CURRENT STATUS AND PERSPECTIVE FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF SHIPS AND PORT TERMINALS FOR CARBON DIOXIDE (CO2)

Abstract

The current achievements and future prospects in international scientific and project activities in the field of sea transportation of carbon dioxide (CO2) for further application in projects in the Russian Federation are analyzed in the paper. The theme is relatively new and actual - the port transshipment and transportation of this new gaseous cargo has been considered by the authors since the early 2010s, the first projects will be implemented by the mid-2020s. CCS (carbon capture and storage) is capture of CO2 from industrial processes, transportation and storage in underground geological structures; it is one of the key large-scale technologies for reducing CO2 emissions at industrial facilities. This causes a growing interest in the development of CO2 maritime transport, which is confirmed by the fact that in the current decade in Europe more than 5 large-tonnage CO2 maritime hubs have been announced for implementation. Maritime transport is a promising type for the delivery of carbon dioxide from territorially remote emitters (more than 1 km) to CO2 injection geological fields, what is confirmedby the scientific researches and feasibility studies. The analysis of the most cited and authoritative scientific sources performed in the paper has shown that significant progress has been made in certain technological areas: the reliability of the technological chain has been confirmed, the transport characteristics of CO2 have been determined, and a conclusion about the advisability of transporting CO2 in ships under medium (15-20 bar, operated by a small-tonnage fleet of food-quality CO2 and vessels for the Norwegian Longship project) or low pressure(up to 10 bar, the greatest prospects are in cost reduction and increase of cargo capacity) has been drawn. At port terminals, operations for CO2 storage in isothermal tanks and loading-unloading through marine loading arms of liquid cryogenic cargoes will be confirmed by 2024 with the construction of the first marine CO2 hub in Norway(Northern Lights). In the study described in the paper, for the first time on the Russian language, the general functional and technological logic of the CO2 maritime transport chain is formed and the best promising available technologies are identified. Eventually based on the results of the analysis, a groundwork for further research and applied work, which has high potential due to the growing demand of the state and industrial enterprises to reduce the carbon footprint, is created.