TUI Cruises has appointed an independent environmental advisory board in an ongoing effort to provide carbon-neutral cruises.
The four-member panel plans to meet "on a regular basis" with company management to discuss thoughts and ideas on improving environmental stewardship, the company said.
TUI Cruises is a joint venture between German tourism outfit TUI Group and US cruise major Royal Caribbean Cruises.
“As a leading cruise line, our goal is to make our cruises as clean as possible., chief executive Wybcke Meier said.
"We already operate the youngest and most environmentally friendly cruise fleet worldwide."
Six of TUI Cruises' seven ships were built between 2014 and 2019 and have exhaust gas scrubbers.
May the talks begin
Board members include professors Stefan Gossling, Horst Harndorf and Luci Reisch and former Hamburg first mayor Ole von Beust.
Gossling is a professor at Lund University's Department of Service Management and Service Studies and Linneaus University's School of Business and Economics of Linnaeus, both in Sweden.
He has worked in an advisory capacity for several UN organisations, World Bank and European Parliament.
“Cruise shipping is one of the most energy-intensive types of tourism and faces a major challenge in terms of its transformation," he said.
"Together, we’ll hopefully succeed in uniting climate protection and economic efficiency.”
Harndorf is a shipping expert and former head of the chair of University of Rostock's piston machines and internal combustion engines.
Professor Lucia Reisch is a professor for consumer behavior and consumer policy and from 2010 to 2019 and a member of the federal government's German Council for Sustainable Development.
Von Beust, a lawyer, founded von Beust & Coll., a consulting firm that launched German national LNG initiative Maritime LNG Platform.
New York-listed Carnival Corp this month put in place an environmental compliance team focused on finding ways to improve environmental practices across its nine brands. That came after a federal judge in July levied a $20m fine against the Miami-based cruise giant for violating a five-year probation given in 2015 for other environmental offences.
