WASTE NOT, WANT NOT

摘要

Sky high bunker fuel prices may prompt more owners to look at the advantages of advanced waste heat recovery systems. And, as if that wasn't enticement enough, so too should the increasing desire to shrink a ship's carbon footprint. There's nothing particularly new or hard to understand about the concept. A waste-heat recovery (WHR) system reuses excess exhaust-heat to generate energy for on-board electricity consumption. The associated reduction in fuel consumption results in a corresponding reduction in emissions. Of course, this "free power" isn't actually free. You have to add more equipment-and, on the face of things, more equipment takes up space and means added investment cost, not to mention more maintenance. When bunker prices were lower, shipowners took a look at the extra degree of complexity of WHR systems and didn't even bother to calculate the Return on Investment (ROI).