Scrubber uptake grows among dual-fuel box ship newbuilds

Earlier in the year, demand for scrubbers within the container ship market was stagnant – but there has been a slight improvement in the uptake of scrubbers for newbuilds using dual-fuel engines.  

CR Ocean Engineering special adviser Nick Confuorto says, “The reason for the limited uptake on newbuilds is due to the realisation by many that relying solely on alternate fuels may leave them vulnerable, as it may not be commercially available when they need it.  The dual-fuel approach seems to be the direction being taken to assure that at least they can reliably count on the availability of the proven oil-based fuel.”  

CROE has seen a move towards hybrid scrubber designs instead of the previously dominant open-loop approach. Mr Confuorto believes this is due to the “pressure being exerted by several political groups against water discharge from open-loop systems in ports.”

He adds, “Rather than argue that the discharge has been proven to be safe for the sea and the sealife, some shipping companies choose to give in to that pressure and use a hybrid system instead.  Using a hybrid system allows them to operate in closed-loop mode while in ports and then, when at open sea, they can switch to open loop.”  

CROE sells all three types of scrubbers - open loop, closed loop and hybrid.

Once the market is available, CROE will offer two approaches to capabilities for carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).  Since all CCS approaches require a clean exhaust gas prior to the carbon capture step, the existing CROE scrubbers can be used as prescrubbers to remove the sulphur oxides and the particulate prior to carbon capture.  

Mr Confuorto adds, “CROE is presently selling its scrubbing systems not only to reduce emissions from the use of heavy fuel oil but also as a prescrubber for future CCS.”