Strong growth momentum for Maritime Singapore
Published by Jessica Casey,
Editor
LNG Industry,
Singapore’s annual vessel arrival tonnage, total tonnage of ships under the Singapore flag, container throughput, total bunker sales, and sales of alternative bunker fuels reached new highs in 2024. Cargo throughput handled at the port of Singapore also increased in 2024. These were among some of the announcements by Murali Pillai, Minister of State for Law and Transport, at the annual Singapore Maritime Foundation (SMF) New Year Conversations event. Murali said that despite strained global supply chains, Maritime Singapore has maintained strong growth momentum in 2024 and looks forward to continued steady growth in 2025.
Total bunker sales registered a new high of 54.92 million t, marking a 6.0% y/y increase. The increased uptake was partly due to the extended Asia-Europe shipping routes via the Cape of Good Hope given the disruptions in the Red Sea. Singapore made steady progress as the world’s largest bunkering port, supplying over a sixth of the total fuel used by global shipping.
Sales of alternative bunker fuels exceeded 1 million t for the first time to reach 1.34 million t in 2024, a y/y doubling. Specifically, the sale of biofuel blends grew from 0.52 million t in 2023 to 0.88 million t. Biofuel blends of up to B50 are available commercially with trials of up to B100 on-going. LNG increased from 0.11 million t in 2023 to 0.46 million t. An expression of interest was launched in December 2024 to explore scalable solutions for sea-based LNG reloading to complement the existing onshore LNG bunkering storage and jetty capacities and support the supply of e-/bio-LNG as a marine fuel in Singapore. Methanol was available on a commercial scale and registered 1626 t, while 9.74 t of ammonia was bunkered for the first time globally in trials in the port.
As part of the pro-enterprise rules review exercise led by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade and Industry, Gan Kim Yong, to help lower business costs, Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) will reduce the verification frequency of mass flow meters from twice to once a year, starting 1 April 2025. This aligns with the updated SS648:2024 standards and is expected to save the industry approximately S$300 000/y. Risk-based audits will continue as the industry undertakes the transition.
From 1 April 2025, all bunker suppliers will need to provide digital bunkering services and issue electronic bunker delivery (e-BDN) notes by default. The digital bunkering initiative, which includes an e-BDN record verification service by MPA, aims to streamline operations, enhance security and transparency, and is expected to save up to 40 000 man-days annually. A standard for digital bunkering supply chain documentation (SS709:2024) was also published in November 2024. Singapore is the first port to implement digital bunkering at scale for bunkering operations following approval by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to use eBDN at the 80th meeting of the Marine Environment Protection Committee in 2023.
Read the article online at: https://www.lngindustry.com/small-scale-lng/16012025/strong-growth-momentum-for-maritime-singapore/
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