Retrofitting ships with green ammonia propulsion is expensive   

Retrofitting ships for green ammonia propulsion is currently prohibitively expensive, an in-depth study has found.

A cross-company, cross-discipline group of industry experts concluded that deepsea shipping can transform to ammonia as fuel, but there are several difficult hurdles to overcome.

Through 2022, a group of industry experts, led by Norwegian shipowner Grieg Star, studied the possibilities of retrofitting an open hatch vessel to run on green ammonia.

The study found the main barriers today are the combination of high retrofit investment costs, lack of availability of competitively priced green ammonia and unclear effects of regulatory frameworks. The study was initiated and facilitated by the Norwegian Green Shipping Programme. In total, 21 entities participated in the study’s five workstreams, with workstream leads from Yara, the Norwegian Maritime Authority, G2 Ocean and Grieg Maritime Group.