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October, 2016:

Cruise ships: a paradise of fun or floating killing machine?

Every year tens of thousands of people die because of ship pollution, but cruise liner companies are slow to make the switch to green technology

http://www.atimes.com/article/cruise-ships-paradise-fun-floating-killing-machine/

At a football pitch next to Victoria Harbor in central Hong Kong, kids can be seen dribbling, running and scoring goals. In the background small Chinese fishing boats, local ferries and international cruise ships slowly pass by.

It’s almost idyllic. But the number of children playing for the team could have been considerably higher. Some parents have pulled their kids out of the club because of the ships vomiting out toxic smoke.

“Just look at all that black smoke, all that pollution,” says one of the mothers who doesn’t bring her son to the pitch anymore as we look out over the harbor. “I really love that he enjoyed playing for the team, but this is not a good place.”

Road traffic and factories are often, and correctly, blamed for the deadly smog that pollutes the air in south China and elsewhere across Asia. But every year tens of thousands of people die because of air pollution from the dirty bunker fuel ships burn.

For cruising companies — which are dependent on upholding a glamorous image to attract tourist — the issue is becoming an increasingly sensitive topic, with several green groups slamming the industry for negligence and paying lip service.

According to Cruise Lines International Association, the industry’s main trade group, the cruise ship industry is now one of the fastest growing sectors in the mass tourism market, with 24 million passengers expected to sail in this year compared to 15 million a decade earlier.

Hong Kong received 260,000 cruise passengers last year, twice as many as the year before, according to the Commerce and Economic Development Bureau of Hong Kong.

At the same time, pollution increases.

The shipping industry is by far the world’s biggest emitter of sulfur, with the sulfur dioxide content in heavy fuel oil up to 3,500 times higher than the latest European diesel standards for vehicles. Sulfur dioxide is responsible for deadly lung and heart diseases and may contain carcinogenic particles.

Each day when an average cruise ship is at sea it emits more sulfur dioxide than several million cars, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency. It can burn as much fuel in a day as a whole town.

But even at berth, cruise ships keep their engines running to provide electrical power to passengers and crew. Just imagine a car park with all cars having their motors on, day in day out.

Indeed, sulfur dioxide emissions of ocean-going vessels at berth accounts for 40% of its total emissions during its stay in Hong Kong, according to the government. Large ships make up one-third to half of airborne pollutants in Hong Kong.

A China-led report published in Nature Climate Change in July said that ship pollution caused an estimated 24,000 premature deaths a year in East Asia. About three-quarters of deaths were in China.

“It is time to crack down on the emissions and destructive development caused by vast container vessels that pollute the air and seas,” a group of Chinese and American academics recently concluded in another Nature article.

dirty-ten-nature_comment_pm-shipping-pollution-map_18-02-2016-web-new-1

Progress is being made in green shipping, with new technology and tougher regulations. Cruise ships can install smokestack scrubbers to remove sulfur dioxide, burn lower-sulfur fuel or use liquefied natural gas. They can plug into shore-side power rather than running their engines while in port.

“The direction of the cruise industry is that it is becoming more and more environmentally conscious,” Thatcher Brown, President of Dream Cruises, a new premium line owned by Genting Hong Kong, said in an interview.

“When I look at the industry I see a tremendous amount of progress. It’s never good enough, absolutely not. But some of the cruise lines, I take my hat of for them, are really impressive.”

Jeff Bent, Managing Director at Worldwide Cruise Terminals, operator of Hong Kong’s Kai Tak cruise terminal, said that the industry often was being portrayed unfairly and that much advancement was being made.

Last year, Hong Kong was the first port in Asia to require all ocean-going vessels (OGVs) to switch to low sulfur fuel at berth, with more parts of China following suit. Worldwide, the UN’s International Maritime Organization (IMO) plans to cut the sulfur limit for ships’ fuel to 0.5% from 2020 from a current 3.5%.

“I would say that with the fuel switch regulation in place, and lines installing scrubbers, the race for cleaner air is on,” Bent said.

Not all agree.

Cutting sulfur levels is a good start, says Bill Hemmings, marine expert at Brussels-based Transport and Environment group. But more has to be done to restrict the deadly pollution.

“[Cutting to] 0.5% is a dramatic global shift in one go. But ultimately along vulnerable coasts like Hong Kong and China we need 0.1% and eventually lower,” he said. “[A level of] 0.1% is still 100 times more sulfur than road diesel.”

A report released in June suggested an “ongoing lack of initiative by cruise companies” to address the liners’ environmental footprint and to install technologies that reduce their air and water pollution impact on travel destinations and local people.

“Despite its PR blitz regarding installation of new pollution reduction technology, the cruise industry continues to get an ‘F’ for transparency, and many are failing when it comes to air or water pollution or both,” Marcie Keever, oceans and vessels program director for environmental activist group Friends of the Earth, said in a statement.

“It’s way past time to set a higher bar for this dirty industry.”

Daniel Rieger, a transport officer at German environment group Nabu, was quoted by the Guardian earlier this year:

“Cruise companies create a picture of being a bright, clean and environmentally friendly tourism sector. But the opposite is true,” he said.

“One cruise ship emits as many air pollutants as five million cars going the same distance because these ships use heavy fuel that on land would have to be disposed of as hazardous waste.”

Last year, Hong Kong’s government shelved plans to install plug-in shore power, or cold ironing, at the Kai Tak terminal. The Environmental Protection Department said it would be too costly considering that only 16% of all international cruise ships are equipped with onshore power systems, and is “not a priority task among cruise ports in the Asia-Pacific region.”

And while happy cruise passengers continue to sail through the Hong Kong harbor, children playing football at the waterfront pitch will continue to fill their lungs with the ship’s toxic smoke.

Many ways to cut ship NOx emissions

Establishing NOx Emission Control Areas would significantly reduce ship NOx emissions by 2040 – introducing economic instruments could cut emissions faster and further.

http://airclim.org/acidnews/many-ways-cut-ship-nox-emissions

A new study has given projections of ship NOx emissions in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel up to 2040, and estimated the potential of various measures to reduce NOx emissions from international shipping.

Ships emit significant amounts of air pollution, including sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and small particles (PM2.5), causing serious damage to health and the environment. As a result of both EU and global regulations, sulphur emissions from ships are expected to gradually come down, but there is currently no regulation that will ensure any significant cuts in their NOx emissions.

The only existing regulation of NOx from international shipping is in Annex VI of the MARPOL Convention under the International Maritime Organization (IMO). However, the NOx emission standards in this regulation solely apply to newly constructed ship engines, and the currently (since 2012) applicable Tier II standard accomplishes just a modest 15 to 20 per cent emission reduction compared to an unabated Tier I engine.

There is however a stricter Tier III standard that requires emission reductions of about 80 per cent compared to a Tier I engine, but this applies only to newly built ships in designated NOx Emission Control Areas (NECA) which currently only exist in North America.

While the Tier II standard can be achieved by internal engine modifications that adjust combustion parameters, bigger changes are needed to reach the Tier III standard.

There are several different abatement options for reducing emissions of NOx from marine engines, including:

  • Exhaust gas after-treatment, where the main option is selective catalytic reduction (SCR).
  • Combustion modification using techniques such as exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) or methods where water is introduced in the engine.
  • Switching from marine fuel oils to, for example, liquefied natural gas (LNG) or methanol.
  • Reduced fuel consumption, e.g. through slow steaming.

According to the study, SCR, EGR and using LNG as fuel can all reduce NOx emissions to Tier III levels. Of these, SCR has the longest history of marine applications, LNG is increasingly being used as a marine fuel, and while EGR is said by engine manufacturers to live up to the standard, so far there is limited data from practical applications.

In terms of costs, EGR and the SCR have comparable costs per kg of NOx reduced, while the costs for LNG depend largely on whether an existing ship is rebuilt or the LNG system is installed on a new ship – the latter being considerably less costly than the former. Fluctuations in the LNG price also affect the potential return on investment.

In order to analyse the potential for reducing NOx emissions from shipping, the study made new projections of emissions up to 2040 in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel. Regarding activity levels, ship traffic was assumed to increase by 1.5 per cent per year for all ship types except container ships, where the increase was set at 3.5 per cent per year. The average lifetimes of ships were assumed to stay the same up to 2040, i.e. 25 to 28 years.

Expected improvements in transport efficiency will result in lower fuel consumption for comparable volumes of freight transport, and in this study efficiency is assumed to increase between 1.3 and 2.25 per cent per year for the different ship types. The authors point out that these values are quite optimistic and result in fuel consumption that is stable over time despite an increase in ship traffic.

Projections were given for two scenarios – one business-as-usual (BAU), i.e. with no NOx Emission Control Area (NECA), and another with a NECA in place from 2021.

Current (2015) emissions were estimated to amount to 830,000 tonnes of NOx. Under the BAU scenario, emissions in 2040 are expected to come down by about 14 per cent, to 715,000 tonnes. Assuming that a NECA is in place from 2021, emissions in 2040 would instead be reduced by nearly two-thirds, to 306,000 tonnes.

In addition to estimating the impact of a NECA, the study evaluated several policy instruments that could be implemented in addition or as an alternative to the NECA. These policy instruments would address NOx emissions from the entire fleet, not only from newly built ships.

Three policy instruments were shortlisted as the most promising for use in addition or as an alternative to a NECA:

The first option is a levy that ships have to pay for NOx emissions in the area. The revenue from the levy would be used to fund the uptake of NOx abatement measures in the sector.

The second option requires ships to reduce their speed by 15 per cent under the baseline speed when sailing in the area. As an alternative compliance option, the ships that prefer to stick to their baseline speed can pay a levy, depending on their NOx emissions in the area. The income from this levy would be used to fund NOx abatement measures in the sector.

The third option is a stand-alone levy that ships have to pay for their NOx emissions in the area. The revenue from this instrument is assumed to go to the member states and not to be earmarked.

These three instruments were evaluated regarding their NOx reduction potential and the associated costs for the sector if the levy rate was either set at €1, €2 or €3 per kg NOx. It was found that two of the three instruments were better at meeting the two criteria, firstly a levy & fund and secondly regulated slow steaming combined with a levy & fund.

Introducing a levy & fund instrument could quickly and significantly reduce ship NOx emissions. In 2025 emissions could be cut by two-thirds (67%) in the case of no NECA and by 61 per cent with a NECA in place (see table). In 2040, reductions would amount to about 70 per cent in the absence of a NECA, and about 30 per cent if a NECA is established. This is roughly twice the reduction achieved with regulated slow steaming combined with a levy & fund if the baseline speed is reduced by 15 per cent. However, costs for the sector of a levy & fund are also roughly twice the costs of regulated slow steaming combined with a levy & fund.

Table: NOx emissions from international shipping in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel 2005–2040 (thousand tonnes).

nox-emissions

Expressed in tonnes, this means that even with a NECA in place, the use of economic instruments could cut annual NOx emissions by about 400,000 tonnes on average throughout the 2020s. For comparison, this is more than the total land-based NOx emissions of Sweden, Denmark and Finland combined, which in 2014 amounted to 385,000 tonnes.

Because the Tier III NECA standard applies only to newly built ships and ships have a very long lifetime, the introduction of economic instruments such as a levy & fund would provide a very useful complement to the NECA, by also ensuring significant emission cuts in the short term. Assume, for example, that a levy & fund is adopted and put into practice in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea in 2021, this would achieve an accumulated additional emission reduction over the ten years up to 2030 amounting to nearly four million tonnes of NOx.

Christer Ågren

The study “NOx controls for shipping in EU seas” (June 2016) was commissioned by Transport & Environment and prepared jointly by the consultants IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute and CE Delft.

Figure: NOx emissions from international shipping in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel 2005–2040 under a) business-as-usual (BAU); b) a NOx emission control area (NECA), and; c) a NOx levy and fund system.

Figure: NOx emissions from international shipping in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the English Channel 2005–2040 under a) business-as-usual (BAU); b) a NOx emission control area (NECA), and; c) a NOx levy and fund system.