New Jersey company to install scrubber on Finnish ship

CR Ocean Engineering says it has now sold five scrubbers to reduce sulfur emissions to shipping companies.    CR Ocean Engineering (CROE), based in Parsippany, N.J. said that the Finnish container shipping company Bore has ordered one of its scrubbers to reduce sulfur dioxide emissions from the main engine on its container roll-on, roll-off vessel Seagard.
   The exhaust gas cleaning system is scheduled to be on line in late this spring.
   Once installed, the system will allow the vessel to meet the low sulfur requirements in the emission control area (ECA) in the Baltic Sea even when burning high sulfur heavy oil. The CROE design has special features that allow the ship to efficiently reduce stack sulfur emissions even when operating in the lowest alkalinity/salinity waters of the eastern Baltic.
   At the start of this year, all ships that operate in the North American and European ECAs were be required to switch to .01 percent sulfur fuel or install scrubbers to meet the equivalency standard for SO2. As an alternate, IMO has allowed ship-owners to install scrubbing systems as an equivalent to fuel-switching.
   Nick Confuorto, chief operations officer of CR Ocean Engineering said the company has been designing and supplying scrubbers since the 1950’s to industrial companies to treat a wide variety of pollutants, and has now moved into the marine market.
   CROE has sold five of the systems to shipping companies including two to Sweden’s Stena, and two to a U.S. bulk ship operator which will use them on the Great Lakes.
   The company makes both open loop systems, which use seawater to reduce sulfur dioxide, and closed loop systems, which use a recirculating scrubber design that utilizes an aqueous solution to reduce sulfur dioxide so it can be used in fresh water.