https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/01/biggest-change-in-fuel-since-leaded-gas-went-away-could-raise-prices.html
this is potentially huge as these fuels are responsible for a huge chunk of transportation emissions
As soon as shipping companies start pouring billions into lobbying republicans to do so.
we sadly don't abide by the treaty of the seas (or w/e that treaty is) so american ships technically don't have that issue. Really I wish we would have ratified these fucking things decades ago because it really does hurt our position when china belongs to more UN treaties than we do.
Blows my mind that bunker oil ever caught on as a fuel considering at room temperature it's closer to road tar in consistency than diesel or gasoline.
Its because its such a cheap by-product from the refining process, its got no actual use other than what its currently being used for and to get it into a usable state just means running a steam heater around the container which is a simple process, especially on ships, they don't exactly have a limit to creating steam as they're constantly in water/near it. Also this ban relies heavily on the cooperation of the refineries to agree to producing a hybrid low sulphur mix with their current diesel output, which granted they do already produce as a marine fuel but this will cause an overnight change instantly. Its going to be a fucker to supply and demand, plus there is a fuckload of older ships running engines which will run worse on the low sulphur marine fuels, so it will in effect burn even more fuel. Hell some ships wont even run on it and will need to be scrapped.
This is a problem caused by allowing the use of these fuels in the first place and letting it go on for so long, its gonna hit the entire world hard as we rely on these fuels for basically everything in relation to transportation across the world.
The larger shipping companies are already committed to shifting away from bunker fuels, so hopefully this will hurry them along and force the smaller outfits to catch up. Marine engines are basically giant diesels so retrofitting them for a less polluting fuel won't cost the operators much in the grand scheme of things, it's just that the major lines wanted to replace the ships outright with more efficient ones.
I think you're referring to the Convention on the Law of the Sea, which the US failed to ratify because a disagreement with a specific part. They agree with most of it, though.
In this case these fuel regs are from the International Maritime Organization which the US is a member of (along with all coastal nations, and some landlocked ones) so good fucking luck skirting away from this one.
Besides, none of the major players in commercial shipping are American so even if we somehow weaselled out it really wouldn't matter.
Well, A) it's dirt cheap, as Reagy explained, but B) it's also a very volume-efficient fuel.
Hydrocarbon fuels generally have a really nice, straightforward set of tradeoffs based on the average length of the carbon chain. At one end, you've got stuff that's really energetic per unit weight, at the cost of taking up more volume - methane, then ethane, then propane, then butane. All of those are gases at room temperature, but can be condensed into liquids (butane most easily, methane least easily). (Natural gas is a mix of these, mostly methane IIRC since there's more of it, but it's not strictly controlled). These also have the benefit of easier ignition.
At the other end, you've got coal, asphalt, and bunker fuel, the latter of which can be melted without too much trouble - these are most energetic per unit volume, at the cost of high density. In between, ordered from short-chain (weight-efficient) to long-chain (volume-efficient), you've got gasoline (a mix of heptane and octane - the "octane rating" is basically how much octane to heptane), kerosene (including heating fuel, jet fuel, and RP-1 rocket fuel), and diesel. (Ethanol breaks the rule a bit - chemically, it's partially-burned ethane, but it's slightly ahead of gasoline on this curve because of that big old oxygen atom). The other problem you get at the higher end is purity - a tank of propane is pretty much guaranteed to be mostly propane, maybe a bit of ethane or butane, some inert gases; a tank of gasoline is a mix of various heptane and octane isomers, with some oxygen and sulfur contaminants; by the time you get to bunker fuel you don't have any real control over which exact molecules you're getting, just some bulk physical properties and maybe a known atomic makeup.
Vehicles that care about the fuel weight tend to go lighter - aircraft mainly use kerosene as a tradeoff, since volume is also at a premium (look up "fineness ratio" for why). This is why rockets are starting to move from kerosene to methane - or, if you treat hydrogen as a zero-length carbon chain hydrocarbon, why a lot of them used liquid hydrogen, in terms of energy per unit mass, H2 is the best chemical we've got, until someone figures out how to keep monatomic hydrogen ions stable in storage.
Vehicles that don't have to care much about how much their fuel weighs, just how long a tank will last, tend to use longer-chain fuels. Big trucks use diesel, since their fuel is a relatively small amount of weight compared to their cargo, but they have to fit into a certain size to be road-legal. Trains use diesel these days, used to be coal but that's harder to automate the handling of. Energy per unit volume also impacts how powerful an engine is for its size - if your cylinders or combustion chamber is X large, you can pack more energy into it with a denser fuel, another reason why big, torque-y cargo movers like it. So, of course, big ships like bunker fuel because it means their fuel tanks and engine can be as physically small as possible, leaving as much room for cargo as can be.
There's obviously more factors this simple carbon-chain scale doesn't account for - economics, handling, legal considerations - but a surprising amount can be derived from almost pure chemisty.
With my original comment I was saying it blew my mind because I wasn't aware of how easy it was nowadays to keep it in a non-"not quite peanut butter" state. Regardless I see thanks to you and the other guy's post why it's an extremely lucrative fuel.
its the dregs from distillation that can't be used for anything and have been a nuisance for refiners since the first refineries were erected. like they tried for decades to find a use for it but couldn't really find any until large diesel ships
The title is a bit misleading. They're not banning bunker fuel (frankly, at this stage that would cripple world trade), rather they're setting restrictions on sulphur content. This won't reduce CO2 emissions, but it should reduce sulphur emissions.
Yeah, wait a tick that's quite the title edit there @Sableye
I would change it if that's a thing mods could do.
Didn't one senator say, essentially, that they didn't want to relinquish sovereignty over the sea?
but they are banning certain bunker fuels, namely the cheapest most prevalent ones in favor of forcing them to use more refined products.
Yes, burning sulfur compounds generally produces sulfur dioxide or sulfur trioxide, or some intermediate product that will then burn to a sulfur oxide. (Assuming you're burning it with oxygen or hydrogen peroxide or something like that, if you burn it with fluorine I think you'd get sulfur tetrafluoride)
SO2 itself isn't a big climate problem, though it does cause respiratory problems at high concentrations. The problem is that it fairly readily turns into sulfuric acid (SO2 + OH + O2 => H2SO4). At a low level, that's a major cause of acid rain, alongside nitrogen dioxide turning into nitric acid (NO2 + OH => HNO3). Higher in the atmosphere, sulfuric acid causes dimming - it blocks the light of the sun, which causes cooling. Large volcanic eruptions also directly blast dust and dirt into the higher atmosphere, which also is a major factor in post-eruption cooling.
I would expect the main concern with ships is the acid rain part. AIUI ground-based sulfur dioxide normally stays in the lower atmosphere, where it doesn't have a significant cooling effect. Volcanic eruptions can blast sulfur dioxide straight into the stratosphere, which is where they cause more dimming. I could be wrong here, though - I'm not an expert, I just read too many blogs and too much Wikipedia.
I'm actually gonna shoot myself this is 3+ megarich missed opportunities. Guys if you have a spare 10-20k invest it in a company that manufactures fuels for these ships immediately trust
https://lloydslist.maritimeintelligence.informa.com/LL1126441/A-third-of-scrubber-orders-will-miss-IMO-cap-deadline?src=SOCIAL&utm_content=Article&account_type=TWITTER&account_name=LloydsList&utm_campaign=Awareness&utm_source=TWITTER&utm_medium=SOCIAL&date=20190304&linkId=64313592
This just came up on me twitter. Oh well.
The only difference is that the heavy fuel oil will have less sulphur. It is one of the most disgusting and dirtiest fuels out there but with proper technology can be purified for the engines to take it. Ever since the energy crisis in the 1970's heavy fuel oil became the cheapest choice for shipowners. According to 2016 data (by the words of my professor), HFO cost around 180$/t while marine gas oil cost 350$/t and liquified natural gas 250$/t. Like some said here, HFO is the leftovers from crude oil processing. Imagine a person processing food and then the leftovers... Anyway, when there is a leakage, the fuel quickly starts becoming like a snot because of its low pour point - it loses its flow characteristics, so the clean up can become a pain in the ass. When we switch to diesel oil, life becomes a blessing. Diesel does not need heating for it to flow and it's also cleaner but it's much more expensive and has a lower flash point. Sulphur oxides are very dangerous but so are nitrogen oxides, don't forget about them. Then there is particulate matter yeah. Right now the future is LNG but we have to design completely new ships for it.
LNG seems to be the best thing that can be done without totally reinventing the modern cargo ship. I'm not sure nuclear will ever return even though I think it could be done, there's a lot of sketchy players in shipping.
Problem with LNG is storage. You need so much volume to store some gas. It can be done. There are dual-fuel engines in use with diesel used for maneuvering and gas when out of territorial waters. Keep in mind that LNG is much more flammable than conventional fuel and when a crew member decides to light up a cigarette.. My point is that leakages happen all the time, they're just inevitable. We can also fit nuclear reactors but the crew has to be incredibly disciplined like US Navy nukes are. Merchant navy is much more relaxed. It means way more training, paperwork and wages which all shipowners don't want to see. There's also the fear factor thanks to a few disasters. If you'd propose a new plant in 2010 you'd get Chernobyl thrown at your face now it's Fukushima.
Why LNG as the ship fuel of the future is a massive red herring
We need new builds that are zero emission asap if we have any hope of hitting 2050 targets.
You need more than just clean fuel, we also need bilge water systems that hold onto the water that seeps on board so it can be offloaded into facilities to clean before being reintroduced into the ocean. One of the biggest issues with cargo transport is the rampant contamination of microscopic invasive species.
Nuclear merchant fleet isn't the scale option either. It would probably only work for the biggest of ships and those who could afford it like Maersk and MSC etc. But that ignores the vast majority of much smaller ships around the world which are usually pieces of shit you wouldn't trust with nuclear material.
Building very large vessels can be economical as you write off old and small vessels and save on running costs like fuel and crewing. Rotor ships can be close to zero emissions. On-board bilge water is processed and may be pumped overboard if the oil content is below 15 parts per million. Some areas completely prohibit doing that so the bilge water and other waste is discharged to on-shore facilities. I'm not sure what they do with it. You can read more on MARPOL.
When it comes to bringing alien species to alien environments you're gonna have some nasty problems. There's this Ballast Water Management Convention but that's where my knowledge on this subject ends.
Cryogenic engines maybe? People joke about running things on rocket fuel but liquid oxygen is cheap, energy dense and not all that difficult to contain. Lockheed also experimented with a surprisingly simple controllable thrust aerospike rocket engine for the canceled NASA X22 space shuttle replacement and although it was mean't for rockets I could totally see its use in the freight industry.
For those unaware here's a promo video from rocketdyne
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWf4iOMSPNc
Are you suggesting using a rocket engine for the propulsion of a ship?
yes.
You would still have to power all the other stuff on the ship and power to keep the fuel cold. The fuel and engine system would probably be incredibly complex with gas generators etc. You'd also require backups as per seaworthiness regulations. And failsafes. What if the cooling system breaks down and the gas doesn't vent? Will it explode? I think using rocket fuels would be extremely complex. At that point you might as well make it a giant ekranoplan if you're making something the size and as self contained as an ocean going ship with the complexity of a rocket.
Wouldn't a rocket necessitate a fuel alongside the oxygen? If you're gonna use oxygen and hydrogen for a rocket you might as well just make it a fuel cell ship. Anything else is not zero emissions. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Nah your right. My line of thinking is even if it has emissions as long as its nowhere near black gold levels of emissions its fine. The environment is going to die to collective negligence so my idea of a goal at this point is to draw out the death scene as long as possible and use the time most efficiently to develop enough solutions to save ourselves at the very least.
I'd also argue that Cryogenic fuel is the only real path we can take. Nuclear has way too much red tape and social stigmas attached to it and electric as far as I'm aware can't make the same distances as petrol derivatives when it comes to freighters as far as I'm aware.
Plus think of the coolness factor of rocket freighters!
What even is the benefit of using cryogenic fuels? The reason why rockets use liquid hydrogen is because it provides incredible energy density (by mass at least), and gives a very high specific impulse. Even then the increased energy density is offset by the fact that because hydrogen is so light you need a very large tank to store a given amount of hydrogen. There's also no reason for a vehicle that operates entirely within Earth's atmosphere and doesn't require massive thrust on demand to carry its own oxidiser.
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.
