Reluctance to accept new regulation has traceable reasons, the environmental congress gmec at the SMM fair in Hamburg has shown. As for ballast water, comparability stays a mystery.
The second edition of the global maritime environmental congress (gmec) as part of the SMM fair once again attracted many[ds_preview] distinguished international visitors to Hamburg, which were welcomed by Conference Chairman Spyros Polemis, Immediate Past Chairman of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS).
CO2 reduction
Widely discussed was the reduction of CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions. Katharine Palmer, Manager of Lloyd’s Register, stated that business as usual can no longer be an option for the shipping industry if it wants to meet emission targets. Among other things the panel discussion debaters reviewed the agenda announced by non-governmental organisation Carbon War Room (CWR) to drastically reduce CO2 emissions and to stimulate economic growth by doing so in the end. In the first place this will succeed by introducing technology and by new corporate solutions, as José Maria Figueres, head of CWR, pointed out. All parties generally agreed that this approach was welcome, »but many companies don’t want to take the risk of investing in immature technology,« Palmer said. As a possible solution Dr Pierre Sames, Senior Vice President Strategic Research of Germanischer Lloyd (GL), presented a zero-emission vessel, which GL has developed. Those liquid hydrogen fuelled vessels would still be too expensive, he admitted, but rising fuel prices may increase interest.
The views differed, however, whether shipping may still contribute significantly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, taken the many efforts in this sector. Others like Peter Hinchliffe of ICS asked whether all the low hanging fruits may have been reaped already.
LNG as ship fuel
One main topic of another session was liquefied natural gas (LNG). Most participants agreed that in the future LNG will probably be the best alternative – as long as the needed infrastructure will be set up. Attempts to keep funnel exhaust clean were another key issue. Experts discussed options in ECAs and for worldwide sulphur ban as global shipping will soon have to digest some step changes in permissible exhaust gas and fuel specifications. In 2015 the first ECAs will limit SOx and NOx exhaust and just some years later sulphur in marine fuel will be strongly restricted. The latter limitation will create the real impact, since only 12 % of all ships spend significant time in ECAs.
Experts discussed three options to cope with the sulphur challenge: switching to low sulphur fuel, exhaust gas cleaning by scrubbers, and finally LNG. Although every option has advantages of its own, it soon became evident that there will be no »silver bullet«. Participants learned the provision of low sulphur fuels may be limited by the world’s approximately 700 oil refineries, which do not always make money with new exotic fuel specifications. On the other hand, LNG is still hampered by the missing bunker infrastructure and by regulatory gaps. The port of Antwerp demonstrated co-financing of an LNG bunker vessel. Jan Fredrik Melling, CEO of Eidesvik, got to the heart of the matter stating there were no gasoline stations along the road before we had cars. However, DNV’s Director Trond Hodne received much consent when he said decision making for shipping operators how to cope with the challenges is complex, and costs are quite significant. That is why shipping is actually predominantly in wait and see mode.
Ballast water treatment
Furthermore, aspects of ballast water treatment dominated at gmec. While IMO is waiting for the ratification of its Ballast Water Convention (BWC), the US Coast Guard (USCG) seems to set the pace for ballast water management systems (BWMS) installations now. Having even stricter criteria for type approval than IMO, USCG requirements are expected to be considered for dry dockings in 2014. BWMS constitute a major investment for ship operators. Fumiko Reikan of NYK Line for instance quoted an investment magnitude of 800 mill. $ for the line’s approximately 800 vessels while retrofits would be nearly twice as expensive than installation on newbuilds.
Carnival’s Vice President Corporate Shipbuilding, Capt. Mike Kaczmarek, shared some of his group’s plans dealing with BWMS. He expressed concerns to be tackled by the rule makers: obvious discrepancies between the IMO and USCG approval criteria, the missing standards on sample and analysis for port state control and especially for cruise ships, the problem of dual-function tanks for grey and ballast water.
The challenge of fair port state control turned out to be crucially important in a marine biologist paper of SGS Fresenius, presenting the progress (overall ~ 50 %) of a respective development project for sample and analytic methods, funded by German Bundesamt für Seeschifffahrt und Hydrographie (BSH) and giving insight into the problems the developers face. They start with zero knowledge what happens to the species biology in dark, unstirred and sediment accumulating ballast water tanks as such. This renders any comparison extremely shaky.
The session chairman, Hendrik van Platen, Executive Vice President of Samco Shipholding, recommended to study the recent intervention MEPC 64/2/18 well, which the non-ratifying registers of Panama, Liberia and the Marshall Islands submitted. The paper highlights actual challenges to be overcome before ratification of the BWC. This explains the reluctance of some major players to kick off the convention. There is certainly a lot of food for thought for politicians and many open questions for ship operators. However, large shipping players such as Carnival and NYK start to draft and execute BWMS implementation programmes now, because they are concerned about the availability of makers’ capacities in the expected peak installation years 2016–18.
Michael vom Baur, Anne-Katrin Wehrmann
