EMEA News
Cargill Looks to Greater Biofuel Use for Fleet
Commodities trader Cargill has been increasing the amount of biofuels going to its fleet, according to a top executive.
Current biofuel bunkering is around 30,000 mt to 35,000 mt but this is expected to rise, the head of the firm's shipping arm, Jan Dieleman, told commodity price reporting agency SP Global Platts.
"We are doing already a significant amount of biofuels," Dieleman was quoted as saying.
"We are actually both a user and a producer of biofuels [which is why] we went a lot faster than many other people."
The 30,000-35,000 mt of marine biofuels Cargill has supplied went to its operated fleet of around 570 ships and external customers across various shipping segments.
The waste-based fuels were supplied at ports including Singapore, where the B24 grade with a biofuel blending ratio of 24% was bunkered, and Rotterdam and Amsterdam, where B30 was the common type.
"I would be surprised if we are going to be much less than 50,000 mt this calendar year," Dieleman said in reference to the accumulated volume of the bio-bunkering program.
Cargill's bunker agent Pure Marine Fuels has sourced the biofuels with supplies from Cargill's own plant in Ghent that can produce 400,000 mt/year of fatty acid methyl esters and external producers.
Looking ahead, Pure Marine will aim to facilitate supplies of other green marine fuels -- such as methanol -- whose availability is limited, according to Dieleman.
