Carbon capture and storage (CCS) in shipping will likely become more common in the next few years as an interim decarbonisation measure for the maritime industry, along with its shift towards using cleaner fuels.
Argus spoke with Mike Watt, director of classification society Bureau Veritas' (BV) Innovation Centre of Alternatives and Renewable Energy and its Future Shipping Team, South Asia and Pacific on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Maritime 2024 conference and exhibition in Singapore last week. Edited highlights follow.
Why do you feel CCS in shipping will likely become more common in the next few years?
If you remember the scrubber revolution that happened a few years ago, there are parallels with CCS. We were talking about scrubbers for sulphur and now "scrubbers" for carbon dioxide (CO2). It's cost efficient as well.
Shipowners are looking for something they can use now, as compared to scrapping an entire fleet of ships which will have other implications on sustainability. CCS helps with emissions reductions without shipowners having to renew fleets early, especially for owners of fleets in the 10-year range who would be looking to keep them for at least another 5-10 years.
The technology to implement CCS is mature as well, and therefore has enormous potential to help hard-to-decarbonise industries to minimise CO2 emissions.
Could you share with us more about the findings from the feasibility and design study regarding installing CCS units on existing ships that BV conducted last year?
We partnered with Hong Kong's Wah Kwong Shipping and marine technology company Shanghai Qiyao for the study and trialled the installation of CCS units onboard two in-service ships. We wanted to look at the design aspects of it and space utilisation onboard.
We found there was a high degree of feasibility, and CCS can be tailored for a diverse range of vessel types without significant disruption to exhaust trunking and machinery. A lot of analysis was done on pre-design, operating conditions, maintenance of the system, analysis of the installation and calculations of the electrical load.
Via Qiyao's system, an organic amine compound solution reacts with CO2 in the scrubber, separating it from exhaust gas. The dissolved CO2 compound solution is then released at high temperatures in the stripper. The extracted CO2 is then compressed, purified and cooled into liquid form. The liquefied CO2 is finally stored in a low-temperature storage tank.
We found that there is likely enough space for CCS units on board without disturbing too much of the existing systems.
Where carbon capture can be applied in connection with alternative fuels is in the production of blue fuels, such as blue hydrogen. Blue hydrogen is produced via a steam reforming process, which brings together natural gas and heated water in the form of steam. But CO2 is also produced as a by-product. CCS can then be used to trap and store this CO2.
What are the challenges you foresee in implementing CCS in shipping?
The biggest challenge would be the infrastructure required to process the captured carbon and finding offtakers for it. Essentially, the mapping of the entire value chain. But this will become more established as CCS technology is adopted more by shipowners.
We also need port facilities and the ability to take that captured carbon on vessels and process it. For example, how do you transfer carbon ship-to-ship or ship-to-truck? It'll be interesting to see the outcome of studies regarding this. We had similar discussions on LNG before. The commodity may be different but the process is similar.
Other limitations include technological effectiveness, although this will also improve over time, and how much carbon can be captured. To achieve maximum possible CO2 reduction, customised design of CCS units would be required on an economically viable basis.
There are pilot projects under way and the components are there for CCS in shipping to happen. But decisions also have to be made at the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) level first of all that will then propel the industry forward. I'm looking forward to see if there's any amendments to IMO regulations at the Marine Environment Protection Committee 81st session.
