The good ship EverLoNG returns to ‘port’

Reflections from the final project consortium meeting and public webinar, 12-13 March 2025, Augsburg, Germany

Following three and a half years of hard work, the EverLoNG consortium gathered for one final time in Augsburg, Germany. The two-day event (12-13 March), hosted by technical partner MAN Energy Solutions, included a comprehensive debrief and detailed discussion of the final results from all 6 work packages, a third and final public webinar, as well as a tour of the MAN facilities.

Project lead Marco Linders (TNO) kicked off the final consortium meeting on the first day. On the one hand, Marco expressed a sense of pride for the combined efforts that met - if not exceeded - targets and expectations. On the other hand, there was an obvious sadness regarding the fact that this pioneering 42-month project, involving some 16 partners from 5 countries, was now coming to a conclusion - a sentiment that was shared by everyone in the room (and online).

EverLoNG objectives

• WP1 - Demonstrate OCC on-board of two LNG-fuelled ships
• WP2 - Facilitate the development of OCC-based full CCUS chains (logistics, port facilities)
• WP3 - Optimise OCC integration to existing ship infrastructure
• WP4 - Perform life cycle assessment and techno-economic evaluation: to show the impact of this technology, from both economic and environmental viewpoints
• WP5 - Facilitate the regulatory framework for OCC, including safety aspects

Overall, the project aimed to advance Onboard Carbon Capture (OCC) to bring it closer to market readiness. To that end, several significant milestones were reached,  including two successful demonstration campaigns at TRL 7 (capture, liquefaction and storage at 10kg/h) onboard the TotalEnergies-chartered LNG carrier, the Seapeak Arwa, and Heerema Marine Contractors’ SSCV Sleipnir; the development of a Port Readiness Tool for CO₂ (PRT-CO₂) and a Roadmap for OCC implementation in Europe towards 2050; and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) results indicating that OCC could help avoid between 39-44% of CO₂e over the entire lifecycle compared to the non-intervention benchmark case. The project also found that there are no showstopping regulatory or class rule frameworks preventing OCC from being implemented today.

The final results also reveal important takeaways for OCC if it is to deliver the contribution that it demonstrably could towards decarbonising the maritime sector and achieving the IMO’s net zero ambitions. These include impacts on CO₂ quality concerning high NO₂ content and solvent degradation rates, implications for CO₂ offloading at port due to peculiar and not-always-predictable vessel operational profiles, trade-offs between optimisation and standardisation of ship systems, techno-economic projections indicating the need for revised/new financial instruments, accreditation of OCC within existing emissions reduction frameworks and indices, and uncertainties around the classification of captured CO₂ as either a ‘waste’ or a ‘product’, for instance.

Download final presentation slides   |   View final webinar recording

As the good ship EverLoNG returns to ‘port’, it does so having significantly furthered our understanding of OCC and its application. With much already achieved and some fine-tuning remaining, the EverLoNG consortium can reflect on a job well done.

The EverLoNG consortium would like to thank MAN Energy Solutions for a warm welcome and hospitality over the 2 days. The exclusive tour of their factory was a real highlight, giving the group front row insight into cutting-edge developments and of course how OCC fits into the bigger picture of maritime propulsion systems

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