Vessel Owners Choosing More Fuel Efficient Tonnage for ECA Routes

Ship operators are plotting routes to avoid prolonged exposure in the low sulfur zones

Ship owners are becoming more selective about the fuel efficiency of vessels they choose to send into Emission Control Areas (ECAs) and plotting routes to avoid prolonged exposure in the low sulfur zones - resulting in potentially greater CO2 emissions overall, Lloyd's List Intelligence says.

Lloyd's Maritime Insight Team determined the impact of sulfur emission control areas by examining every ship track over the first nine months of 2014 and the first nine months of this year.

According to Craig Eason, the team "looked particularly to see how often and for how long vessels went into either the North American emission control area, or the North European Emission control areas.

"The published data report also shows the age, size and type of ship going into these areas."

While's Lloyd's found that the actual number of vessels is ECAs had "hardly" changed, the type of vessel being dispatched leaned towards being newer and more efficient.

However, Eason says owners have also said "they have ordered masters to make passage plans that take vessels out of an ECA as quickly as possible, as a way to cut fuel costs,", adding that instead of clinging to the coastline, vessels "may go further out to sea before heading towards the next port of call."

In noting that these longer voyages may increase CO2 emissions, Eason points out that the introduction of a global SOx emission cap will probably reduce the economic impact of the ECAs and thus reduce the incidences of ECA navigation avoidance.

However, this "will create even more price challenges, as bunker supplies will increasingly be low sulfur."

In September it was reported that container carriers are accelerating newbuild orders to beat a January 1, 2016 deadline that will impose stricter nitrogen oxide (NOx) emission requirements on ships travelling in the North American ECA.