Value Maritime: The future is bright for CCS tech in shipping

Dutch maritime technology company Value Maritime hit the headlines earlier this year as it developed what it claims to be the world’s first onboard CO2 capture and storage (CCS) unit for the maritime industry.

The solution has been successfully installed onboard Nordica, a 2011-built 1,040 TEU containership owned by the Netherlands-based shipping company Visser Shipping and operated by Singapore’s X-Press Feeders.

The 152-meter-long vessel recently embarked on a voyage to test the system, which was approved by French classification society Bureau Veritas (BV).

According to Rein Steeman, Director Sales and Marketing CO2 Services at Rotterdam-based Value Maritime, the most challenging phase of the project was the development and testing of the new technology on land, before the actual testing of the system at sea took place.

Fortunately, the system proved its worth and is working as expected, Steeman confirmed to Offshore Energy – Green Marine.

Specifically, the module captures CO2 from the ship’s exhaust and uses the CO2 to charge a CO2 battery which serves as a carbon dioxide storage facility on which CO2 can be charged and discharged.

“Our system filters ultra fine particles, SOx and captures CO2. The percentage of CO2 the owner or charterer wishes to capture is at their own choice,” Steeman explained.

“In the case of the Nordica, the fuel savings the system generates by not having to buy more expensive lower sulphur fuel oils earns back the investment. The system is equipped with a clean loop filtering the seawater used capturing the particulates in the water so it will not end up in the sea.”

Installation

According to Steeman, Value Maritime has a standardized plug and play pre-installed and commissioned unit that can go up to engine sizes of 15MW.

This represents 75 per cent of the total market.

“Installation is included in our offering and is also standardized as much as possible resulting in predictable, reliable and quick installation. Installation time is around 7-10 days.”

When it comes to the installation process, the collaboration between the technology providers, owners, charterers and class societies is said to be very important.

“The collaboration between owner and charterers has been important in case of the Nordica,” Steeman noted.

“The collaboration with class society is also important as it is a new technology. In the case of Nordica with Bureau Veritas and charterer X-press Feeders, this goes very well.”

Circular solution for a circular future

Apart from being an industry first, one of the main features of Value Maritime’s CCS unit for the shipping sector is that it is a fully circular solution.

As explained, the carbon dioxide battery is offloaded in ports and transported to CO2 customers — for example to those from the agricultural segment — who reuse the stored CO2. Once they discharge the CO2, they return the battery to the vessel. The battery is then ready to be recharged with “new” CO2.

Steeman revealed that Value Maritime — a company created only four years ago with 12 installations of its new filtering technology completed so far — is involved in innovative projects to reuse the captured CO2 for various outlets.

One of these solutions includes the roses that grow from the CO2 captured on the boxship Nordica.

However, in the longer term, the company would explore opportunities to recycle the captured CO2 into new fuel types. It will also explore other options of CO2 use.

“We want to geographically grow the company and arrange worldwide CO2 outlets for our customers. Also, we would like to work together with customers in reducing their CO2 footprint in their supply chain and delivering them the CO2 needed in their production process. By doing so we can together have a big impact on making shipping cleaner today which drives us.”

ROI and other benefits

Offshore Energy – Green Marine wanted to know more about annual savings that can be achieved per ship unit.

Steeman said that, in case of the vessel Nordica, the investment at current market prices is earned back in 1.5 years, generating a stable fuel saving.

He explained that the owner can offer their charterers the advantage of capturing CO2 at a variable cost at their choice.

“The variable costs per ton CO2 captured is a choice of the charterers who need to forward these costs to their customers. When CO2 tax is implemented at current ETS prices the system generates also saving on the tax side. This will give an additional incentive for owners to start capturing CO2.”

He went further and informed that the advantage of the system depends on the ship type.

“For example, the Nordica can run on higher sulphur fuel oils giving it fuel saving as our system filters sulphur and the owner/charterer can buy less expensive fuel.”

“But in case of for example LNG vessels or diesel oil driven vessel, the financial advantage is applicable when CO2 tax is implemented. For these vessels, a system like ours is installed because a charterer/owner wants this or other local legislation to apply.”

The future of CCS in shipping

When asked about the future of the CO2 capture and storage technology in shipping, Value Maritime shared a more than optimistic view.

“We see a bright future for this technology as there are no real short term solutions to have a big impact for the 60,000 fossil fuel oil seagoing vessels worldwide,” Steeman pointed out.

“With our solution, vessel owners can save money and reduce CO2 at a competitive price per ton CO2 as much as they or their customers choose.”

In the context of more stringent maritime environmental regulations, Value Maritime believes that regulators need to provide greater support to clean technology providers to speed up the decarbonization of the maritime sector.

Value Maritime stressed that vessel owners and charterers can achieve impact now because the company’s system achieves the 50 per cent reduction.

“From a regulatory perspective, it is important that regulators realise that there are new technologies like ours out there that can have an environmental significant impact now,” Steeman stressed.

“By realising this, regulation can be implemented supporting systems like ours. We need to realize that, for shipping, fossil fuel oil for various reasons will be there in the coming decades and we need to act now regarding emissions. With systems like ours, we can do so while developing new cleaner vessels.”

“In this case we should not make the perfect — zero-emission vessels — the enemy of the good resulting in not having a big impact today.”