INTERVIEW: Port of Long Beach to expand bunkering capabilities for green shipping corridors

The Port of Long Beach aims to grow its bunkering operations to supply lower and net-zero emission marine fuels, as it prepares to onboard industry partners under its green and digital shipping corridor with the Port of Los Angeles and Singapore, a senior port authority executive said.

"We don't do as much bunkering today in LA [Los Angeles] and Long Beach [compared to Singapore]. I think that's a more of an area of operation that will need to be expanded in our ports to be able to support these alternative fuels," Heather Tomley, managing director of planning and environment affairs for the Port of Long Beach, California told S&P Global Commodity Insights in an interview.

This comes as the Port of Long Beach has identified a potential group of shipping line partners, following the conclusion of a comprehensive baseline study to understand shipping activities along the trans-Pacific shipping corridor and decarbonization opportunities.

The port plans to have more focused discussions with these potential partners on areas like the type of bunker fuel they require and when the fuel is needed, so that preparations can be made to facilitate such bunkering.

"That takes a while where we are to get through the approval process, get through the permitting process and start to establish those operations with these fuels that are going to be different, and there will be a learning curve," said Tomley on the sidelines of the Singapore Maritime Week.

"So starting that process now and working through it is going to be an important part."

An agreement to form a green and digital shipping corridor connecting the Port of Singapore, Los Angeles and Long Beach was signed in April last year, while further partnership strategy details were unveiled at the UN Climate Change Conference in December.

In 2022, the Port of Long Beach also joined the Shanghai-Los Angeles green shipping corridor, which aims to deploy a zero lifecycle greenhouse gas emission ship on the route by 2030.

Methanol first

As the industry moves towards a multifuel future, Tomley sees keen interest in the near term for methanol as a marine fuel.

"All of the shipping line partners that are a part of that [Shanghai-Los Angeles] corridor are already making vessel orders for ships that use methanol, while at the same time they're exploring what an ammonia option might look like," she said.

Although the Port of Long Beach has existing facilities that can easily be converted to store methanol, the port lacks mechanisms or bunkering facilities for methanol specifically to ships, said Tomley.

Meanwhile, the use of ammonia as a marine fuel is "a lot more challenging", she said, adding that safety risks and toxicity concerns from the community can be alleviated through the sharing of bunkering safety standards and training within shipping corridors.

"We also recognize with the lower energy density, there's going to be more fueling that occurs. I think bunkering will become more of an operation in Long Beach and Los Angeles," Tomley said.

Such operations could be similar to how LNG bunkering was first carried out at the port in 2022, using trucks instead of a dedicated bunkering facility, she added.

"As sort of a stopgap to be able to provide the fuel, we've figured out a mechanism where we can do it at a smaller scale because we don't have larger facilities. So there may need to be an interim solution like that as we're coming up with plans to meet the ultimate longer term needs," she said.

Green corridor priorities

Green shipping corridors can play a key role in bringing in cleaner fuels and technologies, by providing a controlled and contained environment to address specific challenges, said Tomley.

"Our hope is that through doing some initial deployments, bringing on some shipping lines that are committed partners that are ready to route vessels along this corridor, we can then start there and then expand out," said Tomley.

The Port of Long Beach's current priority is to focus on developing its shipping corridors with the Port of Singapore and Shanghai, added Tomley, when asked if the Port of Long Beach is looking to establish green shipping corridors with other ports.

This comes as the number of such green corridor initiatives have grown significantly, more than doubling from 21 to 44 globally, according to the 2023 annual progress report from the Global Maritime Forum.

"We need to be careful that we don't get green corridor fatigue because it is a lot of the same shipping line partners that are lined up to participate in all these different corridors," she said.