Exhaust emissions reduction and fuel consumption from the LNG energy system depending on the ship operating modes

Abstract

In today’s environment of increasing pressure to reduce fuel consumption and emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx), the LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) transportation industry is growing in size and influence. In this context, further efforts are needed to improve the energy efficiency of LNG marine energy power plant. The LNG vessels and their equipment considered in this study have different power consumption requirements depending on the vessel’s mode of operation (loading/unloading, maneuvering, anchoring, at sea, etc.). For each ship mode, where the power plant requirements are the same, the specific fuel consumption (SFOC) and exhaust emissions, NOx and CO2, are compared with a different number of engines in the network to find the optimal number of engines in the network, considering both the safety aspect and the port requirements. An analysis was performed showing the efficiency of the on-board power management system (PMS) in terms of manual load sharing between engines. A comprehensive analysis of the data and its comparison led to the conclusion that the manual distribution of power among the engines is the slightly better solution. The obtained results show that further analysis of the number of engines for a given load with minimum fuel consumption and CO2 and NOx emissions is required.