Norway’s Hurtigruten cruise operator signs deal to power ships with fish waste biogas
The move is part of the company's bid to be carbon neutral by 2050.
Norwegian cruise ship operator Hurtigruten has signed a 7.5-year deal to buy liquefied biogas (LBG) made from dead fish and other organic waste to help power its vessels, the firm said last week.
Under the contract with Biokraft, Hurtigruten ships will start receiving near-daily supplies of LBG, with the first delivery taking place in 2020.
The company last year said it would invest about $800 million to refit six vessels to partly run on the renewable fuel.
The hybrid ships will run on a combination of electric power from batteries, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and liquefied biogas.
Biogas is already used as fuel in parts of the transport sector, especially in buses. It can be produced by using organic waste, such that from fisheries and forestry, which the Nordic region has in abundance.
Hurtigruten is the Nordic region’s most high-profile cruise fleet operator and is best known for the ships that ferry tourists along the country’s fjords and coastline and up into the Arctic.
The shipping sector is facing tougher international regulations, including cuts in CO2 emissions by at least 50 percent by 2050 compared with 2008 levels, and a ban on fuels with sulphur content above 0.5 percent from 2020 against 3.5 percent now.
Hurtigruten said it hoped to be carbon neutral by 2050.
