Brussels Express – Hapag Lloyd’s first box carrier to run on LNG

German shipping group Hapag-Lloyd has announced the successful conversion of the 15,000 TEU-capacity Brussels Express to run on liquefied natural gas.
In completing the conversion, the ship becomes the first “large” containership to make the switch to LNG propulsion, the company says.
“The fact that a retrofitting of this scale had never been done before meant that we faced numerous challenges – from the planning to the implementation. We have broken new ground with the conversion, and we will now be testing it very precisely in real-world operation,” says Richard von Berlepsch, Managing Director Fleet Management at Hapag-Lloyd. “Fossil LNG is currently the most promising fuel on the path towards zero emissions. The medium-term goal is to have CO2-neutral shipping operations using synthetic natural gas (SNG).”