Abatement Cost

Abatement cost is the price of avoiding one tonne of emissions through a given measure, the metric that ranks decarbonization options on a marginal-abatement-cost curve. Negative-cost measures (slow steaming, hull cleaning, trim optimization) pay for themselves in fuel saved, while switching to green ammonia or e-methanol carries a high positive cost until production scales. Carbon pricing through an ETS or the IMO levy works by making higher-abatement-cost fuels competitive against paying for emissions.