Vancouver Reports First-Ever LNG Bunker for Cruise Ship

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Written by Daniel Graeber for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--With new draft regulations on shipping emissions in the works, the Port of Vancouver said it completed the first ever ship-to-ship transfer of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to a cruise ship.

The Seaspan bunkering vessel Seaspan Garibaldi conducted the ship-to-ship transfer last week at the Port of Vancouver for a cruise ship bound for Alaska.

"Providing dependable LNG bunkering services from Vancouver represents a major step forward," Harly Penner, the president of Seaspan Energy, said Thursday. "This first LNG bunkering of a cruise ship at the port is a milestone we are excited to share with the Port of Vancouver, as it signals meaningful progress in the industry's decarbonization efforts."

The International Maritime Organization (IMO), a U.N.-backed agency overseeing the global shipping industry, set standards that mandate reductions in sulfur-dioxide emissions and other pollutants.

To meet those standards, shippers have installed onboard devices called scrubbers that clean the ship's exhaust or otherwise looked to fuels other than the sulfur-rich heavy fuel oil (HFO) more commonly used today.

IMO in April drafted new legislation that would outline new fuel standards and global-pricing mechanisms for emissions. Set for implementation in 2027, the standards would apply to vessels of more than 5,000 gross tonnage, vessels that are responsible for more than 80% of the global shipping emissions.

Seaspan in late 2024 became the first accredited LNG supplier to ships calling at the Port of Vancouver and now operates three bunkering vessels there. Port authorities said the option of delivering LNG as an alternative fuel supports its efforts to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.

"We all have a crucial role to play enabling the energy transition and as a port authority our focus is on putting the infrastructure and processes in place to ensure visiting ships can move beyond traditional marine fuels and embrace alternative fuels like LNG," said Captain Shri Madiwal, a vice president of operations and supply chain at the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority.

Elsewhere in North America, Galveston LNG Bunker Port LLC is planning a facility near the Port of Galveston that would supply LNG to shippers, possibly before the end of 2026. If built, it will be the first facility in the U.S. designed specifically for bunkering, which refers to the process of fueling a ship.

LNG is cooled considerably, lowering the overall volume for deliveries. And because it's derived primarily from methane, which is made up of carbon and hydrogen atoms, it has no significant sulfur content, satisfying some of the IMO's mandates.

But while it's a potent energy carrier, methane has a warming potential that's far greater than carbon dioxide. A recent study from the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies (OIES) concluded that "methane emissions are the potential Achilles Heel of any claim for gas and LNG to act as a transition or bridge fuel."

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