De-Carbonising The Shipping Industry, An Impossible Challenge? | Lenovo | BBC StoryWorks

Is de-carbonising the shipping industry an impossible challenge? 🚢
Learn how Seabound is developing onboard carbon capture technology to create a smarter, greener way.
#Ad paid and presented by Lenovo and Intel Corporation

Want to see more like this? Check out our sustainability playlist here:

Enjoying our content? Don't miss a thing, subscribe here:

#BBCStoryWorks #Lenovo #DecarbonisingShipping #Sustainability #Technology

[nickcook]

Note - comment also posted on Linkedin

A neat and simple idea, at least as far as the ship based part of the solution is concerned, but I very much doubt whether it is going to scale.

Just did the calcs for a very large container ship traveling from Shanghai China to Tilbury UK, running on heavy fuel oil (HFO), and it's probably going to require nearly 20% (over 2000x40ft) of its containers to be used for 100% carbon capture using this method. The situation is likely to be worse with reducing ship sizes.

Note: 1t HFO produces about 7.2t of CaCO3!

Furthermore, you need to produce the calcium oxide in the first place. This is going to require a lot of limestone/calcium carbonate (CaCO3), a heck of a lot of energy plus carbon capture for the CO2 released from the limestone, even if the energy source is renewable.

This obviously simplifies, technically, the on-ship process but I suspect the extra complexity and costs are likely to significantly more than just putting the carbon capture directly on ships. With new build, probably best to start with a powertrain specifically designed to enable easier carbon capture.

I very much doubt whether the business case will work at commercial scale without huge subsidies from the taxpayer, although I could be wrong.