Ro-Ro transportation competes with land transportation, offering flexible options for wheeled cargo and beyond: from containers to dry and liquid bulk cargo carriage. The popularity of this type of shipping requires the support of environmental practices, which you will discover further in our article.
With the rise of environmental initiatives, there is a growing need for shippers and carriers to be aware of the challenges and opportunities to ensure an efficient and sustainable global supply chain. Imagine loading up your fleet to cover a route for which you can calculate the carbon footprint in advance or be sure that the Roll-on/Roll-off vessel is running on hydrogen fuel cells. This is no longer science fiction but the possibility for your daily logistics operations. Let's look at the trends in environmental initiatives for Ro-Ro transportation.
Discovering environmental impact
To begin with, let's take a look at the factors that affect the energy consumption of Ro-Ro vessels:
- speed
- carrying capacity
- operational operations
With higher speed and lower cargo capacity, fuel consumption and emissions will increase accordingly. With this in mind, energy consumption can be calculated, predicted, and controlled.
In view of the above, it is a common practice in the global supply chain to utilize the benefits of Ro-Ro transportation in intermodal integration. Not only by avoiding traffic congestion but also by emphasizing the environmental benefits of reducing the overall carbon footprint of intermodal transportation, Ro-Ro vessels are worth choosing.
Achieve sustainability in Ro-Ro shipping
What are the key drivers for maintaining the eco-friendliness of Ro-Ro shipping? Let's focus on regulatory provisions, as having this information will save carriers and shippers money on penalties, facilitate operations planning, and improve social responsibility by providing high-quality green transportation service with minimal environmental damage.
- The IMO 2020 Sulfur Cap is the primary statement since the International Maritime Organization enforced the global sulfur cap of 0.5% (down from 3.5%) in marine fuel from January 1, 2020. The IMO 2020 provisions represent a massive reduction from the previous limit of 3.5%. This affected the entire shipping industry, including Ro-Ro shipping, unlike earlier regional sulfur controls, for instance. Most of the sulfur regulations before IMO 2020 applied to Emission Control Areas (ECAs). IMO 2020 extended the limits worldwide, making it the first truly global sulfur cap.
- Going forward, the IMO's priority is to reduce the carbon intensity of international shipping by 40% by 2030 and to achieve zero emissions by 2050 or so.
- Finally, international regulations are reinforced by regional rules from organizations such as the EU Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), which requires ships transporting cargo in European waters to monitor, report, and pay for their CO2 emissions to compensate. In other regions, it is the ECA (Emission Control Areas) for North America and the Baltic Sea.
Let's take a closer look at the main ways to overcome the challenges in the Ro-Ro sector and achieve environmentally friendly shipping:
- Ecologically clean fuel: Initiatives such as FuelEU Maritime encourage the transition to cleaner fuels. To avoid environmental risks for Ro-Ro freight operators, shipping companies use low-sulfur fuels and LNG (liquefied natural gas), as well as biofuels derived from environmentally friendly used oil.
- Biosecurity: Biosecurity practices for vessels, such as ballast water treatment systems (BWTS) using UV irradiation, help to deactivate the spread of bacteria and viruses in new marine environments.
- Decarbonization practices: Optimized vessels with bulbous noses and propellers to allow higher levels of aerodynamics and energy efficiency, combined with air lubrication, cooling, exhaust gas cleaning, slow evaporation, and waste heat recovery for further fuel consumption reduction.
- Electrification: Integration of electric powertrains and hybrid engines. Examples include all-electric Ro-Ro ferries in short sea shipping.
- Modernization of port infrastructure: Onshore energy systems to reduce emissions during loading/unloading and designing “green” terminals using renewable energy sources.
- Other keys: Waste management, recycling of old vessels, biosecurity of cargo, dismantling of transport facilities, etc.
Innovations in the shipping industry: Solutions for Ro-Ro
Are you looking to focus on transforming your supply chain, optimizing costs, and responding to global trends and demand for sustainable logistics solutions? However, none of this is possible without overcoming key challenges, such as delays, lack of transparency in supply chains, and high carbon emissions. This is where technology becomes a key enabler for sustainable solutions.
- Energy efficiency systems powered by carbon calculation tools are useful for any type of cargo you plan to ship. In real time, you can predict the exact amount of CO2 emissions just by specifying the departure and arrival points, and get an offset carbon figure. In addition, you can take full advantage of the database of global carriers and compare carbon emissions by specific carriers to choose the best option. Quick access to such an advanced calculator will facilitate your operations and put supply chain planning at your fingertips.
- Selecting the most efficient and environmentally friendly routes should be based on extensive real-time data. Tools for instantly calculating your route distances and transit times will help you find the transportation option that best suits your needs. Route optimization and planning reduce travel time and help you select the best option of Ro-Ro transportation for a particular request. As a result, you get lower fuel consumption and more efficient operations.
- Here we've come to supply chain transparency. Tracking the entire route and your shipment at each new stage of delivery gives you the ability to proactively respond and be precisely prepared. Get complete real-time information about any changes in the route and the current location of the cargo on the world map. Provide yourself with the data to analyze logistics operations and thoroughly prepare for improving the energy efficiency of transportation, avoiding environmental damage due to poor logistics management.
When making decisions for your supply chain, it is beneficial to rely on tools that gather real-time and historical data from global logistics service providers about global freight activity. Thus, by implementing digital logistics solutions in your business operations, managing emissions, improving the environment, increasing visibility, and much more will be automated in your workflow.
Improving the “green” logistics management with SeaRates
What's next in Ro-Ro sustainability? By 2050, Ro-Ro shipping should be carbon neutral, fully compliant with the IMO's zero-emissions targets. In addition to the widespread adoption of green hydrogen, ammonia, and electric propulsion, the industry expects full digitalization of operations to optimize resource and energy use. How to achieve this? It is this systematic approach of combining green logistics and advanced digital solutions for cargo transportation that is possible with SeaRates.
Impact the improvement in sustainability and achieve immediate influence in managing carbon offset. Except that SeaRates CO2 Calculator enables you to choose the greenest delivery option, you can take part in our Ecology Support Programme, which is part of the corporate Sustainability Strategy. Supply chains are empowered by the greener logistics services in one click with SeaRates' 'CO2 offset' shipping option. Just find the available carbon offset compensation based on your shipment routes and types of transportation. Chart the path to sustainability in Ro-Ro, multimodal transportation, or any other mode of your choice.
To sum up
Ro-Ro is one of the most appropriate methods of wheeled cargo transportation and other types because of its flexibility and efficiency. However, modern challenges, including reduction of emissions and optimization of logistic processes, call for another kind of solution.
By implementing a thoughtful mixture of digital innovations in green technology and logistics solutions, together we can transform the Ro-Ro freight industry. We're paving the way for this by providing tools to manage emissions, optimize logistics processes, and implement green solutions. Let’s create a future of efficient, transparent, and environmentally responsible logistics.
Invest in a sustainable future for your business and the planet by partnering with us. You are always welcome to contact our team at [email protected] to enhance your logistics experience and fulfill any requirements.
