Page 38: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (June 2023)

PROFILE: ARDMORE SHIPPING “I suppose one of my favorite [fuel reduction technologies] is simply variable speed drives. The whole engineering plant is designed to run at 100%. By employing variable speed drives on the main [energy] consumers, we've seen drastic reductions in our fuel consumption … almost a third of our daily hotel load has been reduced.”

Garry Noonan,

Director, Innovation, Ardmore Shipping sense.” “Even when I look at liner trades and at green corridors, a

While he and his team aim to squeeze as much savings out lot of those projects are not going to go live anytime soon. We of existing hulls and technologies, he believes that the truly are in a capital-intensive business and making the wrong deci- monumental step changes would require an equally dramatic sion could be fatal,” said Noonan.

seismic shift in the industry in terms of true collaboration, true When Noonan joined Ardmore, he envisioned being in the risk and reward sharing. But here he sees the very nature of middle of the next great fuel wave in maritime. the industry working against itself. But now – with the broad availability of future fuels at “You read some of the papers out there where there's a po- quantities required and the infrastructure to support them still tential for 30% savings on CO2 emissions just purely based more than a decade away – he earnestly believes that he won’t on the way we operate a vessel; to me, that would be the holy see a substantial, industry wide adoption of alternative fuels grail, long before we ever talk about future fuels. We're all in his career.

well-aware that our industry is quite fragmented, but if we “I thought I was going to be in the middle of this massive could get everyone on board, there's a lot we could do with transition, but if I'm frankly honest, I'm worried it's going to what we have now.” pass me, I won't be around for it.”

As talk turns to energy transition, Noonan is cautiously op- A particular sticking point in the fuel transition will be the timistic. The ? rst, and greatest challenge, is the fact that Ard- cost of the fuel itself. more operates on the spot market, making it dif? cult ? rst and “I understand people's skepticism [of future fuels] because foremost to ensure its ships are positioned to get its fuel. if you're paying twice, maybe even four times the price for “For us in the spot market, without mass adoption, we sim- your fuel, if someone else is does not have to pay that, then ply can't make that decision,” said Noonan. “Personally, and they have a massive competitive advantage over you, which obviously Ardmore believes in methanol, in the near future means you may not be commercially viable.” we don't see a pathway to putting methanol propelled vessels “I think in the grand scheme of things, unless we have price on the spot market.” parity across the different types of fuels, you're not going to 38 Maritime Reporter & Engineering News • June 2023

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