China’s Dalian Shipbuilding Industry (DSIC) has won a contract to build two LNG-powered CO2 carriers which will serve the Northern Lights joint venture in Norway.
Equinor, Shell and TotalEnergies are the partners in the JV. The three firms are developing infrastructure to transport CO2 from industrial emitters by ship to a receiving terminal in western Norway.
As part of the first phase of its CO2 transport and storage infrastructure development, Northern Lights will use two dedicated CO2 carriers, each with a cargo size of 7,500 cbm and a length of 130 meters.
CSSC’s DSIC should deliver the dual-fueled vessels by mid-2024, according to a statement by Northern Lights.
Once in operation, the ships will load captured and liquefied CO2 from European emitters and transport it to the Northern Lights receiving terminal in Øygarden.
Besides LNG power, the vessels would feature a wind-assisted propulsion system and air lubrication in order to reduce carbon intensity by around 34 percent compared to conventional systems, the JV said.
Also, Northern Lights said the ships are the first of their kind and would potentially set a new standard for CO2 shipping on coastal trading routes.
“The use of ships will enable the development of a flexible and efficient European infrastructure network for transport of CO2 captured by our industrial customers, keeping costs as low as possible to help decarbonization scale up”, Børre Jacobsen, managing director of Northern Lights JV, said.
