Where will the future oil supply come from? It’s one of the questions that tanker owners are looking to answer adequately, as it can provide them with a competitive advantage. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Gibson said that “earlier this month the IEA released its medium-term outlook for the global oil markets, which provides analysis and the forecast of the key issues in demand, supply, refining and oil trade through to 2024. The report portrays a positive outlook for oil demand growth, which is expected to continue to increase ...

Petrofin Research’s latest annual survey of the Hellenic-owned fleet, yielded some very interesting conclusions. It appears that the Greek fleet, although maintaining an overall robust growth, took a small breather last year. It can be argued that the frenetic activity both in newbuildings and S&P transactions could not continue at the same pace. However, we can detect some key points that shaped last year. Petrofin said in its analysis that “the dry bulk market experienced a good year, in terms of both vessel values and incomes. However, as the year ...

Shipowners with scrubber-equipped vessels will need to lock in long-term HSFO supplies, and hedge if needed, amid concerns about consistent availability and quality when the International Maritime Organization’s global sulfur limit rule for marine fuels kicks in from 2020, Adrian Tolson, a bunker industry veteran and senior partner at 2020 Marine Energy, said. The IMO’s global sulfur limit for marine fuels will cap global sulfur content in marine fuels at 0.5% from January 1, 2020, down from 3.5% currently. This applies outside the designated emission control areas where the limit ...

The global 0.50% sulphur cap will enter into force in 2020. Finally, this date is no longer in the far-off future but in less than 365 days. What four options are available for ship owners? The figures are impressive: According to the guidance paper Global Sulphur Cap 2020 published by DNV GL on the topic, more than 70,000 ships worldwide will be affected by this regulation. As a result, if they have not done so already, ship owners will need to weigh up their options in the very near future ...

While the U.S. and China are negotiating a trade deal, the world’s biggest container shipping company is watching out for other problems between major economies. One risk to import and export activity include the United States’ outstanding trade negotiations with the European Union. Another is the possibility of changes in the relationship between Europe and China, Soren Skou, chief executive of A.P. Moller-Maersk, said on Sunday. “First of all, it’s pretty clear that the U.S. administration and EU have an outstanding discussion. It was kind of kicked to a corner ...

German container group Hapag-Lloyd is on course to achieve better earnings and further reduce debts this year as it cuts costs and benefits from merger savings in an improving shipping industry, it said. “We see fairly stable demand growth and the fundamentals are favourable,” Chief Executive Rolf Habben Jansen said on a call with analysts on Friday. “This will enable us to deliver on our goals for 2019,” he added. The upbeat tone was in line with that of French container shipping group CMA CGM, which booked record revenue in ...

China’s container transport for export purposes slightly contracted for the week ending Friday, according to the Shanghai Shipping Exchange. The average China Containerized Freight Index (CCFI) stood at 813.37, down 0.9 percent from a week earlier, the exchange said. The sub-index for West/East Africa route saw the strongest rally of 9.5 percent week on week, while that for the Persian Gulf/Red Sea route led the fall by dropping 3.9 percent. The CCFI tracks spot and contractual freight rates from Chinese container ports for 12 shipping routes across the globe, based ...

Venezuelan state-owned PDVSA is seeking to extend the contracts of three petroleum tankers, and hire five additional tankers, to compensate for the loss of vessels due to US sanctions, according to sources and PDVSA reports. “PDVSA requires as soon as possible three vessels for LPG, two Aframaxes, two Panamaxes and one long-range [LR1] vessel,” an official of PDV Marina, a PDVSA shipping company, told S&P Global Platts on condition of anonymity. While PDVSA is not able to work with some shipowners because of sanctions, “we will continue working with those ...

The international shipping industry is wrestling with a spate of fires aboard vessels at sea in recent months that have crippled several big cargo ships, killed a number of seafarers and cost companies and their customers hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. The latest blaze came on March 10, when a nearly 31,000-ton combined container and automobile carrier caught fire in the Bay of Biscay off the eastern coast of France, leading to the rescue of 27 crew members by a British Navy frigate. The Grimaldi Lines-operated Grande America ...

MOST (Mobile Sensory Technologies Sweden AB) a leading company within ‘Real time monitoring’ and Absortech Group a leading company within moisture prevention in shipping containers has entered into a partnership. MOST´s superior real time monitoring solution give customers insight into what happens to the cargo while in transit. The customer gets alerts via email or SMS when there is a deviation from the preferred levels on temperature, humidity and shock. The solution also detects intrusions and tracks the position of the shipment – all to enable proactiveness rather than reactiveness. ...

Capesize The big ships endured heavy losses last week extinguishing any hopes from the recent minor rally. Negative sentiment gained pace throughout the week, Cyclone Veronica developed in North-Western Australia prompting Port Hedland and Dampier to issue port closure notices, expected to last in-excess of 48 hours. Miners were largely absent through the latter part of the week, as route C5 traded sharply down to $5.00. Mid-week saw a short-lived bump in freight on South Africa/Qingdao tender cargo as the slim ballaster fleet showed signs of pressure points, with many ...

The Drewry Container Port Throughput Indices are a series of volume growth/decline indices based on monthly throughput data for a sample of over 220 ports worldwide, representing over 75% of global volumes. The base point for the indices is January 2012 = 100. There was a positive start to the new year with a 2.1% (2.6 points) month-on-month and 3.6% (4.6 points) annual increase in the global container port throughput index in January 2018. The monthly increase was entirely attributable to the largest region (China) which outpaced all other regions ...

A petrochemical fire was quickly put out after it had re-ignited Friday at a fuel storage facility outside Houston, which had compounded the danger from a containment wall breach earlier in the day that spilled chemicals and halted ship traffic in the nation’s busiest oil port. The fire in multiple giant tanks of fuel at Mitsui & Co.’s Intercontinental Terminals facility in Deer Park, Texas, was put out by emergency workers at the scene about an hour after it began. But lingering smoke and leaking toxic chemicals prompted the U.S. ...

GE’s Power Conversion business and Nedstack, a leading fuel cell manufacturer, are collaborating on developing hydrogen fuel cell systems for powering zero-emission cruise vessels. This partnership brings together GE’s recognized expertise in cruise electrical power and propulsion solutions plus system integration capability, with Nedstack’s extensive experience in megawatt-scale hydrogen fuel cell technology. The result will be highly efficient fuel cell solutions that enable a zero-emission cruise industry. Zero-emission cruising The cruise industry shares a joint responsibility to eliminate the possible negative impacts it might have on port communities, the health ...

Nakilat-Keppel Offshore & Marine (N-KOM) has successfully completed its first floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) project for the 138,000cbm FSRU Excelerate owned by Excelerate Energy (USA). During its period at the Erhama Bin Jaber Al Jalahma Shipyard, the FSRU underwent routine drydocking and repairs, in addition to modifications and retrofitting of several new systems, including the installation of a ballast water treatment system (BWTS). To date, N-KOM has completed seven BWTS installations for various types of vessels, such as LNG and LPG carriers as well as very large crude carriers ...