Tokyo Stock Exchange -listed shipping major NYK Line (JPX TYO: NYK) has announced several green shipping initiatives.
New fuel test engine
NYK has started operations on a test engine facility in Chiba Prefecture (to the east of Tokyo) to evaluate the safety of new marine fuels. The facility will help test and analyse new marine fuels, which, in addition to trial operations would otherwise take about two years to complete.
Using NYK’s own test engine will however allow the company to conduct stress tests, eliminate the need for trial operations and will help shorten the testing period and reduce the cost of testing. The company believes that the review period can be cut from two years to three months.
“Utilizing the engine operation and fuel-oil analysis technologies of NYK Group companies Boltech Co. Ltd. and Nippon Yuka Kogyo Co. Ltd. allows NYK to verify the potential of various new marine fuels and accelerate their practical application and commercialization,” the company said in a statement.
Pilot hydrogen rubber tyred gantry crane project, Tokyo
NKY Group, along with the Port and Harbour Group of the Tokyo city government, have begun a trial operation of a hydrogen-powered rubber tyred gantry crane. A rubber tyred gantry crane is used to shift containers around in a container yard and it has rubber tyres (hence the name) and does not run on rails. Power will be supplied by installed hydrogen fuel cells and the system is operating a the Oi Container Terminal. The participants hope to promote the use of hydrogen in cargo handling machinery and intend to collect and analyse data, identify any issues (and countermeasures), then disseminate the results of the project in due course.
Hydrogen is the simplest and purest element and its combustion principally results in production of heat and H2O – that’s water to you and me.
Hydrogen is transported by a trailer from a hydrogen production plant in to the Chiba Prefecture to the terminal, where it is pressurized at a local supply unit, and then filled into the hydrogen tanks inside the rubber tyred gantry crane.
The project is planned to run until the end of March 2025.
Design concept for an eco-friendly, methanol-powered, very large crude oil carrier
A group of four companies made a mid-October announcement of the formation of a consortium to jointly research and develop environmentally friendly Very Large Crude Carriers. The “Malaccamax” sized tankers will be dual-fuelled with methanol and heavy fuel oil. The vessel design calls for a full length of 339.5 metres, a beam of 60 metres, a full load draught of 21m, and a full load deadweight of 309,400 tonnes.
Methanol (CH3OH) can be manufactured by industrial processes. Water can be split to produce hydrogen and oxygen, which can then be added in the appropriate ratio to carbon, which then creates methanol. Provided that renewable and sustainable power and feedstocks (water, biologically sourced carbon) are used, then the combustion of methanol does not create an additional carbon dioxide burden as the C02 is merely returned to the atmosphere from whence it came.
The design also allows for two interesting energy saving devices to be installed. The first is a shaft generator, which (in very simple terms) is an electrical generator that is connect to the main shaft that links the propellor to the engine. The engine causes the shaft to spin (so that the propellor can spin) and the shaft generator is connected to the shaft. As the shaft spins, it causes rotation of strong permanent magnets inside coils of metal. The spinning magnets induce the flow of electricity which then typically is used to supply power to the ship’s electrical grid. The second energy saving device that can be installed is a “rotor sail”, which is a tall spinning cylinder. Objects spinning in the air generate the “Magnus Force“. The spinning cylinder pulls air around itself causing a low pressure zone; this force can be exploited to produced forward propulsion by optimal installation of the cylinder.
