Total Fuel-Cycle Emissions for Marine Vessels: A Well-to-Hull Analysis with Case Study 13th CIRP International Conference on Life Cycle Engineering, LCE2006

Regional and global air pollution emissions from marine transportation is a growing concern. In discerning the sources of such pollution, researchers have become interested in tracking where along the total fuel cycle these emissions occur. In addition, new efforts to introduce alternative fuels in marine vessels have raised new questions about the energy use and environmental impacts of such fuels. To address these issues, this paper presents the Total Energy & Emissions Analysis for Marine Systems (TEAMS) model. TEAMS can be used to analyze total fuel-cycle emissions and energy use from marine vessels. TEAMS captures “well-to-hull” emissions—that is, emissions along the entire fuel pathway, including extraction, processing, distribution, and use in vessels. TEAMS conducts analyses for six fuel pathways: (1) petroleum to residual oil; (2) petroleum to conventional diesel; (3) petroleum to low-sulfur diesel; (4) natural gas to compressed natural gas; (5) natural gas to Fischer-Tropsch diesel; and, (6) soybeans to biodiesel. TEAMS calculates total fuel-cycle emissions of three greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane) and five criteria pollutants (volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, particulate matter with aerodynamic diameters of 10 micrometers or less, and sulfur oxides). TEAMS also calculates total energy consumption, fossil fuel consumption, and petroleum consumption associated with each of its six fuel cycles. TEAMS can be used to study emissions from a variety of user-defined vessels. This paper provides modeling results for a passenger ferry case study using alternative fuels.