A consortium comprised of Boskalis, GoodFuels Marine and Wärtsilä will head a two year pilot programme to accelerate the development of sustainable, scalable and affordable marine bio-fuels.
Today, bio-fuels are not part of the marine fuel mix that operators and owners can choose and this means that shipping is missing an opportunity to utilise what should be an environmentally friendly fuel option.
Tangible Opportunities
The programme's focus will be on identifying suitable marine biofuels, securing industry certification, and preparing the building blocks for large-scale production. Additionally, the consortium will initiate a global scalability study involving leading ship owners, universities, NGOs, ports, bio-fuel companies and other industry stakeholders. The aim will be to identify tangible opportunities for scaling supply to the world's commercial shipping fleet.
Bio-Fuels from Waste Streams
The consortium will test several next generation bio-fuels made from industrial waste streams at the Wärtsilä laboratory in Vaasa, Finland before "sea trials" are carried out on vessels within Boskalis' global fleet. GoodFuels Marine is a company based in the Netherlands specialising in sustainable marine fuels.
With the objective of developing a fuel mix that is fully sustainable, the programme seeks to promote a reduced carbon footprint (up to ninety per cent versus fossil fuels) for the maritime sector. The consortium believes that these bio-fuels will play a viable role in lowering emissions to levels that no other fuel can currently achieve without a capital-intensive fleet renewal or retrofitting.
Picture: The bio-fuel test engine in the Wärtsilä laboratory in Vaasa, Finland.
