Why Edge still runs on dirty fuel?

[jwlane]

Today's award for resurrecting a 5 year old thread goes to.....

[doghog]

19 minutes ago, jwlane said:

Today's award for resurrecting a 5 year old thread goes to.....

And I stepped right into it. 

[NMTraveller]

On 10/23/2018 at 7:50 PM, Host Jazzbeau said:

Be careful what you wish for.  Cruise lines have two choices to comply with latest fuel regs:  add scrubbers to clean up the exhaust from bunker fuel, or switch to lighter diesel.  It turns out the airlines are worried about that latter choice, as it will raise the cost of jet fuel – and therefore raise the cost of your tickets to get to the ship!  Maybe – as cruise ships return to the old class system – we should expect non-veranda passengers to pull on oars in rotating shifts! 

I think that is Celebrity's next month's plans for cost savings 🙂 

[Denny01]

 

28 minutes ago, jwlane said:

Today's award for resurrecting a 5 year old thread goes to.....

Along with the post quoting my 5 year old post where I listed an LNG cruise ship and the post referenced other LNG ships built 3 YEARS after my original post. 

 

Love it. 

 

Den

 

 

[jwlane]

7 minutes ago, Denny01 said:

Along with the post quoting my 5 year old post where I listed an LNG cruise ship and the post referenced other LNG ships built 3 YEARS after my original post. 

The award for "Click & Post Without Perspective" goes to........

[Tyler414]

We need more electric cars to help offset the cruise ships pollution. 

[Host Jazzbeau]

The mega ships that only do the same itinerary over and over could go all-electric and just trail a long extension cord on their loops...

[C4HCG]

5 hours ago, NMTraveller said:

I think that is Celebrity's next month's plans for cost savings 🙂 

And the award for never misses a chance to have a dig at Celebrity goes to…… round of applause, you’ve worked hard for it 😁

[NMTraveller]

2 hours ago, C4HCG said:

And the award for never misses a chance to have a dig at Celebrity goes to…… round of applause, you’ve worked hard for it 😁

Unfortunately it is rather easy these days.  Once a premium line now headed towards a budget line.

 

What would happen if BMW reduced their product and started building Fords?  The exact same thing you see on this board.

Edited August 25, 2023 by NMTraveller

[NMTraveller]

10 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

The mega ships that only do the same itinerary over and over could go all-electric and just trail a long extension cord on their loops...

That is what we need for the TESLAs.  A 500 mile cord to the next charging station. 🙂

[sixpackeddie]

Just pulling in to port off our shore excursion from the EDGE. Seems like the new MSC ship is no better.

[PTC DAWG]

On 8/25/2023 at 7:13 PM, NMTraveller said:

Unfortunately it is rather easy these days.  Once a premium line now headed towards a budget line.

 

What would happen if BMW reduced their product and started building Fords?  The exact same thing you see on this board.

BMW lost their way years ago. 

[Whinenowine]

3 hours ago, sixpackeddie said:

Just pulling in to port off our shore excursion from the EDGE. Seems like the new MSC ship is no better.

Yeah I think that’s the Seaview, launched the same year as the Edge.  Btw I’m on the same cruise…my family is REALLY BUMMED about Portafino.

[sixpackeddie]

3 hours ago, Whinenowine said:

Yeah I think that’s the Seaview, launched the same year as the Edge.  Btw I’m on the same cruise…my family is REALLY BUMMED about Portafino.

I know, bad weather tomorrow. Let’s enjoy the ship!

[NMTraveller]

8 hours ago, sixpackeddie said:

Just pulling in to port off our shore excursion from the EDGE. Seems like the new MSC ship is no better.

In all seriousness though.  Why would one book a balcony downstream from the stack?

[vwlmember]

16 hours ago, NMTraveller said:

In all seriousness though.  Why would one book a balcony downstream from the stack?

Look at the picture again. Where is the exhaust trail going? Up. Nowhere near the balconies.

 

Now as for particulates. That is more of the issue as they are mostly unseen by the human eye and carry enough weight to drop out of the plume. Those are definitely headed for some balconies. We would see soot on our SV balcony on the Beyond if the wind was blowing in the right direction.

Edited August 28, 2023 by vwlmember
updated cabin info from IV to SV

[neverlaysup]

Perhaps they should build nuclear powered cruise ships. They could easily cool themselves with seawater and are non=polluting. Plenty of ex navy types with the proper training to maintain the systems.....a win win for everyone and the environment! 

[chengkp75]

59 minutes ago, neverlaysup said:

Perhaps they should build nuclear powered cruise ships. They could easily cool themselves with seawater and are non=polluting. Plenty of ex navy types with the proper training to maintain the systems.....a win win for everyone and the environment! 

I'll take this as serious.  All ships "cool themselves" with sea water.  All nuclear reactors release minimal amounts of radioactive material, notably tritium (which is an isotope of water) and have for over 60 years.  I would hesitate to get into a discussion whether the spent fuel cells are "polluting" or not, but they will never go away.  As for having them on cruise ships, there is a reason that only the Soviet Union had nuclear powered commercial ships (they aren't economical).  Also, it is quite different in having "employees" (Navy crew on Navy ships) possibly exposed to a reactor incident than exposing passengers.  There would also be liability issues for whether anyone who developed cancer at any time in their lives after their nuclear cruise, was exposed, and whether this caused the cancer.  It just isn't going to happen.

[leyland1989]

The M-Class use Marine Gas Oils due to its choice of having gas turbine powerplant. (+ 2 diesel auxiliary generators for hotel power) 

 

It's notable cleaner and almost no visible exhaust while underway. However, the pair of gas turbines (fun fact, they are derived from the CF-6 Turbofan you'd find on a 747 or 767) have very high fuel consumption, even at idle. Marine Gas Oils is more refined than bunker fuel which cost significantly more also. Therefore all cruise ships built after the early 00s, including the S class and e class have all gone back to using traditional engines and bunker fuel. 

[neverlaysup]

36 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

I'll take this as serious.  All ships "cool themselves" with sea water.  All nuclear reactors release minimal amounts of radioactive material, notably tritium (which is an isotope of water) and have for over 60 years.  I would hesitate to get into a discussion whether the spent fuel cells are "polluting" or not, but they will never go away.  As for having them on cruise ships, there is a reason that only the Soviet Union had nuclear powered commercial ships (they aren't economical).  Also, it is quite different in having "employees" (Navy crew on Navy ships) possibly exposed to a reactor incident than exposing passengers.  There would also be liability issues for whether anyone who developed cancer at any time in their lives after their nuclear cruise, was exposed, and whether this caused the cancer.  It just isn't going to happen.

it was a joke.........

[chengkp75]

54 minutes ago, leyland1989 said:

The M-Class use Marine Gas Oils due to its choice of having gas turbine powerplant. (+ 2 diesel auxiliary generators for hotel power) 

 

It's notable cleaner and almost no visible exhaust while underway. However, the pair of gas turbines (fun fact, they are derived from the CF-6 Turbofan you'd find on a 747 or 767) have very high fuel consumption, even at idle. Marine Gas Oils is more refined than bunker fuel which cost significantly more also. Therefore all cruise ships built after the early 00s, including the S class and e class have all gone back to using traditional engines and bunker fuel. 

Marine Gas Oil is more familiarly known within the US and Canada as #2 diesel, or home heating oil.  The gas turbines were originally installed to provide "green" operation in Alaska, but they soon found out that operating a 20Mw gas turbine at the 8-9Mw hotel load was cost prohibitive, so the diesel generators were installed for in port operation.  The gas turbines will still provide hotel power when at sea.  

 

At today's bunker prices, IFO380 (the high sulfur fuel ships can use with scrubbers), costs $550/metric ton, low sulfur (VLSFO) bunker oil that can be used without a scrubber costs $640/metric ton, and MGO (Marine Gas Oil) goes for $950/metric ton.  Note also that MGO has a lower "energy content" (how much energy a ton of fuel will produce) than bunker fuel, so that raises the cost even more, as you need to burn more tons of fuel to get the same energy output.

 

The gas turbine engines were never a good idea, except as used on the Cunard Queen Mary, where they are only put on when the ship needs full speed, or the turbine can run at full power.  The US Navy makes extensive use of them, and they work for the Navy for a couple of reasons, one, the power plant is smaller than a diesel or steam plant, and two,  the Navy does not need to show a profit every quarter, so fuel costs are not really important.

 

As for pollution, a lot of what people see as a "brown haze" is actually the result of efficient combustion, and you only see that haze in certain lighting and/or cloud backdrop settings.  It is almost always there, regardless of the fuel used.

[leyland1989]

7 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Marine Gas Oil is more familiarly known within the US and Canada as #2 diesel, or home heating oil.  The gas turbines were originally installed to provide "green" operation in Alaska, but they soon found out that operating a 20Mw gas turbine at the 8-9Mw hotel load was cost prohibitive, so the diesel generators were installed for in port operation.  The gas turbines will still provide hotel power when at sea.  

 

At today's bunker prices, IFO380 (the high sulfur fuel ships can use with scrubbers), costs $550/metric ton, low sulfur (VLSFO) bunker oil that can be used without a scrubber costs $640/metric ton, and MGO (Marine Gas Oil) goes for $950/metric ton.  Note also that MGO has a lower "energy content" (how much energy a ton of fuel will produce) than bunker fuel, so that raises the cost even more, as you need to burn more tons of fuel to get the same energy output.

 

The gas turbine engines were never a good idea, except as used on the Cunard Queen Mary, where they are only put on when the ship needs full speed, or the turbine can run at full power.  The US Navy makes extensive use of them, and they work for the Navy for a couple of reasons, one, the power plant is smaller than a diesel or steam plant, and two,  the Navy does not need to show a profit every quarter, so fuel costs are not really important.

 

As for pollution, a lot of what people see as a "brown haze" is actually the result of efficient combustion, and you only see that haze in certain lighting and/or cloud backdrop settings.  It is almost always there, regardless of the fuel used.

Gas turbines were not optimal for cruise ship operation. I wouldn't say they are terrible for all marine applications.

 

The packaging, power output/volume is superior to traditional marine engines. They are still being used on newly built high speed ferries or military ships. M-Class would not be able to retrofitted with traditional powerplants simply because no diesel engines would fit while providing sufficient power in the same space. 

 

There were popular at the time due to relatively lower fuel prices, novelty and perceived lower maintenance cycle/cost (Gas turbines have much fewer moving parts but require much higher precisions while diesel engine have many more moving parts with higher tolerance, turns out maintaining a jet engine cost more.)