Posted: April 20th, 2022

Cost Comparative Assessment Study between Different Retrofit Technologies applied on Model Ship to Conform to IMO MARPOL

Cost Comparative Assessment Study between Different Retrofit Technologies applied on Model Ship to Conform to IMO MARPOL
HISTORY OF GREEN-HOUSE GAS (GHG) EMISSIONS
Since many decades now scientific community has been discussing over theatmospheric pollution that is caused by the operation of the internal combustionengines. More specifically, its concerns focus on the so called major pollutants, that isthe carbon dioxide (CO
2
), nitrogen oxides (NO
x
) and sulphur dioxide (SO
2
). Asreported by Behrends and Liebezeit (2003), carbon dioxide is considered to be largelyresponsible for the phenomenon of Global Warming while the latter two gasescontribute amongst others to the creation of Acid Rain. Additionally, NO
x
is thoughtto be enhancing eutrophication, the process whereby a body of water becomes over-enriched with nutrients which results to overgrowth of algae and depleted oxygenlevels in the water.Scientific community decided to start examining ways on how to limit the emissionsof ICE (internal combustion engines) although, at that time,
around mid 60’s,
therewas no tangible evidence of
the emissions’
impact to the
earth’s
atmosphere and theenvironment in general. However, the continuously growing dependency on fossilfuels through the years, in conjunction with the rapid expansion of the use of internalcombustion engines in terms of numbers and sizes as well as the heavyindustrialization of businesses worldwide assisted towards radically affecting theeco-balance and lead to environment depicting its first signs of deterioration. Thesealarming observations pushed things to a faster pace and the issue of controlling andregulating the emissions of the internal combustion engines climbed up high on theagenda. Considering the diversity and complexity of different industries(manufacturing, land transportation, automotive, shipping, etc.) that one way oranother base their operation on the use of internal combustion engines, it waspractically impossible to enforce a universal regulation that could be applied to eachand every single case / different industry. With that in mind, it was deemed wiserand more efficient to group cases based on the industry that the internal combustionengines are used by. This would also allow for
each industry’s stakeholders to
participate into an open scientific discussion as to how the problem of theatmospheric pollution could be addressed and subsequently resolved.The story goes back to the end of WWII after which the production of crude oils withsignificantly high sulphur content lead to equally increased produced emissions(Behrends and Liebezeit, 2003). First industry requested to reduce its environmentalfootprint was the power production corporations. Then the heavy-duty industrialunits were also regulated. This was the first attempt to regulate the emissionsproduced from the internal combustion engines that the power stations andindustrial units used for the production of power or were used as main equipmentfor manufacturing processes
The international community, with increased awareness of environmentalconsiderations, set forth a number of regulations which required for productspecifications to be more stringent. After the regulation of power stations and
industries’ emissions, next in
line was the airline industry to be committed toenvironmentally friendlier operations. Finally, the interest of the environmentaliststurned to land transportation industry and in particular to heavy-duty commercialvehicles (trucks) as well as passenger cars.
1.2

THE CONTRIBUTION OF SHIPPING TO GHG EMISSIONS
For years shipping was not taken into account in the emissions equation due to thecommonly accepted belief that the products (exhaust gases)
of the ships’ internal
combustion engines are reacting with the microenvironment of where the ships sailand are somehow neutralized. More specifically, it was believed that the sulphuroxides (SO
x
) are reacting to salt water and turn to gypsum, a very soft and harmlesssulphate mineral, or that, while the exhaust gases float in atmosphere, they assist inreflecting the sunbeams with this incurring, as a positive side effect, the reduction ofthe greenhouse phenomenon. Furthermore, it was strongly supported that thenitrogen oxides (NO
x
) react with and reduce the life of Methane existing inatmosphere, which is considered around 25 times more powerful than carbondioxide (CO
2
).In spite of what was commonly believed, new studies regarding the contribution ofthe ships to the overall greenhouse gases emissions came up with outcomescompletely different than what the international community would expect. Morespecifically, Corbett and Fischbek (1997) calculated that the annual emissions comingfrom the global shipping fleet reached 3.08 * 10
6
tons of Nitrogen and 4.24 * 10
6
tonsof Sulphur which reflect to a 14% and a 16% of the annual emissions of all internalcombustion engines running on fuel. However, only a 2% of the 6 * 10
9
tons of carbondioxide, which is the amount emitted annually from fossil fuel combustion, wasrelated to the operation of ships.This news have alarmed major conventions such as the International MaritimeOrganization (IMO), the United Nations, and Class Society as Det Norske Veritas(DNV), pushing them to perform relevant studies of their own as to assess theaccuracy of the results.The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change calculated in itsstudy the Nitrogen emissions from ships operations at 9.3 * 10
6
tons and relevantSulphur emissions within the range of 7.7-11.5 * 10
6
tons (UNFCCC, 1997).The Norwegian Classification Society, DNV, published its estimates of Sulphur andNitrogen emissions of ships (Det Norske Veritas, 1999), after conducting amathematical model which calculated fuel consumptions, vessel routes and otherrelevant data of shi
ps’
operations. They estimated the NOx emissions at 9.9 * 10
6
tonsand relevant sulphur dioxide emissions at 5.5 * 10
6
tons.

COST COMPARATIVE ASSESSMENT STUDY BETWEEN DIFFERENT RETROFIT TECHNOLOGIESAPPLIED ON MODEL SHIP TO CONFORM TO IMO MARPOL 73/78, ANNEX VI, REG. 14

Nikolaos K. Kotakis
Page 11

Finally, the International Maritime Organization, concerned about the possibleimpact of shipping to the atmospheric pollution and having in mind the perspectiveof regulating shipping industry in line with the Kyoto Protocol signed in Japan in1997, conducted its own study of the emissions of shipping using both model basedand fuel based calculations (IMO, 2000). Without significant variations/differences between the two studies, the results showed an average NO
x
emissions at the rangeof 10.1 * 10
6
tons and sulphur dioxide emissions at the range of 5.65 * 10
6
tons. In2009, IMO issued its second study on greenhouse gases emissions produced byshipping (IMO, 2009) which presented an increase of international shipping exhaustsat approx. 20 * 10
6
tons NO
x
and 12 * 10
6
tons SO
x
as shown in Table 1 below.All relevant studies conducted around that period reached the same conclusion;shipping was found
“guilty”
of contributing to the greenhouse phenomenon byemitting, on an annual basis, a significant amount of greenhouse gases. This broughtshipping under the spot light, pointing out the necessity to introduce a regulatoryframe similar to the one for industry

Order | Check Discount