Paris (AFP)

The cruise sector, regularly attacked on its environmental impact, wants to highlight its innovations to reduce pollution, while liners powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG) will ramp up in the coming years.

On December 29, the Costa Smeralda, a giant of the seas 337 meters long and able to accommodate 6,600 passengers, made its inaugural stopover in Marseille.

Its specificity? Being the second cruise liner in the world - out of the 250 in operation - to use liquefied natural gas (LNG), a fuel that does not emit sulfur dioxide, reduces CO2 emissions by up to 20%, and more 95% fine particles, according to the Costa group.

"We have been working for years on this technology which is a real challenge. LNG is the best today, it is the cleanest fossil fuel", summarizes AFP Raffaele d'Ambrosio, vice -president Northern Europe of Costa Cruises, group which held a press conference Thursday in Paris.

Currently, 26 liners intended to be propelled with LNG are under construction or on firm order in shipyards, representing 44% of all the ships in the world project.

As of January 1, 2020, the sulfur content of marine fuels was limited to 0.5%, compared to 3.5% previously, by the International Maritime Organization.

"The regulations are becoming more and more strict and the boats under construction integrate them. This concern for the environment concerns not only the owner but also the builder. And the ultimate objective of all remains of course + zero emissions + thanks to a "technological mix +", highlights François Lambert, general delegate of the Group of industries of construction and naval activities (Gican).

"LNG is only one technology among others to improve what already exists, or to test on what is being built, such as fuel cells" to store energy, adds Erminio Eschena, president of Clia France who brings together the main cruise companies.

He deplores the fact that the sector is undergoing "oversized attention" in terms of pollution, "while efforts and investments have been made for years: an LNG liner costs a billion euros".

- Waiting for catches -

"Our boats are already 100% self-sufficient in water thanks to desalination plants on board. All the food is weighed, the waste is sorted on board. And the unserved meals are unloaded during stopovers for food banks: 160,000 meals have been distributed since the end of 2017 ", adds Georges Azouze, president of Costa France.

The cruise industry also recalls that maritime transport as a whole is only responsible for 2 to 3% of CO2 emissions, while it accounts for more than 85% of world trade.

For its part, the NGO Transport & Environment claims that the American company Carnival (market leader, which notably holds Costa, Editor's note) alone in 2017 emitted ten times more sulfur oxide around the European coasts than the all of the 260 million vehicles in the European fleet.

But cruise professionals do not want to be the only ones to focus on the ecological transition: "the whole ecosystem must participate. If you have LNG liners, you must be able to supply them", notes Erminio Eschena, President of Clia and also representative of the cruise line MSC.

He points to the lack of equipment in the ports which forces the liners to let their engines run during stopovers to allow life on board. "Our ships have been equipped for years to connect to shore power, but only 13 ports in the world offer connections, and none in Europe".

Marseille should be equipped by 2025, a technical challenge because a giant of the seas "consumes the equivalent in electricity of the city of Toulon at the quay", recently underlined the president LR of the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d 'region. Azur Renaud Muselier. A cruise liner stopover in a port does not generally exceed a dozen hours.

The same problem arises for the supply of LNG: in Europe, "the specific barges are present only in Barcelona, ​​therefore every two weeks" the Costa Smeralda and the Aida Nova, the first LNG liner launched at the end of 2018, must go there to fill up.

The ever-growing cruise industry expects 32 million passengers in 2020.

© 2020 AFP