News / MEPC81: the risk of 'fuels that represent a cure worse than the disease'

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At next week’s International Maritime Organization’s MEPC81, the global shipping regulator is considering a proposal that would see a massive increase in shipping’s global CO2 emissions, for no reason.

In settling the particulars of the IMO Fuel GHG (GFS) standard, IMO member states are tasked with answering the well-to-tank (WtT) question: whether the CO2 emissions involved in fuel production should also be counted toward its carbon footprint.

Various IMO member states are agreed that GFS should incorporate a lifecycle assessment of new fuels, including WtT and TtW (tank-to-wake) calculations in the total.

But if Norway, Saudi Arabia, China, Brazil and others have their way, this will not be the case.

Using industrial processes like steam-reforming, these countries plan to guarantee future demand for their natural resources by laundering their oil, gas and coal reserves into ‘grey’ versions of hydrogen, ammonia and methanol.

Faïg Abbasov, Transport & Environment shipping programme director, told The Loadstar that without factoring WtT emissions into IMO targets for 2030, 2040 and 2050, “…IMO would fail to deliver on the goals of the revised strategy and risk promoting fuels that represent a cure worse than the disease”.

The process of steam reforming generates greater CO2 than burning fossil fuel in a ship. In fact, according to FuelEU calculations, should fossil (‘grey’) ammonia replace fossil VLSFO as the de facto ship fuel, it would increase shipping’s contribution to CO2 emissions by 26% over conventional fossil ship fuels, rather than diminish them.

Chemically, ‘grey’ fuels are identical to their ‘green’ counterparts, meaning that they could be mixed into their supply chains easily and virtually untraceably. Stena and Maersk are currently using grey methanol, though the latter is offsetting through its ‘mass balancing’ strategy.

If adopted en masse, however, grey ammonia would result in a global CO2 increase of 18%.

Asked whether MEPC81 could be expected to provide much sought-after certainty on fuels for shipping’s customers and investors, Mr Abbasov said distorting the market with grey fuels would achieve the opposite.

“Why? Because Norway et al propose assigning zero- and low-emission values to these fuels, which has no scientific justification. As an investor, you would be an idiot to ignore these risks and most likely choose to sit back or explore other sectors to invest in.

“This is the eventuality the maritime sector will face if that proposal is taken forward,” he added.