thick fuels, thick minds

i just attended a breakfast about marine pollution sponsored by amcham this morning. to quickly sketch the backdrop of the issue: marine fuel is several THOUSAND TIMES higher in sulphur content than vehicle diesel. to quote one of the lead participants, arthur bowring, the head of the hk shipowners association: marine fuel is so viscous that if you turned the jar of bunker fuel he keeps in his office upside down, the fuel wouldn't actually move. basically, it's about as thick as asphalt!

bowring said it many times over and over: we want to clean up, but we need a level playing field. a level playing field means coordinated PRD legislation of green harbour measures which would not exceed the international MARPOL regime. (standards tighter than MARPOL, the international maritime regime which covers ship pollution of all sorts, would necessitate additional capital expenditures and technical difficulties such as fuel switching and extra fuel tanks, beyond those considered internationally reasonable). Moreover, a fair playing field would assume the ready availability of cleaner fuel - a state of affairs which does not yet exist - with no penalty if such fuel was not available despite shipowners' best efforts.

apparently, bowring has sought meetings with the government for a long time, in order to convey the support of the shipowners association for more aggressive marine abatement measures. but it's only today that, for the first time, they've had the chance to meet face to face -- thanks to representation from the EPD at today's breakfast. WOW. that means that, to date, the hk govt has been trying to protect the interests of a constituency which didn't want its interests protected -- at least not like this. i hope arthur will convey his support for a stronger SO2 AQO in his upcoming conversation with the EPD, since the main thing holding the latter back has been been perceived resistance from the shipping industry to stricter sulphur standards.

besides learning that marine fuel is the absolute dregs of the oil refinement process accounting for its cement-like viscosity, there were some other interesting takeaways from today --

oil refiners don't want to make higher value distillates (cleaner fuels) because it's convenient and cost-effective for them to continue dumping the dross (marine bunker fuel) into the shipping industry.

the creation of distillate results in substantially greater carbon emissions than the burning of marine bunker fuel, but it's easier for several hundred refiners to scrub their emissions than 100,000 ships to implement scrubbing technology.

to date, no single technology has been able to remove all the contaminants in fuel. rather seawater scrubbers are required to remove SO2 and PM, whereas selective catalytic reduction technology is required to reduce NOx. while both these technologies can effectively filter out 80-90% of contaminants, both come with major technical challenges. in the case of sea water scrubbers, the process results in solid contaminant waste which must then be safely disposed of. in other words, seawater scrubbing merely displaces the problem, converting air pollutants into toxic solid matter. regarding scr, ships must carry large amount of urea and the process must take place at very high temperatures.

in singapore, apparently, scientists have successfully conducted preliminary trials of a new sound wave technology which reduces the ph of emissions, successfully eliminating ALL contaminants, and reducing them into a form of calcium carbonate. ZOUNDS! if it works, it will be revolutionary. (sounds too good to be true, but, then again, i previously worked at a company which successfully eliminated carcinogens from cigarette smoke without affecting the cigarette-smoking experience.)

amcham gets a big gold star for organizing today's breakfast: it went a long way towards improving communication between the shipping industry and the government while bringing us (comparative) neophytes up to speed on 360 degrees of this incredibly complex issue.