As part of their commitment to environmental stewardship, Hamburg Sud and Aliança have decided to extend their tests with low-sulphur fuels to include Asia. Together with other shipping companies, they are participating in the Fair Winds Charter initiative, which aims to sustainably improve air quality in Hong Kong and the Pearl River Delta. To this end, all members of the initiative have voluntarily undertaken to use low-sulphur marine gas oil with a sulphur content of 0.5 per cent, instead of traditional heavy fuel oil, at the berth in Hong Kong from 1 January 2011 to 31 December 2012.
"As a company which makes protection of the environment and natural resources an integral part of each entrepreneurial decision, we are aware that our vessels have an effect on the air quality in Hong Kong and throughout the world", said Michael Britton, Regional Director Asia for Hamburg S??d. "Container shipping is recognzsed as the most environmentally friendly mode of transport worldwide, but we will not sit idle in this knowledge. We will seek new ways of making significant cuts in the emissions of pollutant in the Pearl River delta, now rather than just from 2020. We have decided to send out a signal at a transport hub like Hong Kong, because seven of our roughly 35 worldwide liner services alone call at the port here."

Hamburg S??d is among several carriers comprising the Clean Cargo Working Group, a business- to-business collaboration dedicated to integrating environmentally and socially responsible business principles into transportation management.