Airborne monitoring of compliance to sulfur emission regulations by ocean-going vessels in the Belgian North Sea area

Roy, Ward Van; Schallier, Ronny; Roozendael, Benjamin Van; Scheldeman, Kobe; Nieuwenhove, Annelore Van; Maes, Frank

doi:10.1016/j.apr.2022.101445

Cited by 15 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Airborne measurements have been shown to provide an efficient solution to monitor the compliance of OGVs with regard to the emission regulations [32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39]. Even so, the use of airborne measurement data has not yet been recognized as an independent legal evidence for observed possible non-compliant OGVs, and is thus far, merely used for riskbased targeting of inspections in ports.…”

Section: Of 24mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Since 2015, the RBINS has been conducting airborne surveillance operations to monitor sulfur emissions from OGVs in accordance with MARPOL Annex VI Regulation 14 [34]. In addition, from 2020 onwards, the RBINS has been conducting airborne surveillance operations to monitor NOx emissions from OGVs in accordance with MARPOL Annex VI Regulation 13 [34][35][36].…”

Section: Airborne Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, the alert was shared in the Thetis-EU database and became accessible to all EU Member States (section 2.3.) [34,35,42]. The provision of airborne alerts may therefore be considered as the first step in the enforcement chain.…”

Section: Airborne Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Role of the Belgian Airborne Sniffer Measurements in the MARPOL Annex VI Enforcement Chain

Roy¹,

Merveille²,

Scheldeman³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Responding to an urgent call for effective and cost-efficient enforcement of emission regulations from ocean-going vessels (OGVs) at sea, the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, one of the 17 official partners of the Belgian coastguard structure, launched its airborne sniffer program in 2015. A custom-built sniffer sensor was installed on board of the Belgian coastguard aircraft and has been used for the in-situ measurement of SO2 and NOx in OGV exhausts, providing non-compliance alerts to port inspection authorities in Belgium and other EU member states. To guarantee the consistency in quality and reliability of the airborne non-compliance alerts, the standard operational procedures and measurement methodology have been described and recorded in a sniffer quality management system (SQMS). As part of the SQMS, alerting thresholds for non-compliance with SO2 and NOx standards were defined based on the emission limits and the measurement uncertainty. In addition, compliant measurements for the fuel sulfur content (FSC) were shared through Thetis-EU, which is the sulfur inspection database hosted by the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA). By providing both non-compliance alerts and compliant measurements to port inspection authorities, the coastguard aircraft fulfills a first-step in the enforcement chain. This article demonstrates that the reported alerts have not only led to several sanctions, but the analysis also showed that the provision of airborne alerts improved the efficiency of the port inspection authorities drastically, resulting in a cost-efficient improvement of their enforcement strategy. Port inspection authorities were able to follow-up on 46% of the generated FSC alerts. In addition, 43% of the alerted OGVs, which were followed up, were confirmed as non-compliant after a port inspection. Accordingly, conditions were in place to effectively sanction 20% of the non-compliant observations. For NOx alerts, a limited follow-up was done by port inspection authorities and none of the alerts were confirmed by those inspections, which is mainly due to the lack of suitable inspection mechanisms and the absence of additional EU implementation regulations on NOx emission inspections. Aiming at paving the way for a stricter enforcement of airborne non-compliance alerts, a validation analysis was done between the airborne FSC measurements and reference FSC measurements. In addition to onboard measurements from exhaust gas cleaning systems (EGCS), analyzes of fuel samples were also carried out by port inspection authorities in order to acquire reference measurements. The validation analysis presented in this study showed that the empiric deviation of the airborne FSC measurements with the reference measurements was significantly lower than the uncertainty used in the reporting thresholds. It has also been shown that aerial measurements provide evidence-based data that, given an appropriate confidence interval, has the potential to be considered reliable legal evidence.

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Section: Of 24mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Airborne Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Role of the Belgian Airborne Sniffer Measurements in the MARPOL Annex VI Enforcement Chain

Roy¹,

Merveille²,

Scheldeman³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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“…The FSC can be calculated based on the ambient and the exhaust plume's SO2 and CO2 [47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55].…”

Section: Fsc Measurementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessment of the Effect of International Maritime Regulations on Air Quality in the Southern North Sea

Roy¹,

Merveille²,

Scheldeman³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Air pollution is a leading cause of death worldwide, and has a profound impact on the planet's climate and ecosystems. A substantial portion of air pollution is attributable to Ocean Going Vessels (OGVs). In light of this, international regulations have been put in place to mitigate air pollutant emissions from OGVs. While studies have indicated that these regulations can create significant health, environmental, and economic benefits, there remains a research gap regarding their specific impact on enhancing air quality. The aim of this study is to investigate how the implemented regulations have affected air quality in the Southern North Sea. The study found that the international regulations on ship emissions have successfully led to a decline in SO2 emissions from OGVs in the Southern North Sea, which resulted in a reduction of ambient SO2 concentrations inland, leading to positive effects on public health and the environment. However, it was projected that their proportion is tend to increase in the following years. Moreover, the study revealed that Exhaust Gas Cleaning Systems (EGCS) present significant concerns. They were significantly more frequently found to be non-compliant, and more alarmingly, they emit notably higher average levels of SO2. It also turned out that international regulations in the southern North Sea have less effect on the reduction of NOx emissions from OGVs than expected. The NOx emissions from OGVs will even account for an alarming 40% of the total domestic NOx emissions for the Belgian Region by 2030.

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“…An alternative method is to measure or calculate the concentration of emitted pollutants. This can be done with measuring stations at the banks of rivers, in harbours or on the shore [25][26][27], air sampling [28], (portable) emission measurement systems [29][30][31][32], continuous-time monitoring campaigns [33][34][35][36][37][38], sniffing methods with drones or airplanes [39][40][41][42][43][44], or dispersion models [12,45,46]. Besides the emission of a complex mixture of gaseous and particulate residuals from burnt fuel [17,[47][48][49][50], pollutants are also emitted by the loss of lubricant oil through the combustion chamber and the tailpipe [51].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Inherent Instability of Environmental Parameters Governing Indoor Air Quality on Board Ships and the Use of Temporal Trends to Identify Pollution Sources

et al. 2023

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Indoor air quality on board a 36-year-old ship has been characterized at several locations. The ship is dedicated to nearshore operations at the Belgian coast. This paper presents time-averaged and continuous-time measurements of several indoor pollutant concentrations such as NO2, O3, NO, CO, total volatile organic compounds (TVOC), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), particulate matter PM2.5 and PM10, black carbon, and individual organic compounds. Time-averaged measurements suggest that the ship’s indoor air quality is sufficiently safe according to the prescribed occupational and nonoccupational health limits. However, the concentration of some indoor pollutants is comparable to that of the outdoor air of a large city such as Brussels, Belgium. Continuous-time analyses show that the temporal trends of indoor pollutant concentrations are inherently unstable. A large number of peaks or valleys are observed on a slowly fluctuating background. At some occasions, pollutant concentrations exceed the nonoccupational thresholds. Several pollutant peaks occur simultaneously, resulting in a pattern of peaks that is typical for a pollution source (e.g., exhaust gases entering the ship’s castle through the ventilation inlet, human presence, and bunkering). This study illustrates that multiparameter monitoring campaigns give valuable information about the behaviour of pollution sources, facilitating the definition of mitigation actions.

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Airborne monitoring of compliance to sulfur emission regulations by ocean-going vessels in the Belgian North Sea area

Cited by 15 publications

References 14 publications

The Role of the Belgian Airborne Sniffer Measurements in the MARPOL Annex VI Enforcement Chain

The Role of the Belgian Airborne Sniffer Measurements in the MARPOL Annex VI Enforcement Chain

Assessment of the Effect of International Maritime Regulations on Air Quality in the Southern North Sea

The Inherent Instability of Environmental Parameters Governing Indoor Air Quality on Board Ships and the Use of Temporal Trends to Identify Pollution Sources

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