Innovative Mode of Cooperation to Solve the Dilemma of the Inland River Ship LNG Industry

Wu Xiuxia

This year has witnessed good news of “gasification on the Yangtze River”: on July 5, the local revision work program review meeting of“Code for Design of LNG Filling Terminal in the Inland River”(for trial implementation) , and the industry standard review meeting of“Technical Requirements for Filling of LNG Fuel Tank on Port Ship”were held in Beijing for local revision and editing of the “Design Code for LNG Terminal” and the “Code for Design of LNG Filling Terminal in the Inland River”; on July 8, the Ministry of Transport drafted the“Requirements for Safe Transport of LNG Portable Container Carried by the Whole Ship (draft for soliciting public comments)” to guarantee the safety of the ship-carried LNG portable container, mitigate the supply and demand of natural gas and guarantee the natural gas production, supply and marketing system construction. At the same time, the Yangtze River Shipping Administration under the Ministry of Transport issued a circular stating that, as of June 1, the Three Gorges Navigation Administration started to accept the lockage declaration of LNG-powered ship, and the LNG-powered ship will take precedence over the same type of ship in lockage. Can the good news be a new power for the water transport industry to use LNG? What's the future of LNG application in the water transport industry? How to solve the problem of LNG filling station?The reporter interviewed some industry specialists.

Strengthening Policy Guide, Accelerating Facility Layout

At present, the trend of global emission reduction and low carbon has pushed the shipping industry into the teeth of the storm. Shipping industries all over the world have been exploring alternative energy sources. LNG, as a clean low carbon energy, can obviously win the lead in energy substitution,and usher in new opportunities for the application and development of LNG fuel power under the situation of meeting the requirements of international conventions and domestic standards.

In 2019, the favorable policy of LNG industry for inland waterway ships has been gradually coming out. The local revision work program review meeting of “Code for Design of LNG Filling Terminal in the Inland River” (for trial implementation), and the industry standard review meeting of “Technical Requirements for Filling of LNG Fuel Tank on Port Ship” discussed technical problems of injecting LNG fuel into LNG-powered ships in domestic coastal ports and the design of inland river LNG filling terminal. Industry insiders said that partial revision and editing of the“Design Code for LNG Terminal”and the “Code for Design of LNG Filling Terminal in the Inland River”,and the continuous improvement of the specifications will make breakthrough in the application of LNG in the water transport industry and inject new power in the sluggish inland river ship LNG market. In addition, on January 30 this year, the Anhui Provincial Development and Reform Commission approved the Wuhu Yangtze inland river receiving station (transshipment) project. In February this year, the Department of Transport of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region issued the Work Plan for the Promotion and Application of Liquefied Natural Gas Filling Station for Ships in Xijiang River, Guangxi. It plans to start the construction of one waterborne LNG filling station each in Nanning Port and Guigang Port by the end of 2020. On May 10, Hunan Provincial Development and Reform Commission issued the Approval of Yueyang LNG Receiving Station(Reserve Center) Project (Phase I),approving the construction of Yueyang LNG Receiving Station (Reserve Center) Project, which is the second approved inland river LNG receiving station in China.

At the same time, suppliers and oil and gas enterprises in the industrial chain are also accelerating the layout of LNG filling stations and related supporting facilities. In April this year, CNOOC Gas & Power Group, a subsidiary of CNOOC, together with seven domestic enterprises, established a strategic alliance to build a green shipping alliance for the Yangtze LNG gasification project, aimed at promoting the efficient use of LNG clean energy in the Yangtze River Basin and helping to build green shipping. A principal of CNOOC expressed the hope that by giving full play to the resource advantages and receiving station advantages of CNOOC, the alliance parties will efficiently build the LNG cascade transport and filling system in the Yangtze River Basin, finally realize coordinated development of the whole industrial chain, including joint procurement of LNG resources,anchorage lightering, river transport,ship LNG filling, river and sea transport direct to LNG receiving stations along the Yangtze River, cultivate a healthy and sustainable LNG ship filling and transport market, and form a mutually beneficial and win-win new business format with competitive advantages.

As LNG has good economic and environmental benefits, the adoption of LNG will be the biggest breakthrough to get rid of the dependence of traditional marine fuel. Prior to this, the 13th Five-Year Plan for National LNG Development puts forward active support for the development of coastal LNG-fueled transport ships and the construction of more than 200 marine filling stations. The 13th Five-Year Plan of Energy Saving and Environmental Protection of the Ministry of Transport puts forward the development goal of increasing the proportion of LNG by 200% in the energy consumption of inland river transport ships by 2020 on the basis of 2015. The total annual emissions of sulfur oxides, nitrogen oxides and particulate matters from ships in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta and other regions will decline by 65%, 20% and 30%, respectively, from 2015. It can be seen that the end of the 13th Five-Year Plan will be an important time node for the completion of emission targets and development goals. It is expected that relevant departments will issue relevant safeguards and incentives to ensure the smooth completion of the established targets, which will bring new impetus to the application of LNG in the water transport industry.

Constantly Exploring Innovation and Promoting Construction of Filling Stations

Since the Ministry of Transport began to take the lead in organizing the pilot demonstration project construction in 2014, a total of 24 inland waterway LNG pilot demonstration projects have been implemented in China,covering Shanghai, Jiangsu, Anhui,Hubei, Jiangxi, Hunan, Chongqing and Guangxi along the Yangtze and Xijiang rivers. Some projects have played a role in promoting technological progress and forming industry standards, but not many projects have really been implemented and operated, and the operating projects are basically in a state of loss. According to relevant industry sources, difficulties in the application of LNG in the water transport industry are mainly in the lack of detailed supporting policies and technical specifications in the layout planning of LNG filling stations,relevant specifications and standards of the industry are not perfect with lack of stable policy expectations, which restrict the formation of the initial market scale.

Taking Jiangsu Province as an example, Jiangsu Province, as the most remarkable area to popularize LNG ship application, has a lot of experience to draw lessons from.Moreover, Jiangsu Province has issued relevant documents, clearly stipulating the examination and approval process and departmental ownership of LNG filling station construction, which has substantially promoted the construction efficiency. In addition, Jiangsu Province also gives priority to LNG-fueled ships in the northern Jiangsu section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal for lockage,they enjoy the “privilege” of berthing and unloading, which can increase the navigation efficiency of ships by 50%,a very attractive policy for shipowners.At present, inland river LNG filling stations in Jiangsu Province are mainly shore-based, but some planned stations are located in water areas with limited conditions and without the conditions for the construction of a shore-based filling station. This brings difficulties to the operation supplies of LNG ships.

On June 28 this year, construction of the first LNG filling pontoon of Jiangsu Hongyun Green Energy Co Ltd in the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal kicked off in Zhenjiang City. The ship has a gross tonnage of 584 tons, an overall length of 53.2 meters and a molded breadth of 12 meters. It is provided with a 100 cubic meter gas storage tank,equipped with domestic sewage, oil wastewater and other treatment devices,as well as automatic dry powder fire extinguishers, water spray projector systems and foam fire extinguishing systems to ensure the fire safety of the whole ship. This is one of the filling and supply modes of LNG ship, and it is also a new attempt of inland river LNG filling mode. As the forerunner of LNG promotion and application in the waterborne transport industry, Jiangsu Hongyun Green Energy Company has performed years’ studies, and in line with water area conditions, based on the successful experience of construction of LNG filling pontoon in the Yangtze River, has been exploring building LNG filling pontoon in the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal and trunk channels of the province, improving the supply mode of the inland LNG filling, speeding up the layout of the inland river LNG filling network in Jiangsu Province,and creating conditions for large-scale application of the LNG-fueled ships.

Since the development of LNG in the water transport industry, it has gone through nearly 10 years. Jiangsu Hongyun Green Energy Company has undertaken the tasks of “Jiangsu Inland Waterway Ship Application LNG Clean Energy Demonstration Project”, the Ministry of Transport“Beijing-Hangzhou Canal Jiangsu Section Water Transport Application LNG Comprehensive Demonstration Area” new and reconstruction of LNG-fueled ships, LNG filling station construction and so on. It has taken the lead in exploring the way to realize the application of LNG in the water transport industry, and has basically mastered the application technology of the new LNG-fueled ship. Especially, the technology of “Overall Updating of Existing Ship Power System” is applied to address the problems such as not up to standard discharge of pollutants from the existing ships, and has found the best way to save energy and reduce emissions in the water transport industry, thus well acclaimed among domestic and foreign peers. The company first carried out the research on the standardization construction of the LNG filling station,and was highly recognized by the relevant departments. Up to now, the company has newly reconstructed and put into operation 92 vessels in Jiangsu Province, and built 8 onshore base type LNG filling stations in Jiangsu inland rivers, with three of them put into trial operation.

“Construction of the first LNG filling pontoon in the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal is another new breakthrough in the demonstration project. It also shows the company's determination and courage to continuously try to apply methods and technologies in the application of LNG in the water transport industry and to explore new ideas for the development of the project.” Hong Haizhi, chairman of Jiangsu Hongyun Green Energy Company, said his company will give full play to the role of “demonstration”and “starting off before the others” of the demonstration enterprise, promote the early formation of the inland river LNG filling network layout, and solve the LNG-fueled ship supply problem.

Removing Obstacles to Development and Realizing Large-Scale Application

The application of LNG fuel in waterway transport has got increasing acceptance in the industry, thanks to the guide of previous demonstration projects including the inland river LNG-fueled transport ship. However,as the domestic LNG fuel power application started in 2009, and the development got off late, although the development was achieved with the support of a series of strong policies in China, many obstacles were also encountered in the popularization and application, which seriously restricted the large-scale development of LNG-fueled ships. In addition to the abovementioned problems of the construction of the LNG filling station, high operating cost, incomplete technical specifications, and the lack of stability of the LNG price among other factors also affect the development of the LNG filling station.

High operating costs have become the first “stumbling block”, putting many shipowners and suppliers who have built and revamped LNG-fueled ships in a dilemma and preventing the LNG-fueled ship market from breaking out the years-long siege.The reporter learned that most of the new and renovated LNG-fueled ships in China were built and rebuilt in 2014-2015. during this period, due to imperfect laws and regulations,lagging infrastructure and supply of equipment, as well as the moderate level of design and technology, the construction and reconstruction costs were high, which failed to highlight the economic advantages. Secondly, the lag of supporting infrastructure, the insufficient number and unreasonable distribution of filling stations have seriously affected the development of LNG-fueled ships. At present,the construction of LNG filling terminals is lack of planning basis, the construction site selection is difficult,the examination and approval basis and requirements are not perfect, and the examination and approval of LNG filling terminal construction is difficult,resulting in inability of the normal operation of some completed filling stations due to policy constraints.In addition, the relevant technical specifications of LNG power applied in ships are not perfect, and it is inevitable that there will be blind areas or inconsistent understanding of laws and regulations in ship construction and alteration, resulting in occasional happening of irregular ship design and equipment installation, which increases the cost of ship construction and affects the completion time of construction.

At the same time, various power LNG single fuel and LNG diesel dual fuel marine natural gas engines have been developed in China, and great progress has been made in the design and manufacture of supporting products such as storage tanks, control systems and so on. However, due to immature technology, LNG engine, safety alarm system and central control system(ECU) often fail in the operation process of the first batch of LNG-fueled ships for pilot modification. In view of this, a source of Jiangsu Modern Shipbuilding Technology Co., Ltd suggests strengthening the research and development of technology application,giving full play to the R&D advantages of various relevant enterprises,scientific research institutions and colleges and universities, stepping up basic research of the LNG-fueled ship system and research and development of related products,focusing on strengthening the accurate design of engine air-fuel ratio control,LNG power safety alarm system and central control system and other key equipment, and breaking through the technical difficulties of LNG power application.

Under the background of continuous escalation of environmental protection requirements and few choices of marine clean energy, LNG is still a realistic choice for fuel upgrading of inland waterway shipping in China. Relevant experts in the industry suggest creating development model, promoting LNG-fueled ship R&D units, equipment manufacturers,financial institutions, shipowners, port enterprises and energy enterprises to unite and cooperate, build a support chain, reduce R&D and operating costs, form a large-scale industrial chain of LNG power application, jointly promote the development of LNG ship and its filling industry, and make due contributions to the construction of green shipping.