Germans put up €86 million for LNG bunkerships

The new programme, just announced by the Economics Ministry in Berlin, will run from 2022-2024 and also promote the use of renewable fuels. The first deadline for submitting applications is 31 January, 2022.

Companies can apply for funding over a project duration of maximum three years through share financing with a grant rate of up to 40%. The prerequisite is that the new building project is carried out at a permanently established shipyard or branch located in Germany and is completed in the EU.

This is the third major Berlin promotional funding scheme announced within just a few months as the German Government seeks to kickstart lagging nautical sector developments and offer support to counter the effects of Covid on home shipyards and shipping.

Already up and running are inland ship subsidy programmes to stimulate future-oriented propulsion system and also diesel engines and associated plant upgrades and replacements on inland ships.

Berlin said it was now adding the incentives for LNG bunker ship construction “because shipping is in a state of of environmental and climate protection upheaval. Long-term, alternative fuels are expected to come into use to lower emission levels in shipping”.

The aim, it added, is to increase the number of available bunker ships while improving the infrastructure available for refueling with alternative fuels, so that the use of alternative fuels can also be increased, it added.

It also stressed that new LNG bunker ships built in German yards would be for use not only at seaports or handling points and berths in Germany but also throughout the EU, to conform with EU rules that all member states should expand refueling infrastructures for alternative fuels.