ZERO CARBON BASE LOAD POWER FOR LARGE SHIPS

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Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK
Innovate UK

£1,413,120

Aug. 31, 2021

March 31, 2022

The cruise industry is a major industry and success story for the UK, with more than 2 million passengers embarking and disembarking through the Port of Southampton alone. This traffic supports more than 14000 jobs in the Solent region and contributes over £1.3 billion to the UK economy. However, when vessels are in port, cruise ships continue to use diesel fuel to generate electricity for onboard systems such as heating, ventilation, waste processing and air-conditioning. This "base" or "hotel load" runs continuously at sea and in port and is very large -- about 10 MW -- enough to power about 10000 UK homes. Producing this electricity using diesel generators leads to the emission of CO2 and, of direct concern to the populations of port cities, various pollutants such as Nitrous Oxides (NOx), Particulate Matter (PM) and noise.

This project will investigate the feasibility of innovative solid oxide fuel cell technology and batteries to replace the use of diesel generators for provision of this continuous 'base-load' of energy. The operation of the vessel at sea will benefit from reduced emissions, as well as eliminating these harmful pollutants during port calls. When the fuel cell technology is combined with batteries for levelling demand, a smart energy management system can be deployed to optimise energy use. Fuel cells such as the solid oxide fuel cells proposed here run at high temperatures, and this heat can be harnessed to run other systems on ships. This project will demonstrate in detail the feasibility of deploying such fuel cell systems, powered by liquefied natural gas in the short term and transitioning to use of green Hydrogen in the longer term. Fuelled by liquefied natural gas the system could eliminate NOx and PM and reduce CO2 emissions by half, taking advantage of the greater efficiency of fuel cells compared to combustion of natural gas. Operation with Hydrogen as a fuel will eliminate the CO2 emissions along with NOx and PM. This innovative application of fuel cell technology to large cruise ships will, for the first time, demonstrate a safe and feasible transition pathway for the shipping industry to reach net-Zero emissions in a manner aligned with the UK Clean Maritime Plan and legally binding national and international global climate change targets.