The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) will form a work group with the maritime industry to undertake an industry road mapping exercise to prepare the Singapore bunker industry for a sustainable future.
y William Cho (Port of SingaporeUploaded by Hydriz) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
The initiative was discussed at MPA’s Singapore International Bunkering Conference and Exhibition (SIBCON), where delegates heard that the roadmap will include drivers such as digitalisation and innovation, and transparency and productivity in the sector and has an anticipated completion date of Q4 2019.
Andrew Tan, chief executive of MPA, said: “In light of the International Maritime Organization’s global sulphur limit from 1 January 2020, Singapore is committed to ensuring a sufficient and broad range of solutions available to ship owners.”
Trending issues
SIBCON aimed to provide insight into trending issues such as global fuel availability, compliance options, enforcement regimes, and the developments for LNG as a marine fuel.
MPA said that in the coming months it will also pilot an electronic Bunker Delivery Notes (e-BDN) to drive greater productivity, efficiency and transparency in the bunkering process.
e-BDNs allow important bunkering information to be transmitted almost instantaneously to both buyers and sellers. MPA will continue to work with the industry to roll out this initiative by 2020.
Other MPA initiatives include the publication of an information sheet on the list of licensed bunker suppliers of low-sulphur fuels in Singapore by mid-2019 and enforcing mandatory use of Mass Flow Meters (MFM) for bunker tankers to deliver distillates in the Port of Singapore by 1 July 2019.
MPA’s international focus group to deepen cooperation and information sharing on LNG bunkering now has 11 participants.
Source: Greenport