Shipping Industry Protests Call for Tax on Emissions. Plane Emissions Soar.

In a brief released this week, a think tank division of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development warned of rising emissions from the shipping industry -- greenhouse gases could climb 50 to 250 percent in the next 35 years, according to the group -- and implored the industry to act.

Emissions from the maritime shipping industry, a little more than 2 percent in 2012 -- the majority of which came from bulk, container and tanker ships -- are rising and may account for 14 percent of global emissions in 2050, said the International Transport Forum, part of the OECD.

"The greenhouse gas emissions of shipping are considerable," the ITF said.  To reach a 2-degree-Celsius trajectory, the industry must halve its carbon emissions by midcentury, according to the ITF, which endorsed a $25-per-ton carbon tax on the shipping sector.

"Instead, they are set to rise substantially," the group's brief reads.  "The industry needs to act."

The International Chamber of Shipping, a global trade group representing about 80 percent of the world's merchant fleet, bristled at the notion of a carbon tax, responding that it would prefer a tax on fuel rather than an emissions-trading market or "other complex alternatives that would distort global shipping markets."

Read more at Shipping Industry Protests Call for Tax on Emissions.  Plane Emissions Soar.