NYK has announced that the tugboat Sakigake has been completed, and will enter three months of commercial trials in Yokohama harbor and Tokyo Bay. Thanks to retrofits, Japan’s first LNG-fueled vessel has now become Japan’s first ammonia-fueled vessel.
A new Scandinavian collaboration aims to transform Risavika and the wider Stavanger region as a bunkering hub for ammonia fuel, supplied by Iverson eFuels’ hydro-ammonia production project in Sauda.
The FuelEU Maritime Regulation is set to launch on August 31, requiring companies to submit monitoring plans ahead of its full implementation in January 2025. With modest initial targets and sophisticated compliance mechanisms like banking, borrowing, and pooling, the scheme offers flexibility while driving innovation in sustainable maritime technologies. The scheme also offers extra incentives for companies to proactively embrace Renewable Fuels of Non-Biological Origin (RFNBOs), before mandates enter into force next decade.
Two potential consortia have been selected to develop and operate an ammonia power generation and bunkering pilot on Jurong Island, Singapore. Either Keppel Infrastructure or Sembcorp-SLNG will be selected to lead the project, which will feature a 60 MW, direct ammonia-fed gas turbine, linked to a 100,000 ton ammonia bunkering facility.
Moored in Yokohama Port, the A-Tug was refueled from a shoreside tanker truck with ammonia earlier this month. The ammonia for the demonstration was supplied by Resonac Corporation, and ammonia fuel is to be supplied by JERA once the vessel is delivered for commercial operations in the coming months.
The Norwegian Maritime Authority has approved the ammonia fuel system design to be deployed onboard the platform supply vessel Viking Energy. The system will directly feed 2 MW of solid oxide fuel cells, allowing for long-range, high power sailing of up to 3,000 hours per year.
More than $37 billion will be invested across the initial stages of hydrogen and ammonia production projects, ranging in location from the Gulf of Suez to west of the Nile Delta. A series of agreements concerning existing and newly-announced projects were signed at the recent Egypt-EU Investment Conference.
At last month’s MariNH3 conference in Nottingham, a series of keynotes laid out the opportunities and challenges ahead for marine ammonia fuel. Onboard ammonia cracking technologies are moving through testing phases and closer to commercialisation, vessel designers are working through the unique challenges of carrying ammonia fuel onboard, and emissions mitigation technology (in combination with adherence to existing Tier 3 standards) will be necessary to ensure that ammonia-powered vessels are more environmentally-friendly than conventional counterparts.
Wärtsilä Gas Solutions will now provide the ammonia fuel supply and cargo handling systems for all six of EXMAR’s dual-fuel vessels being built in South Korea. Meanwhile, Amogy and Mitsubishi have completed concept designs for two onboard systems: a powertrain combining ammonia cracking and hydrogen fuel cell for ships, and a hydrogen supply facility to provide hydrogen as pilot fuel to an ammonia-fueled engine.
Trafigura reports its first successful ship-to-ship transfer of ammonia has taken place in the Straits of Gibraltar. Around 6,000 tons of ammonia being shipped from CF Industries’ Donaldsonville complex in Louisiana was transferred between gas carriers, before being delivered to Fertiberia in Spain for the production of feritliser.