Norwegian Cruise Line has successfully retrofitted a new Exhaust Gas Scrubber system aboard their ship Norwegian Jewel. The installation is in conjunction with their Eco-Smart Cruising program, and is aimed at reducing air emissions and the vessel’s environmental footprint.
Details
The cruise line is the first to retrofit a ship while it’s in service with the system. The Jewel’s new lightweight in-line scrubbers are a hybrid technology that are able to operate in dry mode, open loop, and closed loop. Five scrubbers were installed – one per engine, and are able to reduce the emission of sulfur to air up to 99 percent, and reduce 85 percent particulate emission to the air.
The ship’s new technology will reduce the equivalent of about 1,500 tons of Sulfur Oxide gas in the years to come. The project didn’t happen overnight, either. The installment process began in spring 2014, and took over 100,000 man hours to be completed.
Coming Soon…
Norwegian now has three ships outfitted with the Gas Scrubbers technology – Jewel, Escape, and Pride of America. The cruise line is on track to meet its MARPOL Annex VI compliance goal of reducing its global sulfur cap from 3.5 percent to .5 percent by 2020. Norwegian Jewel‘s sister ships, Pearl and Gem, will finish their scrubber retrofits in the coming weeks, and Norwegian Jade and Sun are scheduled for the same installations in the first and second quarter of 2017.
