Samsung Heavy receives approval from US on gas recovery system

Samsung Heavy Industries, a major shipbuilder in South Korea, said on Tuesday that its boil-off gas recovery system (BReS) for LNG-powered vessels has obtained a statement of fact approval from the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS).

BReS is a heat exchange technology that can re-liquefy and collect excess boil-off gas using clod heat from LNG tanks instead of a high-pressure compressor. As a result, while reducing fuel costs, BRes enables zeroing of carbon dioxide emissions.

Existing LNG-powered vessels use high-pressure compressors, most of which are imported from foreign makers, in order to remove boil-off gas through forced combustion which accompanies carbon dioxide emissions.

"When BReS is installed on a container ship operating between Europe and Asia, it will reduce about 30 tons of LNG fuel and 60 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per vehicle," said a Samsung official.

The emission amount of 60 tons of carbon dioxide is equivalent to that generated when 500 cars travel between Seoul and Busan.

 "We urgently need to develop new technologies for carbon neutrality in the shipbuilding and shipping industries due to strengthening IMO environmental regulations," said Park Gun-il, a technical member of Samsung's eco-friendly research center.

"Samsung will continue to lead the market by developing not only LNG but also various eco-friendly technologies and products," Park added.

Write to Ik-Hwan Kim at lovepen@hankyung.com