Carbon footprint and cost analysis of renewable hydrogen-fuelled ships

ABSTRACT

The International Maritime Organization proposes several strategies to eliminate the adverse effects of ship emissions. The most important is finding alternative fuels, such as hydrogen. The current paper aims to compare diesel and renewable hydrogen-powered ships using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Cost Assessment (LCCA). As a case study, three different ships sailing in the Red Sea area are investigated. The environmental outcomes are presented in terms of global warming potential (GWP), photochemical potential, eutrophication potential, particulate matter and acidification potential. Producing hydrogen fuel onboard ships will increase the total carbon footprint by 10%–28% higher than the currently used diesel fuels. Economically, the cost-effective target will be achieved at the cost of hydrogen production by electrolysis below 5.15$/kg.

KEYWORDS:

• GHG emissions
• IMO regulations
• renewable hydrogen
• life cycle analysis
• life cycle cost assessment

Acknowledgements

In this paper, LCAs were performed by GREET 2021 software produced by UChicago Argonne, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357 with the Department of Energy. The authors thank the CML 2001 and Footprint 2.0 software teams.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).