- Maersk making greater scrubber investments and plans to raise HSFO consumption
- Currently, it uses 10% HSFO which is likely to increase 150 times to 25%
- This will help them in tackling HSFO VLSFO price differential and manage their fuel expenses
According to a Reuters report, the Danish shipping group A.P. Moller-Maersk plans to raise the proportion of high sulphur fuel oil it consumes from 10% to 25% by the year-end, CEO Soren Skou announced recently
- The world’s largest container shipping firm consumed a total of around 11.80 million tonnes of shipping fuel last year.
- Maersk’s current shipping fuel use comprises of around 10% ultra low sulphur (0.1%) fuel oil, 10% high sulphur fuel oil and the remaining 80% is low sulphur fuel oil.
How will it be done?
A Splash24/7 report further highlighted the matter. The report underlined how during an investor call at last week’s 2019 results briefing, Maersk, previously in the anti-scrubber camp, revealed it is now signed up to a large number of exhaust gas cleaning systems.
Maersk’s current fuel consumption is split with 10% for 0.1% sulphur fuel covering ECA zones, 80% for very low sulphur fuel oil and 10% HFO. The plan, revealed yesterday, is to increase HFO usage to 25% by the end of 2020.
Maersk uses approximately 12m tons of bunker fuel annually so by the end of the year it could be using 3m tons of HFO, depending on scrubber fitting delays at Chinese yards brought about by the coronavirus.
The price differential between HFO and VLSFO has now ducked below $200 per tonne.
Maersk Scrubber Stance Made This Possible?
\Maersk has gradually changed its stance on scrubbers. Initially against them, as the global sulphur cap approached it decided to buy around 30 scrubber kits to trial the technology. It has since committed far more to the devices, as have many of its peers, especially for larger boxships. 2M partner MSC is the liner to have invested most in scrubber kits, buying around 250 units so far.
More than 10% of the world’s containership capacity was fitted with scrubbers by the start of the global sulphur cap on January 1, with analysts at Alphaliner predicting the number could grow to some 1,000 ships – equating to 10m teu – by the end of 2022.
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Source: Reuters
