Mr. Ko Bong-chan, principal surveyor of KR has been elected as chairman of the Environment Panel at the 73th International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) council which was held in Washington, U.S. on 23 June.  

His election was attributed to his active participation in decision making and his technical contribution regarding the prevention of marine pollution. In 2013, Mr. Oh Joo-won (Head of Plan Approval Dept. at the time of 2013) was elected as chairman of Machinery Panel, a position he still holds.

Mr. Ko graduated from Korea Maritime and Ocean University in 1998 and joined KR in 2001. He is a marine environment expert working as KR's representative and a consultant for the Korean government on the prevention of marine pollution in a variety of organizations including the Association of Asian Classification Societies (ACS), International Maritime Organization (IMO) as well as IACS Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC).  

KR expects Mr Ko’s appointment to demonstrate KR’s industry leadership and to raise its profile in the international maritime community. The chairmanship is for three years, starting in January 2017 until December 2019.

IACS establishes, implements and amends relevant rules through its six industry committees which include; Environment Panel, Machinery Panel, Safety Panel, Survey Panel, Hull Panel, and Cyber Systems Panel.

The Environment Panel is in charge of providing information on regulation establishment, its interpretation and recommendations on major environmental issues such as MRV, Measure, Reporting, Verification, IHM, Inventory of Hazardous Materials and BWMC.