In Bunkerworld on the 4th of November, Unni Einemo reported on the debate during a session at the Interferry Conference in October. Uncertainty was expressed about the long term viability of sea water scrubbing as a solution to sulphur emissions legislation. Some very interesting questions were raised regarding the future evolution of power for ships. In the short term: • Are scrubbing systems going to be reliable enough? • Will they be available in sufficient numbers? In the longer term: • Will residual fuel oil supply chains dry up after 2015? • Will a wholesale shift to LNG occur? For the short to medium term the questions are, we believe, reasonably easily answered. Yes of course, early sea water scrubbing trial systems have suffered teething problems. New systems always do and the very nature of “trial” systems means that the responsibility for reliability can often be blurred between ships staff and contractors. Newer designs and technologies are now available which address many of the reliability and material failings of earlier versions of scrubbers and as experience has grown so has the knowledge required to design out failings in peripheral systems. As for availability, this is really demand led at the moment. There are a variety of suppliers with equipment at various stages of evolution and they are keen to “gear up” to supply shipowners. These suppliers, and we can think of at least 6, are actively seeking orders! In the longer term, yes of course there is uncertainty over what fuel will be used, but it is rather unlikely that European fuel oil supply chains will disappear after 2015. There will still be a huge demand from ships trading outside the ECA. North West Europe produces somewhere in the region of 70 million tons of Fuel Oil per year (both high and low sulphur) and this cannot suddenly vanish. Equally the storage and barge infrastructure will take time to adjust to changes in trade patterns, a wholesale switch is unlikely. LNG does seem a potentially interesting solution and may well suit some liner trades where specific infrastructure can be justified, however it would take a long time for a more generally available LNG bunker market to evolve. We feel it is likely that over time the percentage of energy supplied by fuel oil, gasoil, scrubbed fuel oil and LNG will evolve something like the graph on the right. Given a variety of compliance options, ship owners and operators will find the path most suited to their commercial and operational drivers. -
