Emissions of maritime transport: a European reference system

Air pollution and tourism growth relationship: exploring regional dynamics in five European countries through an EKC model

The present study intends to explore the relationship between tourism growth and air pollution at a regional level for five important tourism European destinations: France, Spain, Greece, Portugal, and Italy. Most of the studies found in the literature examine this relationship on a national scale and focus only on the CO2 pollutant, which is a greenhouse gas but not a critical pollutant in terms of air quality and human exposure. This research focuses on a regional basis (NUTS 2 classification) and takes into account the main critical pollutants in terms of urban air pollution (namely: NOx, PM10, and PM2.5), and considers 10 years, from 2009 until 2018. This work aims to investigate evidence of a tourism-induced Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) for the countries through the construction of five panels, one for each country, including different variables: the Gross Domestic Product, the energy consumption, and the number of nights spent at tourist accommodation establishments from both domestic and foreign tourists. The Levin-Lin-Chu unit root test proves the variables to be stationary, while the Pedroni cointegration test shows that they are integrated. The pooled OLS estimator is employed throughout the countries to check the relationship among the variables. Results reveal that the tourism-induced EKC hypothesis is not validated for any of the countries. The findings also show that in Portugal, Italy, and Greece, there is a negative relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution, while mixed evidence is found for France and Spain. Moreover, differences in the impacts of international and domestic tourists on air pollution are found: foreign tourists negatively impact emissions, while domestic ones increase them. This result is clear for Spain, Greece, and Italy. The Granger panel causality test is then conducted to see the causality among the variables.

Recent advances and perspectives towards emission inventories of mobile sources: Compilation approaches, data acquisition methods, and case studies

In recent years, great efforts have been devoted to reducing emissions from mobile sources with the dramatic growth of motor vehicle and nonroad mobile source populations. Compilation of a mobile source emission inventory is conducive to the analysis of pollution emission characteristics and the formulation of emission reduction policies. This study summarizes the latest compilation approaches and data acquisition methods for mobile source emission inventories. For motor vehicles, a high-resolution emission inventory can be developed based on a bottom-up approach with a refined traffic flow model and real-world speed-coupled emission factors. The top-down approach has advantages when dealing with macroscale vehicle emission estimation without substantial traffic flow infrastructure. For nonroad mobile sources, nonroad machinery, inland river ships, locomotives, and civil aviation aircraft, a top-down approach based on fuel consumption or power is adopted. For ocean-going ships, a bottom-up approach based on automatic identification system (AIS) data is adopted. Three typical cases are studied, including emission reduction potential, a cost-benefit model, and marine shipping emission control. Outlooks and suggestions are given on future research directions for emission inventories for mobile sources: building localized emission models and factor databases, improving the dynamic updating capability of emission inventories, establishing a database of emission factors of unconventional pollutants and greenhouse gas from mobile sources, and establishing an urban high temporal-spatial resolution volatile organic compound (VOC) evaporation emission inventory.

Methodology to Assess the Technoeconomic Impacts of the EU Fit for 55 Legislation Package in Relation to Shipping

The recent inclusion of shipping in the Fit for 55 legislation package will have large knock-on effects on the industry and consequently on end consumers. The present paper presents an innovative top-down methodology, the MSF455 model, which estimates the new vessel Operational Expenditure (OPEX) as per the provisions of the Fit for 55 package and various scenarios based on carbon tax, penalty allowances, maritime fuel tax and effect. The methodology is presented and tested against six scenarios that are based on Det Norske Veritas’s (DNV) fuel maritime projections. The model illustrates that the distinction between intra-EU and extra-EU penalty allowance creates a large disparity and thus reduction in the competitiveness of goods (produced and transported).

Estimation of atmospheric emissions from maritime activity in the Veracruz port, Mexico

The port of Veracruz is one of the most important ports in Mexico and is currently in the process of a major expansion. The new port area, "Bahía Norte", will be three times larger than the current port, "Bahía Sur". Atmospheric emissions from the Veracruz port system, specifically from the engines of ships undergoing maneuvering and hotelling operations, were determined on a daily basis from 2018 to 2019 for sulfur dioxide (SO₂), nitrogen oxides (NO_x), carbon monoxide (CO), non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOC), particles (PM), particles smaller than 10 micrometers (PM₁₀), particles smaller than 2.5 micrometers (PM_2.5) and carbon dioxide (CO₂). A bottom-up method was used to estimate the atmospheric emissions, based on official data from the European Environment Agency. The method utilizes on technical information on the type of ship, the power of the main engine (ME) and auxiliary engine (AE), load factor, specific fuel consumption, and spent time in the maneuvering and hotelling phases. The highest atmospheric emissions occurred in the hotelling phase. For the "Bahía Sur" emissions (Mg/year) were 328.6, 993.3, 122.3, 30.6, 22.9, 19.1, 18.5 and 52,723.4 for SO₂, NO_x, CO, NMVOC, PM, PM₁₀, PM_2.5 and CO₂, respectively. For "Bahía Norte" the corresponding emissions were 43.9, 132.7, 16.3, 4.1, 3.1, 2.5, 2.3 and 7,040.9, also in the hotelling phase. The average combined of the atmospheric emissions from maneuvering and hotelling phases (Mg/year) were 1.18, 3.49, 0.44, 0.13, 0.09, 0.08, 0.07, and 189.23 for SO₂, NO_x, CO, NMVOC, PM, PM₁₀, PM_2.5 and CO₂, respectively. During the 2018-2019 period of the study the "Bahía Sur" contributed ~87% and the "Bahía Norte" ~13% of the atmospheric emissions.Implications: The atmospheric emissions reported in this study can be used for the simulation of air quality considering environmental or photochemical pollution models, since atmospheric emissions are reported on a daily basis and compliance with air quality can be monitored considering the reference-concentration established by the Official Mexican Standards in order to propose prevention, minimization and control measures. In addition, the analysis of the information that was carried out in this study may be applied to other port systems in Mexico that are located on the Pacific coast and the Gulf-Caribbean.

An Energy Consumption Approach to Estimate Air Emission Reductions in Container Shipping

Container shipping is the largest producer of emissions within the maritime shipping industry. Hence, measures have been designed and implemented to reduce ship emission levels. IMO’s MARPOL Annex VI, with its future plan of applying Tier III requirements, the Energy Efficiency Design Index for new ships, and the Ship Energy Efficiency Management Plan for all ships. To assist policy formulation and follow-up, this study applies an energy consumption approach to estimate container ship emissions. The volumes of sulphur oxide (SOx), nitrous oxide (NOx), particulate matter (PM), and carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted from container ships are estimated using 2018 datasets on container shipping and average vessel speed records generated via AIS. Furthermore, the estimated reductions in SOx, NOx, PM, and CO2 are mapped for 2020. The empirical analysis demonstrates that the energy consumption approach is a valuable method to estimate ongoing emission reductions on a continuous basis and to fill data gaps where needed, as the latest worldwide container shipping emissions records date back to 2015. The presented analysis supports early-stage detection of environmental impacts in container shipping and helps to determine in which areas the greatest potential for emission reductions can be found.

Improving Liquefied Natural Gas Bunkering in Korea through the Chinese and Japanese Experiences

The International Maritime Organization has strengthened global environmental regulations related to sulfur and nitrogen oxides contained in ship fuel oil since the beginning of 2020. One strategy to comply with the regulations is to fuel ships with liquefied natural gas (LNG) rather than with traditional heavy fuel oil. China and Japan are both developing a business structure for the bunkering of LNG through public–private partnerships to expand their leadership in the field in Northeast Asia and secure a competitive advantage. Compared to China and Japan, Korea has relatively inadequate laws, policy support, and best practices for safe and efficient LNG bunkering for ships. This article provides a comprehensive overview of the LNG bunkering regulation systems in China and Japan and addresses how these systems can be mirrored by Korea to improve the Korean system. It compares the legislative and normative rules of China and Japan regarding the complex global scenario of maritime transportation. The results show that Korea must revise its guidelines and create the advanced institutional framework required for the LNG bunkering market to support an eco-friendly shipping industry and maintain a competitive edge against China and Japan.

Overall Performance Evaluation of Small Scale LNG Production Processes

The liquefied natural gas (LNG) is considered a viable solution to replace oil-based engines (common in heavy-duty truck and naval industry) reducing the environmental impact in the transport sector. Since liquefaction plants represent energy intensive processes, the best configurations/operation assessment is of primary importance. In this paper, a novel general procedure for the thermodynamic design and optimization, engineering design and off-design evaluation for small-scale LNG production systems is presented. The procedure can be used for the complete design and performance evaluation of plug & play facilities at filling stations for vehicles/boats, with the contemporary benefits of reducing pollutant emission in the city/port area and operating as electrical storage, coupled with renewable generators. Furthermore, the procedure has been applied to a case study (ferry boat operating at the main canal in the port of Ravenna, Italy), evaluating the optimal size for the integrated wind plant by minimizing the electricity introduction into the grid. The obtained results show 78 kW as optimal wind size, allowing the LNG plant to operate 187 h/year in design and 4720 h/year in off-design conditions, with electricity surplus around 33 MWh/year. A prototype will be installed to reduce pollutant emissions and test this technology as a storage option for renewable sources.

Selective Adsorption of Sulfur Dioxide in a Robust Metal-Organic Framework Material

Selective adsorption of SO₂ is realized in a porous metal-organic framework material, and in-depth structural and spectroscopic investigations using X-rays, infrared, and neutrons define the underlying interactions that cause SO₂ to bind more strongly than CO₂ and N₂ .

Air quality impact assessment of at-berth ship emissions: Case-study for the project of a new freight port

This work is intended to assess the impact on local air quality due to atmospheric emissions from port area activities for a new port in project in the Mediterranean Sea. The sources of air pollutants in the harbour area are auxiliary engines used by ships at berth during loading/offloading operations. A fleet activity-based methodology is first applied to evaluate annual pollutant emissions (NO(X), SO(X), PM, CO and VOC) based on vessel traffic data, ships tonnage and in-port hotelling time for loading/offloading operations. The 3-dimensional Calpuff transport and dispersion model is then applied for the subsequent assessment of the ground level spatial distribution of atmospheric pollutants for both long-term and short-term averaging times. Compliance with current air quality standards in the port area is finally evaluated and indications for port operation are provided. Some methodological aspects of the impact assessment procedure, namely those concerning the steps of emission scenario definitions and model simulations set-up at the project stage, are specifically addressed, suggesting a pragmatic approach for similar evaluations for small new ports in project.