Industry experts representing various nodes within the marine fuels supply chain shared their opinions at the VPS Fuel Quality, New Fuels & Decarbonisation Challenges seminar in Singapore on Thursday (18 September).
The panel discussion was moderated by Captain Rahul Choudhuri, President Strategic Partnerships, VPS who asked the group on their views towards maritime decarbonisation and the transition towards biofuel bunkers:
Elane Ng, Senior Manager, Standards Development Org., SDO@SCIC – Singapore assisting with marine bio bunker fuel uptake
“The Singapore Standards Programme is based on a public and private partnership model where we invite various stakeholders to participate in the committees and they can contribute their expertise in helping us to review and develop standards,” she said.
“Other than developing national standards, we also leverage on international standards participation to align our national standards to international practice.”
“An example is WA2:2022 Specifications for marine biofuel which we have developed in Singapore. That was during the time when Singapore needed to conduct biofuel bunker deliveries, but we did not have a reference standard for the quality specifications while ISO 8217:2017 was also under revision. WA2:2022 was quickly developed with the relevant stakeholders over workshops to meet the urgent industry needs. Earlier this year, WA 2:2022 was revised and its latest edition, TR140:2025, included enhancements such as guidance on storage and handling on marine biofuel and the use of non-FAME products.”
Kasper Soerensen, Head of Marine Fuel Sourcing, East – Seascale Energy, HAFNIA – Transparency the endgame
Soerensen, whose organisation oversees the bunkering operations of 3,000 vessels worldwide, stated Seascale Energy prioritises bunker procurement in the order of quality, availability, and price.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s cheap – if the quality is bad or the product is not available at the right place at the right time in the right quantity, because at the end of the day we support functions for the shipping industry and we don’t want to delay the operations of our customers or our own fleet,” he said.
“However, we want to drive transparency across the bunker sourcing process and beyond. There are still opaque areas in this industry that almost never serves the customers true needs. Our model flips that by aligning our incentives in a very simple and efficient way.”
Jan-Paul de Wilde, Head of Decarbonization, RINA – ‘Change of mindset’ needed
“I have been attending and speaking at conferences for the last four years since I took up my current role and what you hear conference after conference is challenges of decarbonisation and the energy transition,” he stated.
“I’ve been guilty of that as well but what I think needs to be done is a change of mindset. It’s time we start to see more opportunities here than the roadblocks. People, stakeholders in the industry are often claiming uncertainty especially in the fields of availability and pricing.
“The uncertainty is in my opinion self-inflicted by the industry. If the industry collectively does not make a choice of the fuel of the future, the supply will not be there.
I sincerely hope that mindset will change so we start to see more opportunities.
Kai Cheong Wong, Senior Technical Manager, INTERTANKO – All stakeholders must pay for change
Wong emphasised that INTERTANKO’s policy is to “keep all options open” as the industry navigates the marine fuels transition.
“We recognise that not all fuel options are available to everyone, and implementing new regulations will require significant investment,” he said. “While shipowners must play their part, they cannot—and should not—bear the full burden of decarbonisation alone. The costs must be distributed fairly across the value chain, including charterers and other commercial stakeholders.”
He highlighted INTERTANKO’s work to develop standard clauses and guidance; and engage with charterers and other stakeholders to ensure that the costs and responsibilities of compliance are shared equitably.
“This collaborative approach is essential to ensure a smooth and effective transition for the entire industry,” Wong concluded.
Dr Prapisala Thepsithar, Director, Projects, GCMD – Project LOTUS confirms long term usability of biofuel bunkers
During the panel discussion, Dr Thepsithar unveiled findings of Project LOTUS which studied the long-term impact of continuous use of B24 bio Very Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (VLSFO) blend on vessel operations over a six-month period.
The trial was launched in partnership with NYK Line in May 2024. Using a structured monitoring framework, GCMD tracked fuel and lubricant quality at key sampling points across these systems, and inspected engines and fuel systems components throughout the trial.
“In the trial, we encountered no major issues—only manageable operational item like viscosity change and certain items that require constant observation and adjustments. The good news is, yes, biofuels look viable for long-term use, with no observed impact on shipboard systems so far.”
NYK SHIPMANAGEMENT, Mr. Anubhav Garg, Managing Director – NYK a forerunner in biofuel bunker ops
Garg confirmed the success of Project LOTUS; he shared NYK’s goal was to understand the long-term impact on engine components and systems while using biofuels as well as impact on quality of bio fuels during long term storage itself.
“NYK has been a frontrunner when it comes to biofuels. We started using biofuels in 2022 and annual uptake of biofuels was about 8,000 metric tonnes (mt),” stated Garg.
“Today, it’s close to 100,000 mt per year which is quite a big leap and I only this increasing by a much larger proportion in the coming years. Of course, we are still largely restricted to B24 for various reasons due to availability and supply chain restrictions. As we move on, I expect NYK to ramp up usage of biofuels to B30, B40 and higher blends in the near future.”
Andrew Morton, Managing Director, Asia Middle East & Africa, VPS – Gatekeeping the maritime biofuels transition
The last three months has presented a number of fuel related quality issues across several markets.
It is clear from the statistics that there continues to be numerous off-spec bunker samples and challenges remain in the fuel space, shared Morton.
“We work with the major players across the shipping and bunkering sectors and VPS continues to lead the market in its testing and advisory space as well as the digital and decarbonisation part of the maritime sector,” he said.
“We have a good understanding of bunker fuels developed over 40 years and through our partnerships we continue to ensure that we work towards improvements in this space.”
