Altera pays up over illegal ship scrapping in India

Altera Infrastructure has agreed to pay EUR 695 500 for illegally scrapping vessels in India in 2020. In doing so, the Norwegian ship management company avoids going to trial.

The case has been running since Altera’s office was raided five years ago. It concerns the dismantling of two shuttle tankers, the Navion Britannia and the Alexita Spirit, at the Alang shipbreaking yard.

A trial was scheduled for this month after Altera contested the fine imposed by Økokrim, Norway’s National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime. However, it has now chosen to pay the penalty.

High price, high risks

Swedish watchdog NGO Shipbreaking Platform says it ‘welcomes’ the fine and hopes it will make Altera and other operators like it change its act. It laments that Despite EU rules prohibiting the export of end-of-life ships from EU waters to non-OECD countries, this remains a common practice.

‘The investigations led by Økokrim revealed that Altera chose to dismantle the ships in India,’ says the watchdog’s executive director Ingvild Jenssen. ‘With the help of cash buyer Wirana, a scrap dealer already heavily fined in another case in 2020 (involving the Harrier, a ship renamed three times to escape prosecution), Altera was able to sell the two tankers at a considerably higher price than what they would have obtained from selling to a sustainable ship recycling yard.’

Jenssen stresses that scrapping ships in the intertidal zone without containment and causes severe pollution, including heavy metal contamination of sensitive coastal ecosystems. Workers at these yards also face significant health and safety risks due to lack of protective measures.