Emissions and Container Traffic Rise as Industry Navigates Regulatory Crossroads
In its latest quarterly analysis entitled “Decoding Maritime Emissions, Q3 2025: Containership Emissions and Traffic on the Rise,” VesselBot provides comprehensive insights into maritime operations during a period of increasing regulatory uncertainty and persistent trade disruption. This detailed study analyzes 73,353 container ship voyages completed by 4,750 vessels between July and September 2025, revealing important patterns in container ship fleet performance as the industry approaches critical compliance deadlines.
Using enriched primary data captured at the ship and shipping level, the report examines maritime performance across multiple dimensions – ship size, age, shipbuilding origin and specific trade routes – providing stakeholders with the detailed analysis necessary for decision-making in an increasingly complex operational environment.
Key findings from VesselBot’s ship-level monitoring and analysis revealed:
Emission Stabilization Amid Traffic Growth: Total container ship emissions reached 50.3 million tons in Q3 2025, almost unchanged (-0.2%) compared to Q3 2024 despite an increase in shipping of 2.3%. Average wake-up emissions intensity increased to 195.9 g CO2e/TEU km, down 1.6% year-on-year, driven by longer steaming times and reduced port waiting times.
Trade Tensions Reshape Routes: Sino-US direct travel showed marked volatility, falling 3% in the first nine months of 2025 but surging 15% in July before dropping 10% in September. China’s retaliatory port tariffs targeting US-owned, operated or built ships add complexity to the carrier deployment strategy.
Persistent Ship Size Efficiency Gap: Waking emissions intensity varies greatly based on ship size, from 252.1 g CO2e/TEU km for Feeder ships (up to 2,999 TEU capacity) to 61.4 for Very Large Container Ships (at least 17,000 TEU capacity). Feeder vessels completed 62.1% of all voyages in Q3 but only accounted for 10.3% of total TEU km, while VLCS completed only 2% of voyages, accounting for 17.2% of total TEU km, reflecting a much higher level of efficiency.
Shipbuilding Origin Influences Deployments: Chinese-built ships completed 36% of voyages in the third quarter, while 53.1% of ships under 5 years old were built from Chinese shipyards. South Korean-built vessels carried out 24.6% of all container shipping in Q3, but 41.3% of all VLCS. Shipping of South Korean-made ships recorded the lowest emission intensity of 152.7 g CO2e/TEU km due to larger capacity and the spread of long-distance trade.
Route-Specific Performance Variations: Massive fronthaul trade demonstrated the importance of route-level analysis, with Asia-North Europe shipping intensity averaging 55.3 g CO2e/TEU km and duration of 30.6 days. In contrast, the industry-wide average shipping time is just 3.5 days, highlighting how aggregate metrics obscure important operational differences.
“The regulatory landscape is becoming more complex rather than simplified, as evidenced by the European Parliament’s rejection of Omnibus simplification efforts and the IMO’s postponement of the Net-Zero Framework,” said C. Komodromos, CEO & Founder of VesselBot. “With the start of CBAM certification requirements in a few weeks and Scope 3 reporting deadlines fast approaching, maritime stakeholders need granular, real-time data to navigate varying compliance requirements across jurisdictions. Industry averages fail to capture significant performance variations between vessel sizes, ages and routes that directly impact compliance costs and operational efficiencies. VesselBot’s voyage-level analysis reveals that container vessel intensity can vary significantly depending on vessel characteristics; insights not visible in aggregate data but critical for strategic decision making in changing conditions increasingly constrained by environmental carbon.”
The report provides detailed analysis of fleet dynamics, regulatory developments including delays to the IMO framework, stalled EU simplification efforts and looming compliance deadlines, comparisons of ship age and shipbuilding country performance, and emissions patterns across specific trade routes – providing maritime stakeholders with the actionable intelligence needed to navigate the regulatory implementation phase in 2026.
Source: VesselBot
