National environmental groups leaded by Attorney General Jerry Brown have taken into consideration the amount of pollution resulted from cargo ships and the significant contributing they bring to global warming thus demanding that the Bush administration address greenhouse-gas emissions and find a way to stop the pollution.
Brown and the environmentalist argue that the cargo ships currently frequent the oceans contribute to more than 5 percent of the world's greenhouse gases, that’s about the same amount of gas emitted by the vehicles driven in the United States.
Ships burn through enormous amounts of bunker oil, the dirtiest kind of petroleum, as they travel the high seas and make more than 10,000 stops annually at California ports such as those in Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Oakland.
Brown petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to adopt strict federal government regulations limiting greenhouse-gas emissions from container ships, cruise liners, oil tankers and other large vessels that stop at American ports.
The petition was filed in Washington by Brown's office, supported by Earthjustice, Friends of the Earth, Center for Biological Diversity and Oceana.
Virtually all the ships that transport cargo to the United States are registered under foreign flags, and seeing how international law governs ocean-going vessels, the United Nations' groups have been looking for ways to resolve the matter for years but without success.
State regulators and California port officials are considering rules to require that ships reduce speed as they near the shore, reducing emissions, and plug into electric outlets while they unload, since power can be generated more cleanly ashore.