Use of gas as fuel is attracting increasing attention since this may be economically attractive depending on the relationship between the cost of gas versus the cost of heavy fuel oil and marine diesel oil. Moreover the exhaust gas emissions can also be reduced due to the chemical composition of the gas.
The two-stroke low speed ME-GI engine is a gas-injection, dual-fuel, low-speed diesel engine that, when acting as main propulsion engine in LNG carriers or any other type of merchant marine vessel, can burn any ratio of fuel-oil and gas, depending on the energy source available on board and dictated by relative cost and owner preference.
Both LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) and LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas) can be used as fuel. While LNG and LPG carriers carry gas as cargo, the potential for carrying gas in gas fuel tanks aboard other vessel types is currently subject to a parallel development for which a cryogenic gas fuel-supply system can be used.
MAN Diesel & Turbo has decided to make a full-scale demonstration and performance verification test of the GI principle for all kinds of marine applications on its 4T50ME-X R&D test engine, which will be rebuilt as a 4T50ME-GI engine ready to operate on natural gas by end-2010.