Future-ready and retrofit-capable: MAN Cryo on ammonia fuel supply

Here is an interview with Justin Pearce (pictured), process engineer and technical project manager at MAN Cryo about his company’s ammonia fuel supply system. 

Question: How have you tackled ammonia’s lower energy density in your system design? Are you focusing more on newbuilds or retrofitting existing vessels?

A: We see our place in the market as a system integrator. This means not the design of a fuel supply system, but integrating it with overall requirements of a specific project. This could include bunkering equipment, storage tank(s), fuel supply system and release mitigation. So far, we have seen the market for newbuilds is a bit warmer, but our solutions will be able to be adapted based on customer requirement.

With regard to energy density, there is not much that can be done overcome the additional cargo space as compared to LNG.

Q: What’s your approach to vent treatment and handling ammonia vapor, especially in confined marine environments?

A; The philosophy is to retain as much vapour in the system as possible to reduce the sizing of such equipment. But for those releases we must accept; the mitigation system is a chemical scrubber system. A similar concept has been used already in onboard with closed-loop EGCS, and is common on land installations. The main advantage is reliability, that space requirements for main equipment are limited and that the product is safe to handle.

Q: Which classification societies have approved your ammonia FSS so far, and what has the certification process been like?

We have worked primarily with DNV Alternative Fuels team during the design phase which has included many iterations to ensure the best solution. The cooperation with DNV Alternative fuels team has been very productive and the team have been very helpful in answering our questions and giving guidance.

Q What unique safety features or redundancies have you built into your system that differentiate it from others on the market?

In terms of the overall design there are already clear rules regarding double barriers, operator presence and level of automation for ammonia systems. Redundancy for other systems such as release mitigation or holding time are discussions with class and owners to find the right safe and cost-effective solutions.

Q: Given MAN Cryo links to MAN ES, how much is that a factor for securing orders and how do you consider competitors like Alfa Laval?

We don’t see ourselves as a direct competitor to Alfa Laval’s FFS. Previously we have incorporated AL’s FFS for other media into the overall system design based on client wishes, it could well be the same for AFSS too. On the other side of this, we do have the expertise to design the entire system from our Göteborg office in cooperation with the Chinese manufacturing company YADA to provide a competitive price.

Aside from MAN’s own products, we’ve explored providing systems compatible with a range of other engine platforms, ensuring we are not locked into any single system. Our focus is on adapting to clients’ specific requirements.