Next month will see a large LNG fuelled fast ferry entering service across the River Plate as Buquebus takes delivery of their newest 99 metre ferry from the Australian builder Incat. This too is a major development, with a capacity of 1,000 passengers and 130 cars and a service speed of 50 knots on the route between Buenos Aires and Montevideo.

Another significant recent order was contracted by the US operate TOTE for two LNG fuelled 3100 TEU containerships to operate in the Jones Act trade between Florida and Puerto Rico. There are options for three more similar craft, which will be built in San Diego, California, to a South Korean Design.

Is the use of LNG moving from the area of small domestic craft into the realms of large ships and longer passages; from the “concept” to reality? It is of course significant that these ships which have been built and contracted are designed to operate in areas where the constriction of emission regulations grows ever tighter and their owners are anticipating their effects in this fashion. The use of LNG has been long suggested as a possible route to compliance with new emission regulations.

These ships, like the small ferries and supply boats that work around Norway and which pioneered the use of this fuel precisely because of its clean nature, will all be operating between fixed points in regular trades, making the development of an LNG bunkering infrastructure feasible. It is the lack of such an infrastructure which perhaps, more than anything, has inhibited the pace of development of the LNG-fuelled ship, despite the conviction by engine manufacturers and classification societies that it could well be the “fuel of the future”.

Nevertheless, new concept designs continue to emerge from shipyards and others, which explore the possibility of this fuel moving into long-range, deep sea routes. The DNV classification society has now a whole portfolio of LNG fuelled concept vessels, including large tankers and containerships, which it suggests might encourage owners to think along these lines when considering newbuildings.

A collaboration between Lloyd’s Register, COSCO and Golden Union has now produced a concept design for a Kamsarmax bulk carrier, which carries its fuel in a large insulated LNG tank abaft the superstructure. This too is expected to make people think about the possibilities of the installation of dual-fuelled machinery into their newbuildings, and to suggest that, in time, the use of LNG will inevitably spread into the deep sea tramp trades.

Meanwhile, the search for clean alternatives to heavy fuel oil is widening. Stena, concerned about the effect of emission regulations in their North European ferry trades, is now deeply engaged in research around the use of methanol, with sea trials expected soon in auxiliary machinery. The shipping industry, faced with every sort of challenge, has not lost its capacity to innovate.