Pollution from 15 of world's biggest ships equal that of world's 760 million cars

Hello.





Amazing how our ships have changed from wood and canvas to steel and propeller in the last four centuries alone.


The marine propeller made by German company, Mecklenburger Metallguss GmbH can easily be called the biggest marine propeller with its 131 tons weight.



Emma Maersk itself is the largest container ship around today. Justifiably so, it the largest ship propeller ever built, providing the ship maximum speed of 27 knots. The engineering that went into making and ensuing sustenance of such a large propeller is certainly something to wonder about, along with its size, of course.


Here's where there is a problem: Running at her rated 80 Mw, her main engines burn 14 tons of residual fuel each hour. Annually, that's 97,400 tons of fuel.

Emma Mærsk and similar ships have been criticised for their burning of bunker fuel, which has a high sulphur content. Fuel sulphur content is 2.5 to 4.5 percent which is over 2,000 times more than allowed in current automotive fuel. This fuel oil is not burnt in internationally-agreed Sulphur Emission Control Areas (SECAs); there fuel with a maximum of 1.0% [2010] sulphur is permitted; the limit is to be reduced to 0.1% in 2015. Reduced sulphur in the fuel affects the lubrificatory properties, which could lead to lower reliability, and higher costs for maintenance and repair, over and above purchasing the more-expensive low-sulphur fuel.

Says James Corbett, professor of marine policy at the University of Delaware: "Ship pollution affects the health of communities in coastal and inland regions around the world, yet pollution from ships remains one of the least regulated parts of our global transportation system." It sounds serious, but how bad could it be? Staggeringly, if a report by the UK's Guardian newspaper is to be believed. According to their story, just one of the world's largest container ships can emit about as much pollution as 50 million cars. Further, the 15 largest ships in the world emit as much nitrogen oxide and sulphur oxide as the world's 760 million cars. The problem isn't necessarily with the ships' 109,000-horsepower engines that endlessly spin away 24 hours a day, 280 days a year. In fact, these powerplants are some of the most fuel efficient units in the world. The real issue lies with the heavy fuel oil the ships run on and the almost complete lack of regulations applied to the giant exhaust stacks of these container ships. The good news is that pressure is building from various governments around the world, including the United States, which just recently introduced legislation to keep these ships at least 230 miles away from U.S. coastlines. Similar measures are likely to follow in other countries like the United Kingdom.

Wiki 10 longest ships

list of long ships



Thank for reading.


SS

I have known this for some time, but forgot how bad it was, thanks for the reminder.
Amazing nothing is done against this.

reply to post by Spike Spiegle


Explanation: S&F!



Personal Disclosure: Bump for Justice!

reply to post by Plugin


Nothing is done "against this" because these ships a vital part of how goods are moved around the globe, without trans-continental shipping many places would not even be able to access certain foods because they simply cannot be grown locally in any large quantity due to conditions. Furthermore those ships bring big-ticket items vital to industries across the world, in short we need these kinds of ships to get things done.

Being a Captain in a Merchant Navy and having friends who are working for Maersk, let me tell you unequivocally that this goes very very deep (pardon the pun - but intended)

We are at the mercy of the charterer - we can go at economical speed and reduce emissions by one third over a standard 2 week voyage.

Maersk run mainly container ships - by their very nature, the cargo is precious and they are required to get there asap - the charterer monitors their progress hourly and aside from tides heights vs draft they are required to get in and out asap as well.

It is relentless, when something goes astray - the Captain cops it. When that happens, it is usually resultant from over exhaustion of crew and the vessels running gear.

Like I said, it is relentless - I hate it from an environmental perspective but the manufacturers of vessels are dealing with massive companies that ARE cutting corners regarding emissions when it comes to final delivery of vessels for trading.

The bean-counters are calling the shots - that's why most vessels are now constructed in China.

Sad but true.

reply to post by Sublimecraft


Thank you for that perspective


Is there any thing that your friends have told you, that might be of interest, working on the largest ship in the world must have it's own set of unique challenges.


SS

reply to post by Helig


Aye, I cant disagree with that, if we want to continue our modern way of life in the west, these ships have to continue sailing...


SS

Explanation: They could all be converted to nuke powered ships and the pollution of the air issue goes immediately away.

There are civilian nuke powered ships [mostly ice breakers] and so this is not an issue!

Personal Disclosure: I will post to this thread again, but will focus on the stacks and the sulpher instead.

reply to post by Spike Spiegle


Not really, every vessel poses its own set of challenges - working on the largest obviously has its unique characteristics. Momentum is the key to maneuverability but that comes with experience - hence the reason the Captain is dedicated to the vessel.

Corporate pressure is the issue these days - Captains are nothing more than glorified secretaries. Gone are the days of navigation, its all done by electronics.

reply to post by OmegaLogos



We could very well do that though, taking the average " U.S. Nuclear Power Plants, safe distance " if and when there might be a metldown, then these new ships wouldn't be able to unload their cargo in port.


Smaller none Nuclear powered ships would need to fetch the cargo and bring it to port, which would lead to a new drain on resources / fuel consumption.


Unless huge advances are made in Nuclear safety and containment, I doubt we can do such a thing.


SS

Originally posted by Helig
reply to post by Plugin

 

Nothing is done "against this" because these ships a vital part of how goods are moved around the globe, without trans-continental shipping many places would not even be able to access certain foods because they simply cannot be grown locally in any large quantity due to conditions. Furthermore those ships bring big-ticket items vital to industries across the world, in short we need these kinds of ships to get things done.

But you could make new international rules for not allowing this kind of the worst oil there is?
Like most country's stopped hunting for whales, sure you could go on hunting them all untill they are exinct and feel very bad later on.

So many many country's (at least in mine) are pushing small cars, taxing big cars more and more while on the same time, those ships together are about as polluting in total then about all the cars driving on this globe, and NOTHING is being done about it?

They should just forbid the use of that oil, simple? or even make normal fuel/oil for those ships more as or even more cheap for them and make a global rule for it.

reply to post by Spike Spiegle


Explanation: Nuke powered subs enter and birth at US harbours ... it should not be an issue!

However moving quikly away from nuke powered ships and focusing on the sulpher issue ...

Surely the sulpher [from expensive sulpher rich fuels] can be reclaimed from the exhuast stacks and then used to enrich lower cost sulpher poor fuels ... and then be again reclaimed inside the stack for further recycling.

Personal Disclosure: Trade directly implies the lack of self suffiencecy and when everybody is self sufficient there will ZERO need to trade anything except for information ... which is as free as by word of mouth.

In the near future I can see the need for such ships going away completely!

People in this industry may want to retrain now ..and miss the panic ok!

reply to post by OmegaLogos


We have very strict guidelines regarding sulphur content when taking bunkers (fuel).
At the moment it is 0.001% content allowable per cubic meter of fuel and the Chief Engineer must take samples before and after the exercise

Sulphur is the number one destroyer of our engines so its content level is taken very seriously onboard

Originally posted by OmegaLogos
reply to post by Spike Spiegle

 

Explanation: Nuke powered subs enter and birth at US harbours ... it should not be an issue!

I disagree, U.S Nuclear powered subs are high value military assets, each one holding the power to destroy the world many times over.


They don't just dock anywhere.


I'm not so sure the world and ports around the world would be ready to extend such leniency to private shipping companies, to enter and birth that is.


SS

reply to post by Spike Spiegle


Explanation: NATIONALIZE THEM!

Personal Disclosure: I'm a bitter commie for a REASON ok!

reply to post by Spike Spiegle


Are these ships unable to make port in the US after this new legislation is in place? Or are they towed 230 miles

reply to post by steppenwolf86


Double post*

reply to post by steppenwolf86


Which ships are we talking about, the present fleet or OL's Nuclear dream fleet?


SS

reply to post by Spike Spiegle

The OP quote from the article about the US legislation passed regarding the current fleet.

These ultra large ships, ULCCs and ULBCs cannot even enter most ports in the world due to draft.

No one notices the really strange part: look at that Wiki of the ten largest ships. Note that all the ULCCs, oil tankers, were built in the mid to late seventies. Remember, when there was supposedly this huge oil "shortage"? THey have all since been scrapped. Hmmm.

The only ultra large ships built recently, as in within the last FORTY YEARS, are CONTAINER ships. Those are the ones that bring all the cheap crap from China to Walmart for you to waste all your money on. For some reason, no huge tankers have been built in a LONG time. They are somehow not "profitable", but you pay up the wazoo for gas. Hmmm.

NINETY PERCENT of everything in the world is transported by ship. This stuff is super important. Check out the Baltic Dry Index, and what it means, for a real eye opener.