IHM was introduced in the 2009 Hong Kong Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships.

All ships over 500GT will be required to carry the Inventory of Hazardous Materials. The purpose of an IHM survey is to provide ship owners, managing agents, crews, engineers, and workers with a management report of all the hazardous materials, which are on-board the vessel.

The main materials that the IHM survey covers are; Asbestos, PCBs, TBT’s, ODS, HBCDD’s, and PFOS. Other materials may be determined in the following part of the report (PBDE, PBB, Mercury & lead).