Are green ships the solution?

Containers at the Port of Los Angeles. — ©️2023 The New York Times Company

ON a bright September day on the harbour in Copenhagen, several hundred people gathered to welcome the official arrival of Laura Maersk.

Laura was not a visiting European dignitary like many of those in attendance. She was a hulking containership, towering 33m above the crowd, and the most visible evidence to date of an effort by the global shipping industry to mitigate its role in the planet’s warming.