commercial shipping Archives

Articles Tagged with: commercial shipping

July 14, 2023

MAN B&W two-stroke engine achieves successful ammonia combustion

At MAN Energy Solutions’ Research Centre Copenhagen (RCC), the company has successfully run a test engine on ammonia with positive results regarding pilot oil amount and combustion stability. The engine used was a MAN B&W two-stroke 4T50ME-X type.

“This marks a major milestone on our road to developing a full-scale two-stroke ammonia marine engine,” said Gunnar Stiesch, chief technical officer, MAN Energy Solutions. “It’s been a historic week for our team at the RCC where a lot of groundwork and research has now paid off and we have gained a deep understanding of ammonia’s unique characteristics as a marine fuel, as well as its effects on fuel supply and safety systems. This successful combustion represents yet another important step towards decarbonizing the marine market and bringing big things to zero.”

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April 19, 2022

ABB system to power hybrid-electric biomass fuel carrier

Switzerland-headquartered technology company ABB is to provide an electric-propulsion system for the e5 Lab’s Roboship project to support the decarbonization of the Japanese shipping industry.

The Japanese Shipowners’ Association announced in October 2021 its goal of achieving net zero GHG by 2050, and is supported in this endeavor by the e5 Lab consortium, consisting of Asahi Tanker, Exeno Yamamizu Corporation, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines and the Mitsubishi Corporation, which will further develop renewably powered commercial vessels.

e5 Lab’s previously announced Roboship project will now feature a fully standardized, electric propulsion system from ABB to enable zero-emission operations in harbor locations.

Built by Honda Heavy Industries, the 70m-long and 499-gross ton vessel is said to be the world’s first hybrid-electric biomass fuel carrier and will have ABB’s complete modularized electrical propulsion package installed on board, enabling it to utilize multiple energy sources for optimized operational efficiency and emission-free operations. Furthermore, the new system will lower maintenance costs, reduce noise and vibration levels, and improve the ship’s steering capabilities when pier docking or undocking.

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April 25, 2022

MSC’s cruise division to increase its use of shore power connections

MSC has announced that starting in May 2022 and continuing throughout the 2022 summer season, two of its cruise ships will consistently use shore power: MSC Virtuosa at the Port of Southampton’s new Horizon Cruise Terminal in the UK, and MSC Poesia in Rostock-Warnemünde, Germany (reportedly the largest shore power provider for cruise ships in Europe).

This follows the company’s 2021 commitment to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Having investigated several new technologies to decarbonize company cruise operations, MSC believes the use of shore power to be an effective way to reduce the impact of cruise ships on port environments and surrounding communities when berthed.

“We look forward to using shore power in Southampton and Warnemünde throughout the summer season and we congratulate the port authorities for their forward thinking and innovative commitment,” said Linden Coppell, director of sustainability at MSC Cruises. “We at MSC Cruises are continuously striving to improve our environmental footprint, and shore power allows us to do so by drastically reducing our ships’ emissions while berthed. We need more ports in other key markets in Europe to introduce shore power as quickly as possible, thus joining our efforts toward net-zero emissions by 2050 and greatly reducing our local air emissions.”

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April 11, 2022

Leclanché selected to provide 10MWh battery system for Scandlines’ zero-emission freight ferry

The Scandlines zero-emission ferry project will run on an advanced 10MWh lithium-ion battery energy storage system from Leclanché. The project was announced in November 2021 and aims to build the world’s largest electric-powered hybrid ferry.

Leclanché joins the roster of established companies selected to provide critical components, systems and expertise to the Puttgarden Rødby 2024 (PR24). Other companies involved in the project include Norway’s Kongsberg Maritime and Norwegian Electric Systems (NES). The ferry was designed by Norway’s LMG Marin and will be constructed at Cemre Shipyard in Turkey.

The ro-pax freight ferry is expected to enter service in 2024. It will connect Puttgarden ferry harbor on the German island of Fehmarn, with Rødby ferry harbor on the island of Lolland in Denmark – a distance of 18.5km.

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September 17, 2021

Vitol orders electric-hybrid tanker pair for bunkering business in Singapore

Vitol’s bunker operations company, V-Bunkers, has placed an order to build two electric-hybrid bunker tankers to be deployed for harbour operations in Singapore, as part of the move to reduce carbon emissions within the port.

Delivery of the first of the two bunker tankers is expected in the second half of 2022. The vessels will feature electric-hybrid notation and will employ onshore-rechargeable energy storage systems with lithium-ion batteries for energy storage and an automated power management system that will manage power consumption, reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Mike Muller, head of Vitol Asia, said: “We support Singapore’s aspirations to be a leader in maritime decarbonisation and we look forward to using these new crafts to even more efficiently deliver bunkers to customers here in the world’s biggest bunkering port.”

June 24, 2021

Can Massive Cargo Ships Use Wind to Go Green?

Cargo vessels belch almost as much carbon into the air each year as the entire continent of South America. Modern sails could have a surprising impact.

In 2011, Gavin Allwright was living in a village outside Fukushima, Japan, with his wife and three children, when a powerful tsunami destroyed the coastline, splintering homes into debris, crashing a 150-foot fishing boat into the roof of his wife’s parents’ house and setting off a power-plant accident that became the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.

Allwright had a background in sustainable development, especially as it relates to shipping. In his travels in East Africa and Bangladesh, he had watched traditional sails and masts replaced by outboard motors. The move locked people into a cycle of working to buy fuel, damaging their lives and the environment. In Japan, Allwright had been living a quiet life, running a sustainable farm and dabbling in consulting. Now, it seemed, environmental disaster had followed him there.

To escape the aftermath, the family moved to Allwright’s hometown on the outskirts of London. But Allwright couldn’t stop thinking about the Fukushima disaster. To him, it was a dramatic display of technology going wrong, further proof that the world we built is unsustainable.

He thought about shipping. It produces 2.9 percent of global carbon-dioxide emissions, almost as much as the entire continent of South America. With every country benefiting from global trade, it could be argued that shipping is everybody’s responsibility, but it is treated as if it is nobody’s. In the vast but liminal space of the ocean, cargo vessels — some of the largest machines on the planet — have generally operated in obscurity. The industry’s greenhouse-gas emissions have only grown as world trade has expanded, about 10 percent in the last six years. Shipowners, charterers and regulators have done little about the situation.