5 things we learned at Posidonia 2018

1 – Not everyone thinks scrubbers are a bad idea for meeting the IMO 2020 low sulphur cap. Scrubbers are attracting some serious attention from Greek owners especially for large vessels such as VLCCs.

2 – LNG powered ship engines are having a format war akin to the VHS versus Betamax video recorders in the early 1980's although in this case its MEGI versus X-DF propulsion. Let's hope for early adopters of MEGI it does not prove to be the same as for early adopters of Betamax.

3 – Electric vehicles in large scale production will be cheaper to manufacture than petrol driven cars, which could be bad news for tanker shipping come 2025.

4 – New regulations for safety and emission reductions can actually mean a new ship has higher fuel consumption not less. So Japanese shipbuilder Japan Marine United (JMU) has designed a bulker to overcome the negative impact of the additional equipment and steel and still be more fuel efficient.

5 – Sometimes the old technologies work best. When the power failed during the Japan Seminar, ironically on Maritime Innovation, on a very hot afternoon, the quick thinking organisers whipped out plastic fans to give the audience to help keep themselves cool.