News – Eurasia Petrochemical Transportation

South Korea to Order 200 Vessels

South Korea will implement a plan to order 200 vessels over three years to bolster the shipping industry – which has been struggling with recent diminished global demand and mounting costs.

The order will feature 140 bulk carriers and 60 container ships, including 20,000 TEU mega vessels and eight 14,000 TEU ships.

The orders are part of a restructuring plan for national shipping and shipbuilding industries from The Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, following the industries hit from the bankruptcy of Hanjin Shipping Co. in 2016.

Oceans Minister Kim Young-choon stated: “Following the bankruptcy of Hanjin Shipping, sales of South Korea’s shipping industry were cut by over 10 trillion won, and the tonnage of the deep sea containers has been cut in half.

“We have prepared a set of comprehensive measures to support the shipping and shipbuilding industries grappling with a protracted slump, intense competition and environmental regulations.”

shipping liner, Hyundai Merchant Marine Co., currently has a shipping capacity of 33,000 TEU – making it the 14th-largest liner in the world.

The ministry expects that the vessel orders will raise the company’s capacity to 1 million TEU by 2020.

The nation has also committed to developing eco-friendly and energy containers to be in line with the International Maritime Organizations sulphur cap – coming into enforcement on the 2020.

The ministry has also stated that it will set up an agency in July to encourage and support the order of new ships through investments.

The shipbuilding industry, long considered a central stake in the country’s economy, have been struggling with increased losses and the global industry downturn.

Shipwreck found in Black Sea is ‘world’s oldest intact’

A Greek merchant ship dating back more than 2,400 years has been found lying on its side off the Bulgarian coast.
The 23m (75ft) wreck, found in the Black Sea by an Anglo-Bulgarian team, is being hailed as officially the world’s oldest known intact shipwreck.
The researchers were stunned to find the merchant vessel closely resembled in design a ship that decorated ancient Greek wine vases.The rudder, rowing benches and even the contents of its hold remain intact.“It’s like another world,” Helen Farr from the expedition told the BBC.

“It’s when the ROV [remote operated vehicle] drops down through the water column and you see this ship appear in the light at the bottom so perfectly preserved it feels like you step back in time.”

Rolls-Royce teams up with Google on AI-driven ship awareness

Rolls-Royce has signed a partnership deal with Google to use the latter’s machine learning engine to improve the company’s intelligent awareness systems. Will the technology and collaboration help advance the goal of autonomous shipping? Iiro Lindborg, Rolls-Royce general manager of remote and autonomous operations sheds light on the issue.

It is an idea as disruptive as the smartphone, according to Rolls-Royce’s marine team. “Autonomous shipping,” the company said in a recent position paper, “is the future of the maritime industry,” and “will revolutionise the landscape of ship design and operations”.

As early as 2020, Rolls-Royce envisages a future of reduced crews and previously human jobs supported and operated shore-side. By 2025, the company says there will be remote controlled unmanned coastal vessels and by 2035, fully autonomous unmanned ocean-going ships.

It is a bold vision, but how will it work? At its heart, says Iiro Lindborg, general manager, remote and autonomous operations at ‎Rolls-Royce, is the design of intelligent awareness systems.

“This is the essential ingredient that means you won’t need to have a crew on board,” Lindborg says. “It is about replicating the situational awareness of what is happening around the vessel at all times.”

The road to full automation

Rolls-Royce began developing intelligent awareness systems back in 2015. Its system works by fusing data from a range of sensors, including night-vision, thermal and normal HD cameras, with radar information and life-based sensor systems.

“The first system we are creating will be purely advisory,” Lindborg explains. “In the second phase, we will link the advisory system to the vessel’s control system, which means the machine detecting and observing the vessel can also control the vessel.

“This stage will still have humans in the loop, logging and monitoring the deviations. After that, the third step will involve moving to more autonomous operations where the crew will be monitoring what is going on and the machine will do most of the work.”

Top of Form

Bottom of Form

While that final stage remains some way off, Lindborg hopes the first phase of Rolls-Royce’s intelligent awareness product will become commercially available by the end of 2017.

“We saw a need for these kinds of solutions to be introduced into existing vessels because of the number of incidents they have,” Lindborg says. “These incidents are often related to human errors such as a group being fatigued. Our system is solid and can be used already on vessels as an advisory system to help a crew make better judgement on daily operations.”

“The third step will involve moving to more autonomous operations.”

What type of scenarios could the current system be used in? Lindborg offers the example of a large vessel approaching the port of Shanghai, weaving past dozens of smaller boats, leisure craft and fisherman. Due to the current of the river, which captains must transit through to access the port, ships operating in Shanghai are required to maintain a speed of more than nine knots.

“You need to be aware of where those vessels are at all times,” Lindborg says. “Coupled with the speed, this can be really challenging for vessels. What our system does is detect and also track these boats to help relieve some of that pressure. It means the watch person doesn’t have to be constantly alert, the machine can help them.”

During a recent pilot project, Lindborg says the system performed well.

“Our customers were really happy about the test pilot, the resolutions and the answers that they got from the system,” he says. “It has provided additional safety features for their operations and the crew members also adopted the system well. They said that it increased safety and that it is not just one more system to be used – but is actually there for a purpose.”

Collaboration with Google

To further improve its intelligent awareness systems, Rolls-Royce recently signed a new partnership with Google. The agreement allows Rolls-Royce to use Google’s Cloud Machine Learning Engine to train its own artificial intelligence (AI)-based object classification system, which helps detect and track surface objects.

“We’ve been developing our own machine learning application over the past year and have been looking at possible partners to collaborate with,” Lindborg explains. “Google fits our strategy well and we are partnering with them for our machine learning programme.

“In future applications we are also looking at Google’s speech recognition system. When moving towards autonomous operations, vessels will need to provide information and signals to other vessels. With speech recognition, our system will be able to automatically detect messages and send its own.”

As the company moves closer to designing a fully autonomous vessel, there will be further collaborations, Lindborg adds. “We are looking to build a whole network of companies that can contribute to this end goal of autonomous operations,” he says.

Overcoming barriers

Of course, barriers to full automation remain, chiefly regulation. When a vessel sets sail, it is beholden to a dizzying array of national, international and private laws. And as with self-driving cars, regulatory authorities are playing catch-up.

“Maritime law does not anticipate the development of remote or autonomous ships,” Rolls-Royce said in a recent position paper. “This presents many ambiguities. For example, does a ship’s master or crew necessarily have to be on board the ship? For remote controlled and autonomous shipping to become a reality we need efforts at all regulatory levels.”

Nonetheless, while Lindborg admits the journey ahead will be “a long one”, he is confident the march to autonomous shipping is inexorable. “Development is going faster than we originally thought,” he says. “There is now interest in this field all around the world.”

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Aug 2018

‘Ghost ship’ in Myanmar: Navy finds answers

Myanmar officials investigating a “ghost ship” found mysteriously drifting near the Yangon region this week have found the answer to its fate.The large, empty and rusty container vessel, Sam Ratulangi PB 1600, had been discovered by fishermen off Myanmar’s commercial capital.The navy now say the freighter was being towed by a tugboat headed to a ship-breaking factory in Bangladesh.
However, the crew abandoned the ship after being caught up in bad weather.Authorities and navy personnel had boarded the Sam Ratulangi PB 1600 on Thursday to search for clues after it ran aground on a beach.Police and observers were baffled at how such a large ship, with no sailors or goods on board, had ended up in Myanmar.

The vessel, which was built in 2001, is more than 177 metres (580 ft) long, according to the Marine Traffic website, which logs the movements of ships around the world.
The ship’s location was last recorded off the coast of Taiwan in 2009, and this was the first reported instance of an abandoned ship appearing in Myanmar’s waters, according to the AFP news agency.
On Saturday, Myanmar’s navy said it suspected the ship had been towed by another ship after “two cables… were found at its head”.
They later found a tugboat, called Independence, about 80km (50 miles) off Myanmar’s coast.
After questioning the 13 Indonesian crew members on board, they learned that the tugboat had been towing the vessel since 13 August, and intended to take it to a factory in Bangladesh that would dismantle and salvage the ship.
However, some of the cables attached to the boat broke in bad weather, and they decided to abandon the ship.The authorities are investigating further.

The owner of the tugboat is thought to be from Malaysia, news site Eleven Myanmar reports.

Bangladesh has a large ship-breaking industry – with hundreds of old commercial vessels dismantled in Chittagong each year. But the business is controversial – with critics saying the work is poorly regulated and dangerous to labourers.

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Aug 2018

LNG to Become the Fuel of Choice for Shipping?

Looking at LNG as a marine fuel, the IEA, in their 2017 World Energy Outlook estimates the market potential to 26 million tons per annum by 2030. According to DNV GL, LNG could account up to one-third of marine fuels by 2050.

The IMO requirement that marine bunkers contain no more than 0.5 percent sulfur by 2020 which will have a dramatic impact on the operations of all of the world’s marine vessels. There is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution, and there are numerous alternative fuels and hybrid solutions coming on the market.

The industry is now talking about the possibility of a carbon-neutral maritime shipping in the long run. Natural gas will not necessarily solve the zero-emission and greenhouse gas challenge, but for now, that makes LNG even more attractive since it is the best bridge to longer-term options such as hydrogen and ammonia, which is too big step for the foreseeable future.

Currently, a quarter of the newbuild cruise ship capacity is using LNG, including Carnival, MSC, RCCL and Disney Cruise Line. Major players in other ship sectors like global liners are starting to adopt LNG including Sovcomflot, Siem, UECC, RCCL or CMA CGM which is going to build nine 22,000 TEU container ships fueled by LNG.

In addition, Forward Maritime Group expects to order up to 20 gas fueled Kamsarmax bulk carriers, suggesting that LNG could become a close reality for tramp shipping worldwide. An early order of dual-fuel bulk carriers could facilitate an early start of additional LNG bunkering locations worldwide and accelerate its market penetration since, for many ship operators, the challenge is getting fuel to ports where it needs to be.

While there are no other potential fuels largely available, the issue is very much about having trust into its great economics post-2020: lower OPEX and shorter ROI – following reduced CAPEX over time – will drive the LNG market penetration as soon as the marine industry faces higher distillate costs.

The marginal cost of gas in transport is lower than that of oil-related fuels. According to the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, “the discount of LNG over gasoil remains at least $5/MMBTu, and this is likely to be the most relevant differential once the IMO restrictions are introduced worldwide in 2020,” an equivalent $225 per ton fuel price differential that is large enough to offset extra CAPEX and guarantee a fair return to investors. Going green with black numbers is not an illusion.

The choice of natural gas is the only one meeting present and foreseeable requirements, with proven technology and affordable fuel. Despite the development of LNG as a marine fuel has been slower than anticipated, large marine operators continue to pursue that LNG shall offer long-term price stability, operational simplicity and environmental advantages over exhaust gas cleaning systems, low-sulfur marine fuels and other niche fuels like methanol, ethanol, ethane or LPG.

Topics around this, including LNG as a marine fuel and LNG liquefaction and shipping, will all be discussed at the technical streams at the Gastech 2018 conference, held from September 17-20 at the Fira Gran Via, Barcelona. Over 350 speakers are expected to address 3,500 strategic and technical delegates during the multi-streamed conference.

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Aug 2018

Hydrogen: the upcoming solution | Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide

As it has been seen on shore, shipping companies are starting to look for greener alternatives and environmentally friendly types of fuel such as LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas), Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), Ethanol or Hydrogen.

Some possible causes for this demand are related to the continuously rising fuel costs, the costs associated to pollution and treatment of pollutants emitted by these fuel types (exhaust gases or slop oil treatment), the regulations on voyage and port emissions, and costs associated to equipment maintenance. Growing global energy demand has increased the cost of fossil fuels and thus the resulting volume of harmful Greenhouse Gases (GHG). To reduce pollution and minimize dependency on fossil fuels for energy generation, alternative and clean sources of energy need to be exploited.

In 2010, total global new investment in clean energy had tripled from only five years before, indicating an aggressive search for new, clean and renewable energy sources, such as hydrogen. When it comes to using hydrogen as a fuel source, it can either be used in a Fuel Cell or burned directly in an internal combustion engine. High-quality hydrogen (100% hydrogen) can be produced by the electrochemical conversion of water to hydrogen and oxygen through a process known as water electrolysis (EQ.1).

Over the past decades, the ever increasing price of electricity has hindered and/or postponed the production of electrolytic hydrogen. This is about to change with the recent growth in energy capacity based on renewable sources like photovoltaics or wind turbines. In this scenario, electrolytic hydrogen cannot only be produced from a renewable energy source, work as an energy carrier, and work as an energy storage medium, but also overcome the intermittency of typical renewable energy resources. In Figure 1 it is indicated a possible scheme of how hydrogen could be produced and stored to be applied:

Water Purification: Water can be captured from sea and treated/purified to remove salts and ions (passing through a sand filter followed by osmosis and electrodeonization).
2. Electrolyses: Resourcing to a turbine (using the energy from wind) it is possible to provide the necessary electricity for the electrolysis.
3/4 – Compression and Storage: The produced Hydrogen needs to be compressed at high pressure values (700 bar) to reduce its actual volume, being stored in a module-base tank to be used as fuel.

The main safety aspects are thus related to the use and storage of hydrogen on a vessel. An alternative would be to resource to PEM (Proton Exchange Membrane) fuel cells.

The PEM fuel cell is a mature technology that has been successfully used both in marine and other industry applications. The operation requires pure hydrogen, and the operating temperature is reduced. Energy conversion with a PEM fuel cell, from hydrogen to electricity, essentially results in water with a low operating temperature. The modules currently have the power of up to 120kW, and the physical dimensions are small, which is positive for applications in transport, which may be remarkably interesting for marine use. PEM H2 fuel cells also have a higher efficiency and perform better at partial loads than diesel generators.

The use of hydrogen-powered fuel cells for ship propulsion is still at an early design/trial phase with applications in smaller passenger ships, ferries or recreational craft. However, due the potential shown it is believed that in a near future it might be possible to resort to and apply hydrogen to large merchant vessels. Some countries – such as Norway – intend to start using Hydrogen, going further then the IMO’s initial strategy on GHG. Ola Elvestuen, Norway’s Minister of Climate and Environment at the GCAS shipping event stated that the country intends to achieve zero emissions as soon as possible by using hydrogen and autonomous shipping. This is the path towards decarbonisation.

There are some cases of success in using hydrogen in shipping. One case in particular that recently crossed the Tagus River in Lisbon was the catamaran Energy Observer, an hydrogen-only vessel. It corresponds to an old competition vessel, which was equipped with solar panels, wind generators and hydrogen fuel tanks. The production of hydrogen will be done through the process of electrolysis (energy induction) of sea water.

From Belgium comes another case of success, the Hydroville. This vessel is responsible for transporting people from Kruibeke to Antwerp during rush hour to avoid traffic jams. It was the first certified passenger shuttle using hydrogen to power a diesel engine having the advantage of not releasing any CO2, particulate matter or sulphur oxides when burned. Recently, a partnership between DNV GL, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the naval architect firm Glosten and the Sandia National Laboratories was also mentioned to assess the technical regulations and economic feasibility of a hydrogen fuel-cell coastal research vessel. Besides, not having impact in contaminating air or water (it is impossible to have a polluting hydrogen spill on the water since hydrogen rises on its own and escapes into the atmosphere) it makes almost no noise so it won’t upset marine ecosystems.

By the reasons mentioned above and by witnessing some prototypes and vessels already tested we can assume that the application of Hydrogen in maritime applications, as an alternative to more classic fuels will certainly be a disruptive technology that shall have a significant and successful impact in the near future.

Greenwich Police Marine Division Advice to Boaters: Drink a lot of water. Use sun tan lotion. No drinking on the water.

With the Memorial Day holiday kicking off the boating season, members of the Greenwich Police Marine Division on Thursday shared advice with boaters.

Suggestions included checking all safety devices, including flares, life vests and whistles, as well as mechanicals.

“If they do a good preliminary check and keep checking keep checking that their safety equipment is up to snuff, making sure their boat mechanically is good, they should have a safe and fun boating season,” said Sergeant Michael O’Connor, adding that boats can sink as the result of simple mechanical problems.

In season, on Saturdays and Sundays, paramedics accompany police on the Marine Division vessels. In fact, GEMS operations manager Dennis Fogler described the Marine Division vessels as essentially ambulances on the water.

Fogler said the Marine Division usually responds to 10 to 20 medical calls during the season. He said the calls usually are for heart attacks, strokes, Hypoglycemia and injuries.

Pointing out a stretcher, GEMS operations manager Dennis Fogler described the Marine Division vessels as essentially ambulances on the water. May 24, 2018 Photo: Leslie Yager

Fogler said boaters know to radio the Marine Division on channel 16 so they can recommend EMS care and notify the hospital when they’re coming in with a patient.

He said on warm holiday weekends, the Marine Division often sees boaters suffering from dehydration.

“That’s pretty common,” he said. “When you become dehydrated it causes other problems including shortness of breath.”

Fogler’s advice? “Drink a lot of water. Use sun tan lotion. No drinking on the water. And if you have a medical condition, take your medication. If you have any symptoms or issues, call 911 or on the marine frequency, which is channel 16.”

Fogler also said the Marine Division also sees situations in which people with dehydration correlates to Hypoglycemia or Diabetes, and can present as Boating Under the Influence.

Fogler said Greenwich is unique in having medical services on board its Police Marine Division vessels.

“No other towns have this,” he said. “We’re the only department in the state of Connecticut that does this.”

Because Greenwich is unique in this sense, they also respond to calls from the water off Stamford and Port Chester.

“We’re on call for regional emergencies,” he said, adding that occasionally they’ll respond toward Northport, NY across Long Island Sound for medical calls, sinking vessels or vessels on fire. “They don’t necessarily have medical on their vessels, so they’ll call us.”

“We can do anything the ambulance can do on land,” Fogler said. “Inside, the boat is set up for casualties. The money came from Homeland Security to Greenwich Police to have the boat functional for all three services.

“On one side of the vessel is law enforcement, and the other is medical and fire,” Fogler said. “I can treat any type of situation here on the vessel that I would in the ambulance.

Fogler said having the marine vessels equipped for medical emergencies is efficient.

“It speeds up the care for people,” he said. “Instead of them rushing into a dock dock to meet up with an ambulance, we meet up with them. I can start treating the patient and then transfer them over to a private dock.”

“Boaters in Greenwich know we have the police out here,” Fogler said. “They know we have medics on the boat. If they have a problem, they call and say, ‘We’re out by buoy 23,’ and we go pick them up and treat them and transport them.”

The Fuel Challenge in Shipping

Choosing the most effective, sustainable and aconomically feasible strategy to comply with the new emission limits is not an easy task. The decision must be based in part on assumptions that may or may not prove to have merit. TANKER UPDATE summarizes the options and prospects.

Amid the international environmental and climate-protection efforts, an impressive number of emission restrictions for shipping have come into force recently or will do so within the next few years. They are driving the search for low-emission alternatives to oil-based fuels. In particular, the decision of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to limit the sulphur content of ship fuel from 1 January 2020 to 0.5 per cent worldwide and the recently adopted ambition to reduce GHG emissions by 50 per cent within 2050 have the potential to become game changers and have shipowners, operators and shipbuilders wondering which way to go.

Currently up to 48 million tonnes of fuel with a sulphur content of 0.1 per cent or less will be then needed annually. Once the IMO sulphur cap is in force, most of the fuel consumed (70 to 88 per cent) will have a low sulphur content of 0.1 to 0.5 per cent and will take the role of the high-sulphur fuel used today. In 2016 an installed base of roughly 4,000 scrubber systems by 2020 was assumed, with no more than eleven per cent of the fuel consumed globally would be high-sulphur fuel (HFO). Latest estimates assume only 1,000 to 2,000 scrubber installations, which leads to a high-sulphur fuel consumption well below 10 per cent in 2020. This raises the question whether HFO will be available in many ports due to low demand, and if so, at what price. To support the Port State Control and flag states with the enforcement, the IMO at MEPC 72 agreed to establish a ban on carriage of non-compliant fuels for all ships without scrubbers. This ban is likely to be adopted at MEPC 73 and will then take effect in March 2020. Ships without scrubbers will still be allowed to carry non-compliant fuel as cargo.

Open-loop or closed-loop scrubbers?

As per March 2018 most oil tankers fitted with a scrubber chose a hybrid option that provides the flexibility to operate in both open- and closed-loop mode. When at sea the switch can be made to open loop using only seawater. The sulphur oxides in the exhaust react with the water to form sulphuric acid. Chemicals are not required since the natural alkalinity of seawater neutralizes the acid. When required to switch to closed loop, for instance whilst entering a port in a low-alkalinity area, the natural alkalinity of seawater is boosted by an alkali which uses caustic soda (NaOH) as a buffer.

41 per cent of oil tankers using a scrubber preferred the open-loop option. Open loop scrubbers comply with the IMO’s 2020 regulations regarding SOx emissions while being simpler, cheaper and quicker to install and as such requiring less time off-hire. An open-loop scrubber has less equipment for a crew to monitor and maintain. The shipowner also does not have to worry about the purchase of sodium hydroxide (caustic soda) or more crucially, waste disposal in port.

New low-sulphur fuels

New, low-sulphur-compliant blended fuels (0.5% S) will be available in the market in 2020. It is expected that a varying range of products will be available in different parts of the world, depending on local refinery technology and crude oil quality. These fuels may prove to have a different composition than currently available HFO, hence predicting their compatibility with other fuel batches may be a challenge. It is expected that precautions with regards to fuel storage and mixing will be necessary. The ISO 8217 Fuel Standard working group is currently putting effort into selecting testing methods for fuel stability and compatibility. A draft standard should be available in autumn 2019, with the updated standard publication expected in 2022. First samples of blended fuels are expected to become available later this year, and this will allow all stakeholders to gain experience in using them.

These are some of the practical challenges resulting from sulphur reduction. At the same time the accelerating worldwide trend towards restricting NOx, CO2 and particle emissions is reason enough to intensify the search for fuels and technologies that can help meet the challenges ahead.

Feasible alternative options

Among the alternative ship fuels being discussed to substitute conventional fuels, DNV GL has identified LNG, LPG, methanol, biofuels and hydrogen as the most promising options.

In 2016 the first dual-fuel engine with a low-flashpoint liquid (LFL) fuel system was installed on an ocean-going tanker, using methanol as a fuel. Methanol reduces sulphur emissions (SOx) by about 95 per cent and nitrogen oxide emissions (NOx) by about 30 per cent compared to conventional marine diesel oil. The DNV GL-classed vessels have been assigned the additional notation LFL FUELLED to demonstrate compliance with the DNV GL rules for low-flashpoint liquid fuels (LFL). DNV GL was the first classification society to publish rules covering LFL marine fuels in July 2013, to ensure that the arrangement and installation of these systems have an equivalent integrity level in terms of safety and availability as a conventional system. Methanol today is produced mainly from natural gas but can also be produced by renewable sources, such as biomass, recycled CO2, and hydrogen, or agricultural and timber waste. Its energy content is roughly half that of standard heavy fuel oil, but as it is liquid, methanol can be handled using relatively simple bunkering and storage solutions without having to make extensive modifications.

The first LNG-powered Aframax crude oil tankers will be delivered this year. The new Aframax ships will be equipped with low-pressure X-DF dual-fuel engines meeting Tier III requirements in all operational modes. The first four units will be LNG-fuelled or LNG-ready and capable of running either on LNG or on standard marine fuels. The tankers will receive the DNV GL Clean (Design, Tier Ill) class notation. When not running on LNG fuel, selective catalytic reduction (SCR) technology on board will ensure compliance with the Tier Ill regulations governing NOx emissions.

As DNV GL’s PERFECt ship concept study has demonstrated, the well-known combined cycle gas and steam turbine technology might be a viable solution for ships in the power range above 30 megawatts once low-sulphur fuels are widely in use. Other new technologies with reasonable potential for application in certain ship types include battery systems, fuel cell systems and wind-assisted propulsion. The biggest hurdles for other alternative ship fuels and propulsion technologies are unrelated to whatever it takes to apply current engine and gas turbine technology. In conjunction with the low-emission fuels named above they are readily available or can be developed without substantial effort. Fuel cell technology in combination with various fuels can achieve efficiencies equal to or better than those of current propulsion systems. However, fuel cell applications for ships are still in their infancy. The most advanced developments are those related to the DNV GL-supported e4ships lighthouse project in Germany, with Meyer Werft and Thyssen Krupp Marine Systems leading the initiatives for seagoing vessels. Wind-assisted propulsion likewise has a certain potential to reduce fuel consumption, especially on slow ships, but the business case remains challenging.

Batteries used for energy storage, while not a primary energy source, have major potential for ships running on short distances, or as supplementary energy sources on board any ship if used to increase the efficiency of the propulsion system. In deep-sea shipping, current battery technology cannot substitute liquid or gaseous fuels.

Where to go from here

The primary challenges associated with alternative fuels in shipping result from environmental considerations, availability of sufficient fuel quantities, fuel costs, and the rules of the IGF Code. Environmental and price challenges continue to drive the interest in alternative ship fuels, but the number of realistic candidates remains small. After LNG has overcome the hurdles of international legislation, methanol and biofuels will follow suit very soon; the development of rules for LPG and hydrogen within the scope of the IMO IGF Code will take considerably longer. Yet, the foreseeable volume requirements for shipping could in principle be met by all fuel alternatives mentioned above over the coming years. But a major rise in demand would without doubt require massive investments in production capacity, except LNG, which can also be available in higher quantities than the currently forecasted demand (comp. Fig. 1 for production capacities. Note that LNG includes increase in production until 2020).

Without government action in the form of tax breaks or subsidies, renewable fuels will find it difficult to compete with the prices of conventional fossil fuels. LNG and LPG are the only fossil fuels capable of achieving a reasonable CO2 reduction in the next five to ten years. “CO2-neutral” shipping seems possible only with fuels produced from renewable sources. If the shipping sector resorts to synthetic fuels produced from hydrogen and CO2 using renewable energy, the available alternatives will be liquefied methane (which is very similar to LNG) and diesel-like fuels.

Industrial Fishing Occupies a Third of the Planet

When a team of researchers set out to see how prevalent industrial fishing was around the world—who was fishing where and when—they were met with a dearth of information.

They lacked access to vessel monitoring systems closely held by regional fishery managers, says Juan Mayorga, a marine data scientist from National Geographic’s Pristine Seas project. And that information would have shown only pieces of the puzzle.

To circumvent this obstacle, Mayorga and a team of researchers took a step back—way back—and tracked marine vessels from space, using satellites to learn where industrial fishing vessels fished and when.

They found the footprint left by the industry was staggering.

More than 55 percent of ocean surface is covered by industrial fishing, they found. That’s more than four times the area covered by agriculture.

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Industrial fishing has been responsible for harmful environmental impacts. Overfishing can deplete resources, many animals like dolphins and sea turtles are products of bycatch, and the massive vessels used require large amounts of CO2-producing fuel.

But looking at the industry on a global scale may lead to increased transparency and accountability to ensure fisheries are more sustainably managed, the researchers say.

Where Is Fishing Taking Place?

The study, published in the journal Science, looked at over 70,000 industrial vessels measuring from six to 146 meters, which encompasses more than 75 percent of the large-scale industry.

From 2012 to 2016, researchers watched the ships’ movements down to the hour, by sifting through 22 billion signals from ships’ automatic identification systems or AIS.

TRACKING ILLEGAL FISHING—FROM SPACE

AIS was originally created to prevent ship collisions by broadcasting a vessel’s identity position, speed, and turning angle every few seconds.

“Those AIS messages that are broadcasted are publicly available via satellite,” says Mayorga. “We then combed through [the signals] with sophisticated computing capabilities provided by Google and machine learning algorithms.”

From this, says Mayorga, he was able to glean information about the characteristics of each vessel, which revealed what type of fishing was taking place.

Longline fishing, a type of fishing in which a line with baited hooks is dropped into the water, was found to be the most prevalent. Trawlers were frequently spotted in the North Sea and off the coast of China.

The data also provided useful information by showing activity on the high seas. As opposed to coastal waters under a country’s jurisdiction, the high seas are less closely monitored.

China, Spain, Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea accounted for 85 percent of fishing in the high seas.

When Is Fishing Taking Place?

“You can’t approach getting into the head of a fisherman the same way you can get into the head of a fish,” says Douglas McCauley, a marine biologist from the University of California at Santa Barbara who was not involved with the study.

Unlike sea animals, the satellite data found humans were less influenced by environmental factors. But that doesn’t mean there weren’t patterns.

Researchers saw a massive dip in activity among Chinese vessels during the Chinese New Year. And they saw a massive dip among other vessels over the Christmas and New Year holidays.

As expected, regions that implemented seasonal fishing moratoriums also saw a dip in fishing during those periods.

When fuel prices spiked, the study found fishing was largely uninfluenced. McCauley suspects fishing subsidies, funding the World Trade Organization tried but failed to curb last December, are therefore contributing to overfishing.

Watchdogs Protecting Fish

In addition to National Geographic, the study was supported by researchers from the University of California Santa Barbara, Dalhousie University, Stanford University, and Global Fishing Watch (GFW), a collaborative non-profit supported by Oceana, SkyTruth, and Google that aims to increase transparency.

“The GFW introduces a whole new dimension in the fight against illegal fishing, and for transparency in offshore fishing,” says Daniel Pauly, a marine biologist from the University of British Columbia who was not involved with the study.

By making the study’s data publicly available, the GFW claims low-cost marine reserves can be more easily implemented.

Marine reserves act like a bank for fisheries, allowing a healthy stock of fish to flourish in off-limits areas. Conservationists have long argued for implementing more and larger marine reserves, but face opposition from the fishing industry.

“This [global dataset] makes any decision making or negotiating transparent,” says Mayorga.

Conservationists say they will be able to prove what regions are less frequented by fishers and already prime to be a reserve.

Sustainable Management

“My first job was as a fisherman. You can appreciate how hard that work is,” says McCauley. “You see each of those stories locked in a data set. It’s an industry that’s increasingly important as we confront food security and nutrition shortfalls.”

He believes that by eliminating fishing subsidies and more strategically regulating fishing on a global scale, it’s possible to sustain current levels of fishing without depleting resources.

“None of this was really possible until we had this database made publicly available,” he adds.

If conservation measures are applied to industrial fishing, Mayorga sees a role for AIS signals to be used to keep industry accountable.

“The biggest problem is the traceability of the resources,” he says of implementing regulations. “You have to keep track of where the fish is coming from when it lands. That’s a big issue for sustainability.”

His next goal, he says, is to monitor and track smaller ships.

China-owned fleet becomes world’s second largest

A remarkable maritime event occurred recently. China became the world’s second-largest shipowning country, overtaking Japan. The top shipowner, Greece, is still much larger but the gap is closing as China’s fleet expansion continues at a rapid rate. Numerous giant ore carriers, tankers and container ships scheduled for delivery to Chinese owners in the months and years ahead are likely to further boost capacity.

Strong and accelerating growth in the China-owned merchant ship fleet has unfolded. In 2017 an increase exceeding 9 percent was seen, and recent signs suggest that this year’s annual rise could be similar. The extensive orderbook for new vessels due to be delivered through the next two or three years will add substantial tonnage, but other less predictable influences also will determine fleet growth.

Many new ships will be employed in long-haul international trades where China is the cargo importer or exporter. For container ships, cargoes both to and from China are likely to provide employment while, for bulk tonnage in the biggest size categories, import trades will be most prominent. Amid vast quantities of manufactured goods and bulk commodities moving, potential for further participation of China-owned ships is clearly visible but, on some trade routes, other nationalities’ ships may be displaced.

Powerful fleet expansion
In the past three years and eight months, the China-owned fleet has expanded by just over one-third, a higher percentage increase than seen in the Greek-owned fleet and much higher than Japan’s minimal growth. According to revised figures compiled by Clarksons Research, the China-owned fleet recorded growth rates of 6.5 percent in 2015, 7.5 percent in 2016 and 9.4 percent in 2017, before adding 7.1 percent in the January-August 2018 period.

China’s fleet comprised 7,744 ships totalling 170 million gross tons at the end of August this year, above Japan’s 167.6m gt. The Greek fleet total was 222m gt. Gross tonnage is used in these statistics as a common ship capacity measure for all vessel types. China’s fleet has expanded by 34 percent since the end of 2014, compared with 23 percent growth for Greece. Japan has seen only a slow 2 percent rise over the same period.

Notable ships delivered
At the end of last year orders at shipbuilding yards for new vessels to be delivered to China-based shipowners comprised a huge volume. The 25.5m gt total, according to Clarksons figures, was equivalent to almost 17 percent of the existing China-owned fleet as calculated then. Within this orderbook a large proportion was scheduled for delivery in 2018, and a striking feature was the numerous orders for the biggest bulk carriers, tankers and container ships. Many of these newbuildings already have been completed and begun operating in the first eight months. The remaining September-December period, continuing into next year and later, is likely to see more ships delivered.

One especially notable feature beginning this year is the start of the second valemax ore carrier programme. Among bulk carriers, these are the largest in existence, with a 400,000 deadweight tonnes capacity, well over twice the capacity of the standard capesize vessel which is often the maximum size participating in most trades. China-based companies ordered 30 valemaxes, of which 18 totalling 7.2 million dwt were due for delivery during 2018, and 10 appear to have been delivered in the first eight months followed by an additional ship this month.

The current year’s scheduled valemax deliveries consist of 7 for China Merchants, 4 for China Ore Shipping and 7 for VLOC Holding Company. China Ore Shipping is a subsidiary of Cosco, while VLOC Holding is a subsidiary of ICBC (Industrial & Commercial Bank of China) Financial Leasing.

Mammoth container ships are another prominent feature in the orderbook, with many scheduled for delivery in 2018. It appears that 11 ultra-large vessels with the greatest capacity currently existing are due to be delivered this year, in the 19-21,000 teu (twenty-foot equivalent unit) range, all ordered by Cosco Shipping. In the tanker sector orders for vlccs (very large crude carriers) are at the forefront. The scheduled 2018 deliveries comprised 9 ships of 310,000 dwt for China VLCC, a China Merchants subsidiary, and 2 of 308,000 dwt for CSG Tanker Dalian.

Large newbuilding orderbook
The orderbook for new ships stretches out through the next two years and later. According to the Clarksons data, September-December 2018 deliveries scheduled, of all types and sizes of ship, total 4.8m gt, followed by 9.9m gt in 2019 and a further 6.1m gt in 2020 and beyond. The entire orderbook for China-owned vessels, at end August 2018, amounts to 20.8m gt which is equivalent to 12 percent of the country’s existing fleet capacity.

Compared with the other two largest owner nationalities, China has a more extensive orderbook than Greece which has a 16.9m gt total, equivalent to under 8 percent of the current fleet. Japan has the number one orderbook totalling 25.1m gt, amounting to 15 percent of its current fleet.

Looking ahead to next year’s and later deliveries, numerous mega vessels in the bulk carrier, tanker and container ship categories are set to augment the China-owned fleet. In 2019, the valemax 400,000 dwt ore carrier fleet will be expanded by the scheduled addition of 10 ships for owners based in China, followed by 2 in 2020. A further 4 vlcc tankers in the 308-310,000 dwt size range are listed for 2019, with a similar number in 2020-21. There are 6 ultra-larger boxships on order for 2019 delivery, reportedly postponed from this year.

Among other big vessel categories, two owners in China will take delivery of 6 guaibamax 325,000 dwt ore carriers starting next year when two will be completed. Another bulk carrier category is newcastlemax 208,000 dwt vessels, 3 of which are due for delivery to owners in China in 2019, followed by a further 7 in 2020-21. In the tanker sector, 3 suezmax 158,000 dwt vessels are scheduled for 2020-21 delivery. Also, three 172,410 cubic metre liquefied natural gas (lng) carriers are scheduled over the next two years.

Promising employment
One significant aspect in a global shipping market context is the employment patterns of the new China-owned vessels. Many new ships, especially those in the largest size categories, are likely to be employed in trades where China is at one end of the route, either as the cargo importer or exporter. However, while this activity may form the majority of employment, some ships may be occasionally utilised in trades where China is not involved as a voyage destination or origin. These are the traditional international ‘cross-trades’.

A full analysis of newbuilding vessels’ employment is not feasible, owing to limited information about intentions or contract details. Also, evolving global freight market conditions can be expected to have an impact on employment arrangements, resulting in changing perceptions over extended time periods about trades in which to participate. Nevertheless, in some cases such as the mega-size container ships, the most likely deployment and trading patterns are fairly obvious from a review of the market for this tonnage.

For the new giant valemax ore carriers, there is clarity about their intended usage both in the period immediately ahead and in the longer term future. In all cases, lifespan charters for the thirty newbuildings of this size now being delivered were agreed when the orders were placed in early 2016. The charterer is Brazilian mining company Vale and employment of these vessels starting 2018 or later, after delivery from the shipbuilders, is on a contract of affreightment (coa) basis over a period of 27 years. It seems clear that the principal trade route will be Brazil to China carrying iron ore, although other destinations are likely.

During recent months, one new valemax was on a route identifiable as loading in Brazil followed by discharging at ports in Japan. Another new ship of this type evidently discharged ore at the distribution facility at Teluk Rubiah in Malaysia. A further recent example of diverse trading patterns is a newly-delivered vlcc tanker arriving in Rotterdam, after being recorded at an oil loading port in the Arabian Gulf. This anecdotal information shows significant involvement of new China-owned shipping capacity, as well as the existing fleet, in broader global trading.

An aspect relevant to the introduction of the new vessels is growth in cargo volumes and ship demand within the trades where employment is assumed to be concentrated. For example, arrival of the new valemaxes this year has coincided with signs pointing to a slowing upwards trend in China’s iron ore imports. Seaborne iron ore trade is dominated by China’s more than two-thirds share of global imports. If this slackening trend persists, even if the proportion supplied to China by Brazil – the route on which valemaxes are employed – increases, the new ships may displace other nationalities’ vessels currently participating.

Upwards trend foreseeable
Newly constructed capacity is the most visible and transparent growth element in the China-owned fleet. Other influences determining the outcome are secondhand vessel purchases on the international market, sales of vessels to that market and existing tonnage sold to shipbreakers in China or other countries within the global ship recycling market. These transactions are usually more difficult to track and monitor comprehensively, and therefore overall estimates rely to some extent on guesswork.

Consequently forecasts of the China-owned fleet’s future growth are just a broad indication of the likely magnitude of changes. The longer ahead predictions stretch, the greater the uncertainty surrounding calculations. Evolving freight market trends and expectations could have significant effects on secondhand sales and purchases volumes, while scrapping decisions also could be affected by freight rate levels and market activity, especially when vessels are employed in international cross-trades where China is neither importer nor exporter of the cargo carried.

Nevertheless, despite these imponderables, it seems arguable that a foreseeable trend in the China-owned fleet is further substantial expansion over the next few years. China’s position as the world’s second-largest shipowning country probably will be consolidated.

Article for Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide, by Richard Scott, managing director, Bulk Shipping Analysis and associate,