Shocking report on ship pollution

a very easy fix.....triple the price of all imported and delivered good that come by polluting deep sea cargo ship, make sure the Government gets that extra money and tell them to introduce and strictly enforce the applicable anti pollution laws to stop the problem. Will be fixed in short order as we know enforcement agencies work really well in those circumstances and if not fixed soon, add more fees.

Hi,

Easier than giving either the TSA or Hopless I men Homeland Security more powers or god forbid create another taxpayer funded monster just bring compliance forward worldwide. It is not something that just effects the US and Canada.

As a part if te enhanced Garbage Records that came in yesterday Ships have to include the details of what their engines are discharging via the exhaust.

There is already a sulphur record book where you must record when change from Heavy to MGO etc.

Annex VI BDN 's and FOBAS all tie in to ensure some numbers are not being fudged along the way.

I would say that anything that raises the cost of transport significantly will be passed on to the consumer. At this delicate time in the world economy the level of support amongst the worlds leaders for a sudden surge in costs to reduce what is really only seen as numbers on paper will be a tough sell indeed.

It is a bit of a stretch to assume that all merchant vessel are powered by 100,000 hp 2-strokes. I would bet the average power for the majority of boats in the liner trades (boxboats) are less than half that power, most bulkers (which make up a huge percentage of the deep sea fleet, are powered with less than 10,000 hp and most of the coastal freighters are powered by medium speed 4 stroke engines of far less power.

Sure, it looks impressive to figure out the total pollution as if every ship had a 100,000 hp engine but it is BS and only done that way to make headlines.

Two Canadian Shipping Co. Canada Steamship and Algoma have each ordered six new ships from China. Trillium Class
Trillium | Features
Rodger

Hi,

Seems odd that a new ship designed for GreatLakes ops should use a Tier 2 engine

Hi,

The Norwegians are building a pair of Gas only ships.

Maritime Propulsion | Fjord Line world?s first cruise ferry powered by natural gas alone.

Massive storage for that ??

i would bet if some really looked into the sources of the info posted they would find that the info is not correct how many 100,000. hp ships are there in existence today i'am sure the operators are well aware of the cost of operation and the problems associated with them as well as the ballst water used and it's effect on the enviorment , try and get the rest of the world up to where some allready are

just some thoughts

travler

That article is not only outdated (almost 4 years) but is unfairly skewed against shipping. Here are some current facts.

1) The North American Emission Control Area (eluded to in the article) came into effect last August. All ships must burn low sulfur fuel within 200 miles of shore. The sulfur level is roughly a quarter to a third the level in the typical heavy fuel ships burn worldwide. Unfortunately it costs almost 20% more, a cost which will be passed on to consumers. By 2020 the allowable sulfur levels will be reduced even further, and worldwide, requiring even more expensive fuel or expensive and bulky equipment to “scrub” the sulfur out of the exhaust.

2) Shipping is also making huge strides in reducing CO2 and NOx emissions. Regulations will soon require expensive and bulky equipment to drastically reduce NOx to a small fraction of today’s levels. And shippers are voluntarily finding ways to reduce fuel consumption and the resulting CO2 emissions, though that is largely driven by high fuel costs.

3) The article makes a huge omission by not putting ships’ emissions into context by describing emissions PER TON OF CARGO CARRIED. By this measure, shipping is the most environmentally sound method of shipping cargo. Rail might come close in some circumstances (e.g. comparing a small ship to a very large train) but generally not. And those huge 100,000 hp ships the article attacks will actually decrease emissions by the shipping industry because they carry far more cargo than the increase in hp necessary to propel them (and therefore the emissions per ton of cargo decreases). Of course pipelines beat ships since they have virtually zero emissions (besides the energy needed to drive the pumps) but pipelines can’t transport containers, grains, etc.

4) An extension of the previous point is that shipping represents a small fraction of greenhouse gases emitted. Even at the end of the article a bullet point states “Shipping is responsible for 3.5% to 4% of all climate change emissions.” Which means someone else is responsible for 96% of it. Like China, at something like 30% of the world total, most likely due primarily to their dirty coal power plants.

5) Comments like “70% of all ship emissions are within 400km of land” are almost laughable since the biggest emitters, the energy industry (like China’s coal plants), are 100% within 0% of land!

6) An earlier poster is correct that the average 16-knot tankers & bulkers have engine powers in the 10,000 to 20,000 hp range. The average 25-knot containerships have in the range of 50,000 hp. Very few ships have 100,000 engines despite what the article might lead one to believe.

7) Not only is shipping vastly reducing its emissions, but within a few years all ships that discharge ballast will have ballast water treatment systems on board to halt the spread of invasive species.

8) All of these emission reduction methods and ballast water systems will add millions to the cost of each ship (capital and/or operating costs). All of that will be passed on to us in the form of more expensive Chinese-made household goods.

9) Regarding LNG ships, actually San Diego shipyard NASSCO just signed a contract to build LNG-powered US-flag containerships for Tote, Inc. They’ll be the largest LNG-only-powered ships in the world.

yes man

welcome to the forum , thank's for the info sounds like you must be aware of carb in california and the SCAQMD and the rules they put into effect wwith out giving a lot of thought to and the long range consiquence of the action the impose

travler

Thanks for the welcome Travler. Yep I'm aware of Carb but I've dealt more with the EPA and IMO regs in my line of work.

What I always loved about most these researches is skipping the "robbing Peter" part in paying Paul. Surely there's ton of ecologically "bad" stuff, but very rarely you see a thorough analysis of alternatives and their footprint.

Specifically talking about cargo, you very often see sea routes being notably cheaper then the alternatives (trains, trucks) for the distance. Given how most of the cost is fuel...