Hamburg Süd: LNG Bunkers Would Meet Environmental, But Not Financial Needs

Christoph Gessner, Managing Director of Hamburg Süd's Columbus Shipmanagement, says that "the gap between MGO and LNG [prices] is not big enough."

Christoph Gessner, Managing Director of Hamburg Süd subsidiary Columbus Shipmanagement GmbH (CSG) says the companies have concluded that, while liquefied natural gas (LNG) bunkers would fulfill the company's environmental goals, the choice is not financially desirable given the current low price of oil.

Gessner, who was speaking at the recent Large Engine Techdays conference, explained that the company wanted to pursue the use of environmentally friendly bunkers, and so undertook a study to evaluate if they "could avoid the complete use of fuel oil."

The study is said to have focused on an LNG-propelled container ship concept based on a MAN Diesel & Turbo ME-GI low-speed dual-fuel engine capable of providing the company's customers with "efficient environmentally conscious transport."

Gessner says the study concluded that, while the use of LNG propulsion would contribute towards "a very ambitious target" of reducing CO2 emissions 45 percent per TEU per km by 2020 compared with 2009 levels, "the gap between MGO and LNG [prices] is not big enough."

The company is also said to have rejected scrubbers as a solution to reducing its emissions, with Gressner noting: "we don't see it as a good option to put the emissions from the air into the water."

Despite the study's conclusion, Gressner says that the company has not ruled out the use of LNG bunkers in the future, and will continue to examine ways of emissions reductions in the future.

"We definitely would invest additional capital to reduce emissions," said Gressner, adding that such efforts would be focused on specific regions or trades instead of global routes.

"We will have a project in the near future," Gressner concluded.

Last month Ship & Bunker reported that Hamburg Süd, in a new sustainability report covering the 2014/2015 period, said that its new Fleet Operations Center, which was opened in 2015, has enabled some of the ships in its fleet to achieve a 7 percent fuel savings in 2015, compared to the previous year.