Page 33: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (December 2014)

www.marinelink.com 33 75TH ANNIVERSARY PROFILES

Alfa Laval can be found on many ships worldwide, at work with a wide variety of applications and processes.

As a global supplier with a full net- work of service and support, it pro- vides strong technical competence in diverse areas, including: separation, fi ltration, fuel conditioning, heat- ing and cooling, desalination, ballast water treatment, tank cleaning, inert gas generation, steam genera- tion, waste heat recovery, oily waste reduction and exhaust gas cleaning.

Alfa Laval’s job: within these areas, optimize processes, save energy and reduce emissions by providing equip- ment, systems and competence.

While the word ‘innovation’ is arguably used too often and too loosely, this is not the case with

Alfa Laval, which historically has positioned itself on the leading edge of innovation, offering ship own- ers solutions to what are becoming increasingly complex emission and environmental problems. “In the autumn of 2014 we launched the next generation of the Alfa Laval PureSOx exhaust gas cleaning system,” said Leifl and. “PureSOx enables ship owners to comply with IMO’s sulfur emis- sion cap in Emission Control Areas (ECAs) while using economical HFO, rather than switching to expensive distillate.”

PureSOx 2.0 builds on the exist- ing PureSOx, which include 98%

SOx removal, up to 80% removal of particulate matter (PM) and hybrid operation with either seawater or cir- culation water. These are combined with new enhancements leading to greater compactness and fl exibility.

Among them are a 15% smaller scrubber diameter, greater modulari- ty in the water cleaning unit, powder dosing, noise attenuation and the ability to handle exhaust gas from both engines and boilers. “We have also seen an increased interest in our Automated Fuel

Changeover System (ACS),” said

Leifl and. “This is another solution for meeting the game-changing ECA legislation, which takes effect Janu- ary 1, 2015.”

The Alfa Laval adaptive fuel line was launched at SMM in Hamburg this year, and is designed to take a holistic approach to fuel optimization and engine protection on oceangoing vessels, to deliver energy effi ciency (fuel savings), enhanced cat fi ne removal, fuel quality assurance, multi-fuel fl exibility and safety in

ECA compliance, all in one inte- grated system. “The Alfa Laval adaptive fuel line fully integrates the fuel oil treatment separator systems (ALCAP) with the fuel oil conditioning systems (FCM

One) and the fuel recovery system (PureDry),” said Leifl and. “The integration is completed with control systems and a CatGuard monitoring system for cat fi nes. This combina- tion of feed optimization, effective fuel management, system supervision and waste fuel recovery can provide fuel savings of 2-4%, plus additional savings through reduced engine wear and the prevention of breakdowns due to cat fi nes.” While the com- pany invests mightily in R&D, it is also a consolidator. Case in point is the acquisition of Frank Mohn AS, a company Alfa Laval was following closely for several years.

Riding the Wave

While innovation is necessary in the maritime market with the grow- ing glut of regulation, the need for new technology is tempered with depressed freight rates and low ship- building prices that have put a lot of pressure on the maritime industry. “Due to lack of earnings, some ship owners have had to defer essential maintenance and limit operational effi ciency upgrades to those with a payback of less than 2-3 years,” said

Leifl and. “Shipyards have also had negative earnings due to the excess yard capacity and low ship prices over the last couple of years. On the fl ipside, the marine supply chain has tried to be more innovative in developing energy-effi cient products that reduce vessel operating costs, as well as solutions to meet the in- creasingly stringent and widespread environmental regulations. Korean and Japanese yards and European equipment manufacturers have led the way here.”

Looking ahead to 2015, the need to comply with increasingly stringent and widespread environmental regu- lations will mean continued demand for NOx, SOx, BWT and multi-fuel solutions. And the trend towards energy effi ciency in the maritime industry will continue, in earnest, driving Alfa Laval’s waste heat recov- ery and waste fuel recovery solutions in the years ahead. “We see an increased interest in our

Fuel Management Course, which is conducted around the world by our

Alfa Laval service organization to- gether with VPS (Veritas Petroleum

Services),” said Leifl and.

Going forward Alfa Laval will con- tinue the development of multi-fuel solutions, and it is exploring ways to support the combustion of fuels such as LNG, LPG, methanol and DME in the engines and boilers of ships.

Investment in the Future

Alfa Laval is a global company whose heat transfer, separation and fl uid handling experience are applied in a wide range of industries. Yet it has a specifi c Marine and Diesel division with a dedicated indus- trial focus. Alfa Laval is investing in

R&D, primarily so it can respond to changing customer needs with new products and improved versions of existing solutions. A prime example of this is the new Alfa Laval Test &

Training Center in Aalborg, Den- mark, which is a virtual ship on land with a 250 sq. m. testing area, where the company can also identify new areas of application for existing prod- ucts and key technologies, which is another important means of achiev- ing profi table growth.

Alfa Laval: Keeping it Clean “PureSOx enables ship owners to comply with

IMO’s sulfur emission cap in Emission Control

Areas (ECAs) while using economical HFO, rather than switching to expensive distillate.”

Peter Leifl and,

President, Marine & Diesel Division

Forced by regulation to clean up, ship owners have never been so keenly aware of the exact emis- sions coming from their ships. And when it comes to cleaning up, Alfa Laval is there every step of the way, as Peter Leifl and, President, Marine & Diesel Division, Alfa Laval, explains.

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