Review and analysis of fire and explosion accidents in maritime transportation

The globally expanding shipping industry has several hazards such as collision, capsizing, foundering, grounding, stranding, fire, and explosion. Accidents are often caused by more than one contributing factor through complex interaction. It is crucial to identify root causes and their interactions to prevent and understand such accidents. This study presents a detailed review and analysis of fire and explosion accidents that occurred in the maritimetransportation industry during 1990–2015. The underlying causes of fire and explosion accidents are identified and analysed. This study also reviewed potential preventative measures to prevent such accidents. Additionally, this study compares properties of alternative fuels and analyses their effectiveness in mitigating fire and explosionhazards. It is observed that Cryogenic Natural Gas (CrNG), Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and methanol have properties more suitable than traditional fuels in mitigating fire risk and appropriate management of their hazards could make them a safer option to traditional fuels. However, for commercial use at this stage, there exist several uncertainties due to inadequate studies, and technological immaturity. This study provides an insight into fire and explosion accident causation and prevention, including the prospect of using alternative fuels for mitigating fire and explosion risks in maritime transportation

Charging strategies – implications on the interaction between an electrified road infrastructure and the stationary electricity system

This study uses a vehicle model together with detailed traffic data of the European route 39 in western Norway to estimate how the electricity demand for an electric road system varies with time and location. The aim is to better understand the impact of an electric road system on the stationary electricity system. The results show that the electricity demand for an E39 electric road system is comparable to a larger industry, potentially increasing the peak power demand in the regional electricity system with only a few percent. Yet, if all main Norwegian roads are electrified, or if vehicles can also charge their batteries while driving, there will be a significant (>10%) addition of electricity demand to the current load

The Potential for Electrofuels Production in Sweden Utilizing Fossil and Biogenic CO2 Point Sources

This paper maps, categorizes, and quantifies all major point sources of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from industrial and combustion processes in Sweden. The paper also estimates the Swedish technical potential for electrofuels (power-to-gas/fuels) based on carbon capture and utilization. With our bottom-up approach using European data-bases, we find that Sweden emits approximately 50 million metric tons of CO2 per year from different types of point sources, with 65% (or about 32 million tons) from biogenic sources. The major sources are the pulp and paper industry (46%), heat and power production (23%), and waste treatment and incineration (8%). Most of the CO2 is emitted at low concentrations (<15%) from sources in the southern part of Sweden where power demand generally exceeds in-region supply. The potentially recoverable emissions from all the included point sources amount to 45 million tons. If all the recoverable CO2 were used to produce electrofuels, the yield would correspond to 2–3 times the current Swedish demand for transportation fuels. The electricity required would correspond to about 3 times the current Swedish electricity supply. The current relatively few emission sources with high concentrations of CO2 (>90%, biofuel operations) would yield electrofuels corresponding to approximately 2% of the current demand for transportation fuels (corresponding to 1.5–2 TWh/year). In a 2030 scenario with large-scale biofuels operations based on lignocellulosic feedstocks, the potential for electrofuels production from high-concentration sources increases to 8–11 TWh/year. Finally, renewable electricity and production costs, rather than CO2 supply, limit the potential for production of electrofuels in Sweden

Cost-Effective Choices of Marine Fuels in a Carbon-Constrained World: Results from a Global Energy Model

The regionalized Global Energy Transition model has been modified to include a more detailed shipping sector in order to assess what marine fuels and propulsion technologies might be cost-effective by 2050 when achieving an atmospheric CO₂ concentration of 400 or 500 ppm by the year 2100. The robustness of the results was examined in a Monte Carlo analysis, varying uncertain parameters and technology options, including the amount of primary energy resources, the availability of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies, and costs of different technologies and fuels. The four main findings are (i) it is cost-effective to start the phase out of fuel oil from the shipping sector in the next decade; (ii) natural gas-based fuels (liquefied natural gas and methanol) are the most probable substitutes during the study period; (iii) availability of CCS, the CO₂ target, the liquefied natural gas tank cost and potential oil resources affect marine fuel choices significantly; and (iv) biofuels rarely play a major role in the shipping sector, due to limited supply and competition for bioenergy from other energy sectors