DNV Maritime recently brought together industry experts to share up-to-date insights into alternative and emerging fuels, with GoodFuels and UECC among the participants.
In addition to discussing availability, latest insights, regulatory and financial implications, the discussions highlighted the need for collaboration to enable the decarbonisation of global shipping.
As an example of these collaborations, GoodFuels’ Bernard van Haeringen and Daniel Gent, who is the Energy and Sustainability Manager at ro-ro shipping operator UECC took part. van Haeringenan was invited as a representative from the sustainable biofuels sector while Gent shared his take on being an early biofuel adopter from a shipowner’s perspective.
Van Haeringen said: “We are honoured to contribute to valuable knowledge-sharing initiatives like these and are grateful to DNV for the opportunity. It’s exciting to be able to share our experiences alongside a long-time client like UECC, with whom we kickstarted biofuel trials in 2020. We have seen the leading car carrier company quickly becoming a biofuel frontrunner over the past few years by combining an innovative mindset with an appetite for experimentation. One of the main reasons to step into this is that we see the legislation coming down the line.”
As legislation on regulating emissions is on the horizon, the value of gaining experience with alternative fuels like sustainable biofuels is becoming ever more apparent. According to GoodFuels, one of the main advantages of biofuels is that they drop into existing engines without having to modify the existing fuel infrastructure. However, working with biofuels does require certain levels of technical, commercial, and regulatory know-how.
