Inside Aderco’s carbon credit bet: the data, the origins and the long game

The proof problem

Carbon claims in shipping carry a credibility burden, and 2055G+ is designed to address it directly. As previously reported, a vessel trials the additive for at least six months against a baseline derived from historical noon reports; the resulting savings are then monitored and converted into voluntary carbon credits by project developer, Adi Terra, under the Gold Standard methodology. What the initial coverage did not capture is where the confidence to make those claims originates.

The methodology was proven not at sea but in the Australian outback. In 2020, Aderco conducted large-scale monitoring on mining trucks and recorded savings of around 5 per cent, audited by external stakeholders. The key lesson was duration. “With monitoring sustained long enough, you flatten all parameters and variables, across five years, then one year,” said head of environment, Gérald Baiwir. “At that point, you know for a fact whether savings are being achieved.” The additive itself was never the constraint; the challenge lay in building the system to quantify and certify its impact.

That system has quietly created a second area of expertise. Analysts overseeing the monitoring pool, now more than 100 vessels and weighted towards bulkers with older engines and long sea passages that generate cleaner data, have learned to interpret anomalies. An unexplained rise in consumption, investigated with the owner, may turn out to be a hull fouled in tropical waters and overdue for cleaning.

“From being purely fuel treatment specialists, we now also have strong expertise in data analysis,” said Mr Servajean. Owners, often sceptical at first, tend to be persuaded once a face-to-face walkthrough clarifies the process and the prospect of additional revenue tips the balance; data security is managed through NDAs and internal controls.

The pragmatic case

The pitch rests on a more grounded reading of the decarbonisation timeline than the headlines around alternative fuels suggest. “Today, around 95 per cent of the fleet still burns fossil fuels, and three quarters operates in the tramp trades,” said Mr Baiwir. “We have to be pragmatic and support decarbonisation from that starting point, whatever the next engine or fuel may be.” This positioning speaks directly to the compliance pressures highlighted at launch, namely the IMO Carbon Intensity Indicator and exposure to the EU ETS, and to owners who can demonstrate efficiency gains but struggle to translate them into recognised outcomes.

The ambition extends beyond the additive itself. Aderco has moved from supplier to carbon project owner, and Mr Baiwir is clear that Adi Terra is intended to outgrow its parent. “We hope it will become a company capable of developing its own carbon projects and delivering the same service to other players. As we did for Aderco, Adi Terra could do the same for others.” A parallel focus is biofuel, where the additive removes water and extends fuel life, in Aderco’s view the most likely near-term alternative for bulkers and tankers, and a hedge against shifting regulation.

The benchmark against which Aderco will be judged is clear: 500 to 1,000 ships generating credits within a year, retrofit costs recovered, and the industry’s split incentive finally bridged. The open question is the one hanging over the wider voluntary market: whether carbon credits can retain both their price and their credibility long enough for that secondary revenue stream to deliver on its promise. Fittingly for a programme built on verification, the answer is only likely to emerge after a year of monitoring.