The European Commission has proposed that tankers such as the Prestigeshould be banned from carrying cargoes of toxic heavy fuel oil.
The European Commission said a ban on such single-hull vessels carrying this kind of fuel and other measures to be discussed by EU transport ministers on Thursday, would prevent a repeat of the ecological disaster hitting the Galician coast.
The measure was so urgent, the Commission said, that EU leaders should agree to the ban when they meet at a summit in Copenhagen next week rather than wait for the usual European lawmaking process which can take many months.
"Words are not enough: it is necessary to act and apply the maritime safety measures in full," EU Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio said.
Four EU countries - Spain, France, Italy and Portugal - have already applied a get-tough policy on 'Prestige'-style tankers that are carrying heavy fuel oil, vowing to expel them from their waters if they have doubts about their safety.
Spanish and Portuguese navy ships ordered a Maltese-flagged vessel, the Moskovisky Festivalcarrying 25,000 tonnes of fuel oil, out of their waters last weekend. The countries say they will not let such ships within 200 miles of their coasts.
But three important maritime states are likely to be more cautious over a ban on single hull tankers, which lack the protective extra layer of double hull ships.
According to minutes of a meeting of EU diplomats Britain, Greece and the Netherlands expressed serious doubts about a proposal from Denmark to accelerate an existing timetable to phase out older single hull tankers.
Such a move could have an impact on the availability of ships to transport heavy fuel oil - a low-value residue from refineries which is commonly burned in power stations, the countries argued, and could push up oil prices.