The IMO's Net-Zero Framework — a proposed global fuel-intensity standard and emissions pricing mechanism for ships over 5,000 gross tonnes — was approved at a committee meeting in April 2025 but its formal adoption was adjourned at an extraordinary session in October 2025, after a procedural motion passed by a narrow margin. The decisive adoption vote is now scheduled for December 2026, with legal analysts suggesting the earliest realistic entry into force has slipped from 2027 toward early 2028.
As proposed, the framework would require ships to meet annual greenhouse gas fuel-intensity targets or pay into, or purchase credits from, a new IMO fund — a global carbon-pricing mechanism for shipping, with figures in the range of 100 to 380 US dollars per tonne of CO2-equivalent reported for non-compliance, though these remain subject to negotiation before any vote.
In the absence of a global framework, regional rules already apply and are the live compliance reality today: the EU's FuelEU Maritime regulation and the extension of the EU Emissions Trading System to shipping both cover voyages to, from and within the EU right now, independent of what happens at the IMO.
For a China-origin shipper, the practical takeaway is that carbon-related freight cost exposure today comes from regional rules on specific lanes (EU-bound voyages particularly), not yet from a global surcharge — but that is likely to change once a global framework is eventually adopted, so it is worth treating as a moving cost input rather than a settled one.