of Florida Power & Light to bring the pollution-control technology called shore power to PortMiami. The mayor announced the joint letter two weeks after the publication of a Miami Herald story about the avoidable pollution from docked cruise ships.
Representatives from the county, FPL and the companies — Carnival Corporation, Royal Caribbean Group, Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings, MSC Cruises, Disney Cruise Line and Virgin Voyages — will form a task force to work through the logistical and funding challenges of installing shore power, which allows ships to turn off their engines while docked and plug into the local electrical grid. Former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine will work as a volunteer with the group; he is now CEO of
Royal Media Partners.
Levine Cava announced the joint letter during MiamiDade commissioners’ discussion of a new terminal for MSC Cruises that requires $177 million of public investment. The commission unanimously approved the deal with MSC, including the company’s 62-year lease on the terminal.
The joint letter does not include any timeline for installing shore power. A spokesperson for the mayor said the goal is to have at least one hookup installed within a year or two.
“We’ll be addressing many of the details moving forward,” Levine Cava said.
“Today is the first crucial step.”
Seven U.S. ports have installed shore power for cruise ships since 2001. PortMiami first discussed installing shore power as early as 2009 as a way to protect the city from the health and climate change effects of cruise-ship emissions. Since then, the county has invested more than $700 million in building five new cruise terminals, but none of the plans include the technology.
Cruise companies have already outfitted many of their ships with the plugs necessary to connect to shore power, including at least 15 that have visited PortMiami hundreds of times in the past decade.
For some residents who live near the port, the recently elected mayor’s letter is too little too late. Palm Island resident Tom Sullivan, founder of Lumber Liquidators, is tired of seeing and smelling the cruise-ship exhaust from his yard. He is planning to sue the county, demanding that the MSC terminal deal and all other cruise terminal deals be amended to include shore power.
“It’s just talk, it’s nothing substantial,” he said of the joint letter. “Either they put down a timeline and have an exact plan, or we’ll make them do that.”
According to a 2018 report from Port Everglades, in 2008 Florida Power & Light estimated it would cost $7.5 million to equip a single cruise berth with shore power. More recently, the shore power hookup at the Brooklyn cruise terminal cost $20 million to develop.
A Miami Herald analysis of EPA data and the agency’s shore power calculator found shore power could reduce carbon emissions at PortMiami by about 35%. Emissions dangerous to human health — sulfur oxide and nitrogen oxide — would be cut by 67%- 99%, respectively. As power grids incorporate more energy from renewable sources like wind, solar and hydropower, shore power will become even more effective.
It took nearly a month, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s number on President Joe Biden’s dance card finally came up.
After calling more than a dozen other world leaders since taking office, Biden on Wednesday telephoned his Israeli counterpart. Netanyahu tweeted out a photograph of himself at his desk and on the phone, grinning like the Cheshire cat.
But the long delay – seen as a diplomatic snub considering Netanyahu was President Donald Trump’s third call to a foreign leader upon taking office – drove Israelis crazy.
Commentators and politicians were abuzz with speculation that Biden was freezing out Netanyahu after four super-cozy years with the Trump administration. Or perhaps, they were saying, Biden didn’t want to be seen favoring Netanyahu ahead of Israel’s March 23 national elections.
Danny Danon, a former Israeli ambassador to the
United Nations, tweeted out a list of 10 countries Biden had already called. “Might it now be time to call the leader of #Israel, the closest ally of the #US?” he said. He offered a phone number that Biden could dial, though it had been disconnected.
Rest assured, foreign policy experts say, Biden clearly had Netanyahu’s number – in more ways than one. By making the notoriously arrogant Israeli leader cool his heels while waiting for a call, Biden was signaling a significant refocusing of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East to become more evenhanded in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“A clear message is being sent,” tweeted Aaron David Miller, a veteran Middle
East peace negotiator.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki denied the president intended to slight Netanyahu.
“His first call with a leader in the region will be with Prime Minister Netanyahu,” she said Tuesday. “It will be soon.” A day later, the Israeli Foreign Ministry confirmed the call took place.
Biden, who has known
Netanyahu for decades, appears eager to resume a more traditional relationship with Israel, one with strong ties and cooperation, but without the fawning support that characterized the
Trump administration.
“There’s no question the Trump administration gave Israel everything it wanted – more than it wanted,” said Shira Efron, an Israel expert at think tank Rand Corp. in California. Israelis are going to have to get used to not being the center of Washington foreign-policy discussions, at least for the near future, she said.
Biden’s cooler approach contrasts with Trump’s effusiveness toward Israel. Trump moved the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, recognized Israeli sovereignty over disputed land in Jerusalem and Golan Heights, and cut off aid to Palestinians, including to refugees and Christian hospitals. Trump’s proposed
Mideast peace plan was viewed as one-sided in favor of Israel and was quickly rejected by Palestinians.
Trump and Netanyahu were so linked that the Israeli leader used the American president’s picture in campaign billboards in the last three inconclusive Israeli elections. Israelis are naming settlements after Trump.
Biden is setting a different course. He won’t move the U.S. Embassy back to Tel Aviv, but he plans to restore Palestinian aid and hopes to reestablish the U.S. as a credible mediator in the peace process. Despite Israel’s objection, Biden is moving to rebuild an Iran nuclear accord with other world leaders that Trump scuttled.
And Efron and other analysts say the Biden administration hopes to return to the goal of the creation of a Palestinian state as part of the solution to the conflict. Trump largely abandoned the idea.
Biden will also revert to what had been U.S. policy for decades: that Israel should stop building Jewish settlements on West Bank land claimed by Palestinians. Most of the world considers the settlements a violation of international law.
Michael Koplow, policy director for the Israel Policy Forum, a U.S.-based proIsrael advocacy group that supports creation of a Palestinian state, said Biden’s foreign policy shift will mean, at least initially, that Israel and peace negotiations will not be top priorities. Every president since George H.W. Bush has tried and failed to settle the U.S.Palestinian conflict.
The Biden administration “is very clearly telegraphing that they don’t intend to go down that road again,” he said. Koplow noted that Biden has not yet named a U.S. ambassador to Israel or designated a special envoy for the region, as other recent presidents have done.
Biden’s Middle East policy reset may also change the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia.
As he did with Netanyahu, Trump offered unquestioning support to the de facto Saudi leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a close friend of Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner.
“We’re going to recalibrate our relationship with Saudi Arabia,” Psaki said. She added that future engagement will be “counterpart to counterpart,” which is to say Biden will speak to King Salman and not his son — a significant rebuke.