Blog: Everlong researcher Juliana Monteiro of TNO highlights recent momentum to decarbonise global shipping

In this blog, Everlong researcher Juliana Monteiro of TNO highlights recent momentum to decarbonise global shipping

It’s just a few months since we kicked off the EverLoNG project, which is demonstrating carbon capture on LNG-fuelled ships, and it is exciting to see momentum to decarbonise the global maritime sector building around us. After a decade of talks, last month a consensus emerged at the International Maritime Organization, which oversees the sector, to put a price on shipping emissions – a key incentive for operators to take action. UMAS, the shipping consultancy, described the development as a ‘huge step forward’, publishing a useful summary of these breakthrough talks. The next step will be establishing the emissions price – if it ends up in the 100-150$/t range then SBCC will come close to being a compelling business case for many ships.

Meanwhile, DNV, the shipping classification society and one of our partners in EverLoNG, has published the results of a project evaluating technologies for decarbonising LNG carriers. The research – carried out with TotalEnergies, another EverLoNG partner, and with Hyundai Heavy Industries – identifies ship-based CO2 capture (SBCC), the technology we are investigating in EverLoNG, as the most promising. It has the highest CO2 abatement potential and the lowest total cost of ownership, the study finds.

I certainly agree that SBCC is an effective technology for decarbonisation. But one point that surprised me in the study is that SBCC is considered to reduce CO2 intensity to zero - that means a capture rate in excess of 99%. This may be challenging due to the high energy demand involved, and the need for tall columns to achieve such high separation. In EverLoNG, we'll work on the integration of SBCC on the ship, taking into consideration the ship's heat balance (work led by Conoship International) and also perform a life cycle assessment (LCA, led by Forschungszentrum Jülich) to determine realistic capture rates and the CO2 abatement potential. I expect it to be high (between 50 and 80% depending on the ship), but not 100%.

Most of these results will be publicly available. To follow our progress, please follow us on social media and sign up to our mailing list.