Decarbonising shipping: why it matters and how the maritime industry can respond

Decarbonising a complex sector

Maritime transport is a diverse and varied sector, spanning urban commuter ferries to oceangoing container ships and fishing boats to offshore construction vessels. Each segment of the industry faces its own commercial drivers, challenges and solutions when considering how to minimise carbon emissions.

Deep sea cargo shipping requires substantial energy to cross entire oceans and reaching net zero will require a major shift to sustainable fuels. For now, alternative fuels (like bio methanol or e-ammonia) are expensive, but the additional cost can pale in comparison to the value of goods these mega ships transport. This opens up the opportunity for new commercial agreements that distribute some of the costs of sustainable fuels through supply chains.

Domestic and short-sea ferries – along with port craft, workboats, pleasure craft, and some cargo carrying vessels – are increasingly adopting battery energy storage technologies, workable for shorter duration voyages. Of course, batteries need charging infrastructure and landside planning of electrical systems can be challenging, but innovation in energy storage and charging technologies is expanding the size and type of vessels that can adopt these solutions.

Project

Blueprint for Zero Emission Vessel Transition

In San Francisco, Arup has been planning the energy provision for WETA (Water Emergency Transportation Authority)’s ferry fleet as it moves towards electric boats. This work has demonstrated how unifying energy planning with electrical and maritime engineering can unlock these solutions and prepare ports for an electric future.

How do we source sustainable maritime fuels?

For now, we simply don’t produce enough sustainable fuels to support either emerging demand or address net zero targets. Market development is itself a complex thing – requiring the alignment of capabilities, resources, investment and incentives. We need to see a rapid expansion in the production and supply of hydrogen-based fuels, bio-fuels and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) enabled fuels. 

Developing each of these fuel types will mean overcoming challenges around cost, scalability and sustainability. Policy makers and the market will need to establish whether these fuels are best produced locally, nationally or internationally.

What role do green shipping corridors and other innovation partnerships play?

To make significant progress towards green shipping will require innovation at a number of levels: new technologies, business models, and supportive regulations that enable the safe demonstration of low-carbon solutions. Green shipping corridors and similar innovation partnerships offer a vital testing ground for these ideas, helping to accelerate their development and scale. These collaborations often require coordination across the value chain, including between competitors, going further than business-as-usual.

Drawing on our experience supporting these partnerships – both in shipping and in other sectors that have embraced collaborative innovation – we’re supporting maturing of these initiatives towards operations. This includes delivering pre-feasibility and feasibility studies that assess zero-GHG fuel demand at ports, exploring production or import options, and designing fuel distribution concepts. These studies integrate technical, commercial, and policy expertise within a strategic framework that enables a viable and successful green shipping corridor.

Early movers on green shipping should recognise that they gain the opportunity to unlock related benefits at the national scale. Demand for sustainable shipping fuel can act as a key enabler of industrial and energy strategies, supporting investment in renewable energy, green technology manufacturing and huge fuel production hubs – leading to green jobs, emission reductions and a faster energy transition.

Change on land: what does the future hold for ports?

Ports play a key role in the wider journey to net zero and port authorities and operators are rethinking their role in a climate resilient future. They’re natural sites for offshore wind manufacturing and construction hubs, and can become green energy terminals for import and export of sustainable fuels and captured carbon, or acting as electrification hubs for low carbon mobility.

We have been helping ports around the world to develop their decarbonisation strategies and action plans. The goal is always a pathway that aligns policy, finance and customer drivers to unlock commercial delivery and support port growth. This means taking a ‘systems view’ of a port’s entire operations, recognising that decarbonisation is about reducing ‘scope 3’ emissions (indirect greenhouse gas emissions that occur in a company's value chain) by supporting value chain stakeholders too – but doing this in a way that unlocks investment in port cities, with broad socio-economic benefits. Given the level of uncertainty across the maritime industry, a joined-up long-term view is essential to build a credible and effective decarbonisation plan.