Scrubber Installs to Peak at 6,000: Platts

by Ship & Bunker News Team
Friday November 30, 2018

The total number of scrubber installations will peak at 6,000, Platts Analytics predicts.

Declining economic incentives, such as a narrowing of the HSFO and VSLFO spread, will limit the long term attraction of using the technology as a way to comply with IMO2020.

With DNV GL last month indicating there are now 1,850 vessels with scrubbers or orders to have units fitted, Platts Analytics forecasts 2,200 vessels will be operating with the technology come the January 1, 2020 start date of the new global 0.50% sulfur cap.

And speaking at the Platts Mediterranean Bunker Fuel Conference in Athens Thursday, Chris Midgley, global director of Platts Analytics, said that number could hit 3,000 by the end of 2020.

Those numbers are largely inline with other respected voices on the matter, notably Robin Meech of Marine and Energy Consulting Limited who earlier this year predicted  2,010 vessels would feature the tech at the start of 2020 and 3,228 by the end of the year, for an average of 2,620 vessels with scrubbers in operation during 2020.

Of course, as Ship & Bunker analysis has already highlighted, it remains unclear how the number of scrubbers will translate into HSFO demand, a dynamic no doubt complicated by Friday's announcement by the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) it will ban open-loop scrubber operation in its waters from January 1, 2020.

Ship & Bunker News Team
To contact the editor responsible for this story email us at editor@shipandbunker.com