In this edition of the ship.energy podcast, Lesley Bankes-Hughes talks to a very well-known and proactive leader in the maritime industry, Pia Meling.

Pia has had an extensive career in shipping and the imperatives of sustainability and decarbonisation have informed and underpinned her job choices, including working on good practice in ship recycling and on zero emission, autonomous shipping.

In March this year, she left Grieg Green where she was Managing Director, and she is now leading the team at EVIGO, the green services offshoot of the ship management company, OSM Thome.

One of the largest global ship managers, OSM Thome handles the operations and crewing of around 1,000 vessels across a range of segments, and when it launched its EVIGO division in late 2024 one of its mission statements was ‘to tackle environmental targets head-on’.

In this podcast, Pia discusses the business culture and values she is looking to inculcate in this new venture and also explains why she decided to take the job is its MD.

She explores a changing relationship between shipowner and ship manager in the context of shipping’s decarbonisation, the challenges as well as the positives of stakeholder collaboration, the GHG emission reduction options available to the existing global fleet, fuel ‘demand signals’, and the importance of training the maritime workforce to be able to deliver the energy transition onboard and landside.

She also offers her ‘take’ on EU regulation and the outcomes of IMO MEPC 83, as well her views on what leadership should be as shipping navigates its course through one of the biggest changes in its history.