This session will question the current efforts to develop of green shipping as a means to significantly reduce human activity-derived emission while ignoring the much more significant contribution to global emissions resulting from the cargoes that ships carry. About 40% by weight of all cargoes carried by sea-going ships today are high carbon cargoes, coal, oil and gas.  For example, a large bulk carrier was recently delivered to fulfill a contract to move coal from British Columbia to Japan.  The ship is fitted with auxiliary sail power which then owners claim will reduce fuel consumption by a few percentage points, but the ship will make several voyages per year for the next quarter century carrying 100,000 tons of coal each trip! We are tackling the ship emission problem rather that the cargo emission problem because we have in place the mechanisms to manage international shipping through the UN – IMO, while there are no similar mechanisms to control cargoes. This is a classic case of a maxim I always try to pass on to student and younger colleagues, “Make sure you are solving the right problem before you solve the problem right”.  This paper will examine some approaches which could lead to control of cargoes, but in the long run suggests that nuclear power may be the real solution. Not nuclear power to drive oil tankers and coal bulkers, but nuclear power to produce electricity close to where it is needed and thus reduce the need to move coal and oil across the world’s oceans. This still leaves room for shipbuilders to build floating nuclear plants at central facilities where high quality welding and QA can be applied.