15 Biggest Ships Create More Pollution Than All Cars in the World (2013)
industrytap.com
industrytap.com
When talking about pollutants is important to keeps the following points in mind:
- Is the pollutant effecting health?
- Is the pollutant effecting climate change?
- Is the amount of pollution locally concentrated or very distributed?
Cargo ships typically have a very high emission of nitrogen Oxides (NOx) and sulphur dioxide. When emitted by cars / factories on the mainland these often strongly contribute to harmful smog especially in megacities or cities with poor ventilation. Also they can be generally bad to the ecosystem also on the water due to causing acid rain etc.
The main pollutants on cargo ships have a very strong short term effect but are often out of the air in a few weeks. Because of that they don't rise to the atmosphere and don't directly contribute to long term climate changes. Thus I think the comparison in the article is very dangerous. When considering pollutants that effect climate change cars are more dominant.
So depending on which effects are discussed reducing pollutions from cars can still be benefitial. As an additional thought, the polutions of the cargo ships are spread out over a very large geographich area while the exhausts of cars are much more concentrated around cities. So when considering ones own quality of living, cars have a much bigger impact.
I think an article that better manages to discuss the subject is this one from the guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/apr/09/shipping-...
Excerpts:
- Shipping is responsible for 18-30% of all the world's nitrogen oxide (NOx) pollution and 9% of the global sulphur oxide (SOx) pollution.
- Shipping is responsible for 3.5% to 4% of all climate change emissions
"the 15 largest ships in the world emit as much nitrogen oxide and sulphur oxide as the world’s 760 million cars"
So if you have a car and your family is smaller than 921 children, you're ahead of the game, globally.
Funny choice of words. It reminded me of the classic sketch,
Interviewer: So what do you do to protect the environment in cases like this?
Bob Collins - Australian Senator: Well the ship was towed outside the environment.
Interviewer: Into another environment...?
Bob Collins - Australian Senator: No, no it's been towed beyond the environment, it's not in the environment.
Interviewer: No but from one environment to another environment...?
Bob Collins - Australian Senator: No it's been towed beyond the environment, it's not in an environment.
Using very conservative equivalent estimates for a car of 1 litre, 100 kg, 75 hp and 0.6 - 50 million cars would displace 50 million litres (2000 times more than ship engine), weigh around 2175 times as much, produce 34,000 times as much power and use 79,000 times as much fuel.
Keeping in mind the ships engine is very fuel and thermal efficient, 1 ship producing equivalent pollution to 50 million cars just does not seem plausible, in the slightest.
2. This measure of "pollution" is sulfur oxides, which are extremely low in automobiles since sulfur is almost completely removed from their fuel.
Have you ever been stuck behind a car with a broken exhaust system? The amount of pollution coming out of such a car is surprising, and that's with relatively clean gasoline.
"But, unlike power stations or cars, they can burn the cheapest, filthiest, high-sulphur fuel: the thick residues left behind in refineries after the lighter liquids have been taken. The stuff nobody on land is allowed to use." [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-1...]
I'm not saying you're wrong. 50 million does seem high, but there are other factors. A a former Navy nuke technician, I'm wondering why these ships aren't nuclear powered. I suppose it is the cost.
I rather assume the risk of terrorism.
Getting into it isn't a threat either: terrorists aren't going to be plasma torching into a reactor and surviving long enough to do anything.
A combination of cost and environmental concerns;
'The ship that totally failed to change the world" http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-28439159
For a diesel engine (which is the subject here) that has very little to do with the exhaust system but usually everything to do with the engine (and more specifically, the injectors) itself.
Relatively clean gasoline only pollutes more when the catalytic converter isn't working properly but you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference without a measurement.
So if you see 'clouds of smoke' coming from a car that's either a badly injecting diesel (droplets too large to combust) or a gasoline engine that is burning engine oil.
The exhaust system is 'not guilty' in either case.
I think it has more to do with the obvious safety concerns. Yes, nuclear power is quite safe in capable hands (e.g. the Navy), but I don't trust a private shipping enterprise not to cut costs on things like control rods.
I didn't say it would be a simple thing.
Ships are loosely unregulated, flying flags of convenience, crewed by workers from all over the world making a pittance, risking the occasional front falling off.
Getting a cubic meter from China to the US for $65 or whatever the cost is doesn't allow a big budget for nuclear power plant engineers, fueling and decommissioning costs.
Until there's a safe, cheap and convenient Mr. Fusion, powering your ship owned by a Greek billionaire, registered in Liberia, and with a crew from the Philippines, y'all cannot be serious to put nukes on there.
If this is the quality of thinking in the startup community I recommend sticking to apps and virtual reality.
Even the Navy only uses nuclear power sparingly - you won't find it in destroyers, supply ships, etc. Given the regulatory nightmare and costs around civilian nuclear power plants I really can't imagine nuclear freighters being feasible.
Just the regulations involved with manufacturing and fueling probably makes nuclear cargo ships an economic impossibility, forget about running them across the ocean.
Cost is certainly a factor, but safety and non-proliferation are also huge factors. Nuclear reactors are amazing pieces of technology, and we definitely don't want to give them out as freely as we do diesel engines.
You're a former navy nuke technician - do you think you have more expertise than the average roustabout on a freighter? Is that expertise important? Is there an opportunity for disaster if an untrained everyday joe successfully bluffed his way into your job?
"109,000-horsepower engines that endlessly spin away 24 hours a day, 280 days a year."
Most cars, in comparison, are idle for over 95% of their lifetime. My car for example sits in a driveway or parking lot approximately 23 hours a day.
Brings another factor of 20 into play. Now 1 ship only needs to produce pollution equivalent to 2.5m cars.
(Claim in the article still seems dubious considering that an average car has a 100 - 200 hp engine these days).
I agree, the article is so imprecise as to be completely worthless in terms of information content.
"The world shipping fleet consists of over 100,000 vessels larger than 100 gross tonnes ... Oceangoing ships running large slow-speed diesel (SSD) engines generally burn low-quality residual fuels that tend to contain high amounts of sulfur and heavy metals. Smaller vessels, such as tugboats, fishing vessels and ferries operate medium-speed diesel (MSD) engines that use mostly distillate fuels within nonroad equipment fuel quality standards [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2004]. International commercial shipping vessels operate across international waters with little or inconsistent regulation of fuel quality or pollution emissions".*
* Particulate emissions from commercial shipping: Chemical, physical, and optical properties http://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/black-carbon/lac...
Actual article: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/apr/09/shipping-...
I think the original article interesting and current and worthy of being on HN :)
This is copied one.
Tight sulphur emission regulations happened in 2015. However they are limited to more populated areas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulphur_Emission_Control_Area
NOx limits are tightening. Didn't get a great link but this has something: http://www.imo.org/en/OurWork/Environment/PollutionPreventio...
Ships produce more sulfur oxide pollutants than cars because they use different fuels, and thus produce different pollutants.
A large container ship does produce more more carbon dioxide emission per mile and per gallon of fuel than a car, but ships in general have the lowest emission levels of any other method of cargo transport , producing fewer emissions per ton of freight per mile than barges, trains or trucks.
[1] http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/apr/09/shipping-...
Small quote from the article:
Maersk Line CEO Soren Skou said in a Copenhagen
presentation yesterday that lower sulphur fuel was more
expensive and would increase the carrier’s bunker cost by
estimated $200 million a year.
You can save a massive amount of money by "ignoring" these rules. Meaning: unless it is checked, there is a huge risk of unfair competition between companies which abide by the rules and companies which do not. Especially if a company is in difficult times it needs to be checked carefully.
You'll notice that the bigger companies are ok with such rules, as long as it applies to everyone and is checked thoroughly.
Meat consumption and livestock in general creates more pollution than ALL transportation means in the world all together.
http://www.cowspiracy.com/facts/
I suggest everyone watch this documentary. It changed the way I eat.
I dislike your "irony" or lack of seriousness, but at some point, when the resources will be over, we'd have to fight with each other. It's already happening for petrol, it will probably happen for water and air looking at the last news from Asia at the moment.