How to Clean Up the World’s Dirtiest Industry | Joojin Kim | TED

Overview

Joojin Kim, a climate strategist, outlines a bold plan to tackle one of the world's most overlooked yet impactful climate challenges: maritime shipping. By targeting the financial, regulatory, and supply chain systems that sustain this industry, Kim proposes a transformative shift to clean alternatives, leveraging lessons learned from his successful campaign against coal financing in East Asia.

Notable Quotes

- Shipping is not a side issue in the climate crisis. It is one of the biggest hidden levers in the entire climate fight. – Joojin Kim

- We're playing chess, not checkers, and we're here to win. – Joojin Kim, on the strategic approach to transforming the shipping industry.

- Clean options don’t scale just because they exist; they scale when policy, finance, and regulation align to make clean attractive. – Joojin Kim

🌊 The Overlooked Climate Impact of Shipping

- Maritime shipping is a major contributor to climate change, responsible for emissions on three fronts:

- The fossil fuels it transports (e.g., crude oil, LNG).

- The heavy fuel oils and LNG burned by ships, which release carbon dioxide and methane.

- The steel used to build ships, which is predominantly made using coal.

- If shipping were a country, it would rank as the sixth-largest greenhouse gas emitter globally.

- Kim emphasizes that shipping is a hidden lever in the climate fight, capable of accelerating the energy transition if addressed strategically.

📍 East Asia as a Climate Choke Point

- East Asia, particularly South Korea, dominates global shipbuilding, steel production for ships, and public financing of the shipping industry.

- South Korean government banks financed over $10 billion for LNG carrier ships in 2022 alone, locking in decades of emissions.

- Kim highlights the region as a critical leverage point, where decisions to pivot toward clean technologies could have global ripple effects.

💰 Redirecting Capital Away from Fossil Fuels

- Kim’s organization, Solutions for Our Climate, aims to make LNG shipping a no-investment zone by:

- Exposing emissions, policy gaps, and financial risks tied to LNG transportation.

- Pressuring private banks and Asian lenders to end financing for LNG ships.

- Redirecting capital toward clean alternatives like offshore wind vessels and green ammonia tankers.

- A similar strategy was successfully used to end coal financing by East Asian banks.

⚙️ Building Clean Shipping Supply Chains

- The technology for clean steel and green shipping fuels already exists, but supply chains and demand are underdeveloped.

- Solutions for Our Climate is working to:

- Build clean fuel supply chains and green shipping corridors between ports.

- Replace coal with green hydrogen in steelmaking.

- Shift renewable-rich regions into hubs for clean shipping fuel production.

- Early successes include convincing European banks to exit LNG projects and securing funding for hydrogen-based steel mills.

♟️ A Strategic Playbook for Global Change

- Kim’s team employs a multi-pronged approach involving diplomacy, grassroots advocacy, legal action, and public awareness campaigns.

- Their new initiative, Navigate to Clean, aims to eliminate up to 2.2 gigatons of emissions annually by 2032—equivalent to one year of emissions from the entire European Union.

- By aligning policy, finance, and regulation, the initiative seeks to transform shipping from a driver of dirty trade to a leader in clean trade.