BUNKERING IN THE 21ST CENTURY

摘要

Through necessity, the reputation of the bunkering world is slowly changing with the availability of lots of relatively cheap new small tankers available on the market for charter, though still with the same operators and practices. But the construction of new purpose-built barges, particularly for LNG, is also increasing. There are still many places in the world where the experience of bunkering a vessel has not changed for the full career of many old hands still at sea, and some of the bunker barges have been around equally as long. The image of an old rust-bucket tanker limping alongside a shiny new large vessel, preparing to pump over hundreds of tonnes of fuel, can make any chief engineer's heart sink. The content and quantity of the fuel is often not what was ordered or expected and can cause many problems for the vessel, often once the bunker barge has departed.