Maran Gas reports on LNG methane slip abatement pilot project

Maran Gas completed a shipboard pilot to abate methane slip on the LNG carrier Maran Gas Chios, concluding trials of a plasma-catalytic exhaust aftertreatment system operated under commercial conditions.

Maran Gas and Daphne Technology said the exercise validated feasibility at sea and produced data to inform the next stage of development. The pilot addressed methane slip from dual-fuel marine engines and retrofitted an exhaust-stream treatment unit for live testing.

Reported results showed reductions of up to 4 ± 2 g/kWh, which the partners said evidenced the potential of plasma-catalytic abatement on board an LNG carrier.

The outcome was positioned as an initial step that would guide engineering refinements and risk reduction for future deployments.

Maran Gas Maritime Inc technical director Andreas Spertos said methane-slip reduction was an inherent challenge for gas-fuelled engines and that marine operating conditions compounded the difficulty.

He characterised the trial on Maran Gas Chios as a landmark test, stating that the companies completed the exercise, verified the potential and identified improvements to support ongoing technology development.

Daphne Technology managing director Ivan Raleff said this had been the first deployment of the company’s plasma-catalytic system on a ship and described it as a move into uncharted territory that delivered insights into the real-world behaviour of methane-abatement equipment in a maritime setting.

He added that the learnings would be fundamental to the next phase of product development and expressed gratitude to the Angelicoussis Group for enabling the pilot.

The collaboration was presented as an example of how owner participation accelerated technology maturation by providing operational platforms for first-of-a-kind installations in service.

The partners said the insights generated would inform subsequent iterations and lower deployment risk.

They also said the plasma-catalytic unit continued to be developed alongside a commercial emissions-monitoring platform, with the stated aim of offering scalable methane abatement for marine and land-based applications, and that the partnership would remain central to addressing methane emissions from hard-to-abate sectors.