Recovery of ro-pax ferry traffic from covid-19 under tightening environmental regulations: case Helsinki-Tallinn

Abstract

In 2020, the number of passengers on international ro-pax ferries collapsed due to the pandemic caused by the Covid-19 virus and subsequent travel restrictions. At the same time, both the International Maritime Organisation and the European Union are setting stringent regulations on carbon dioxide emissions from ships. In this research, we look at what options companies offering ro-pax services have to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic under-tightening environmental regulations and the future options for the industry. The case under study is ro-pax ferry traffic between Helsinki and Tallinn. It is one of the busiest international passenger ferry connections in the world. The economics of transport are based on large high-speed vessels, the combination of passengers and cargo, and sales onboard. We created four scenarios for the traffic: to continue the same high-speed ro-pax system as in 2019, to reduce the number of vessels, to switch to new types of ships, to slow down the speed of the vessels or to divide traffic into faster and slower ships. The research contributes to discussion of competitive strengths of ro-pax transport.

Ropax Short-Sea Shipping and Covid-19 Pandemic: Case of Finland

“…In other words, it is mostly popular among smaller countries with good logistics infrastructure. As said earlier (Durán-Grados et al, 2020;Hilmola et al, 2015), emissions of roro and ropax ships have been on the societal agenda for years, and in most recent studies, even electricity and hydrogen are being proposed as solutions for significant emission reductions (e.g., Tapaninen and Palu, 2022;Vidas et al, 2021).…”

Assessment of the Development Limitations for Wave Energy Utilization in the Baltic Sea

“…Nowadays, international organizations such as the key maritime regulators including the European Union (EU) and International Maritime Organization (IMO), as well as many countries, have pledged to make contributions in order to change the situation associated with sources of global warming. In 2018, IMO has agreed upon the Initial Strategy on the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from shipping [6], where the reduction of CO 2 emissions per transport work by 2030 is targeted by at least 40%, pursuing efforts towards 70% by 2050, compared to 2008 [7]. The European Union member states have agreed to fulfill the goals set under the Paris Agreement [8] and achieve climate neutrality by 2050.…”

“…First of all, gaining access to such an enormous untapped source of energy will affect consumers such as shipyards, coastal infrastructure, and vessels, all of which are located near the sea, which are increasingly contributing to the global GHG emissions as the share of shipping emissions in global anthropogenic emissions has increased from 2.76% in 2012 to 2.89% in 2018 [10]. As we will further see a rapid decrease in emissions in other energy production and transportation sectors, the share of shipping will continue to increase [7]. Applying wave energy technology in less favorable environmental conditions, such as the case of the Baltic Sea, would presumably enable a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as the consumption of fossil fuels would decrease in the process.…”