Wartsila Equips Two Shuttle Tankers

Finnish engineering firm Wartsila has won a contract to fit two new 124,000 metric ton tankers with an LNG fuel gas supply system and volatile organic compounds (VOC) recovery system it said June 8, claiming this would lower the vessels' emissions of CO₂-equivalents by about a third while cutting fuel costs.

The ships have been ordered by Knutsen NYK Offshore Tankers and will be built at the Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine yard in Korea, for service in the North Sea oilfields. 

Wartsila's technology prevents noxious VOCs, including methane, from being emitted to the atmosphere, and the gas is instead fed to the VOC recovery module, where it is liquefied by compression and condensation and mixed with LNG as fuel for the engines. 

Wartsila said that the vessels will be able to lower their emissions of CO₂ equivalents by 30% to 35%, or a minimum of 30,000 mt/year, compared with conventional oil-fuelled shuttle tankers, while enabling the combustion of normally vented VOCs and so lowering fuel costs. 

These two new ships will reflect this change, thanks largely to Wartsila’s advanced technology. They will truly represent the new generation of shuttle tankers, with vastly reduced emissions and lower fuel costs,” says Jarle Ostenstad, New Building Director, Knutsen OAS.

Knutsen said the tankers "represent the new generation of shuttle tankers, with vastly reduced emissions and lower fuel costs."