Cleaner Low-Sulfur Marine Fuels Could Save 40,000 Lives Annually

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Researchers writing in the journal Environmental Science and Technology have concluded that unless new low-sulfur standards are adopted for the ubiquitous marine fuels used worldwide to get that Barbie from China to your doorstep, 40,000 needless premature human deaths may occur each year due to the harmful emissions caused by high sulfur fuels.

The current research is a follow up to a 2007 study by the same authors that concluded 60,000 people died prematurely in 2002 due to high sulfur marine fuel usage. The new study assumes that ocean going traffic, which has decreased dramatically in the economic downturn, will bounce back to normal levels in the near future.

The authors of the study suggest that new policies being considered right now to force ocean going vessels to use low sulfur fuels containing 0.5% sulfur (versus the current 2.4%) are the only chance to stave off the premature deaths. The new policies being considered include outright banning the use of high sulfur fuels or banning their use only within 200 miles of high population coastal areas.

Sources: EurekAlert and ES&T

Image Credit: Kofoed‘s Flickr Photostream. Used under a Creative Commons License.

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Tags: deaths, Emissions, low-sulfur, marine fuel, oil tanker, preamture deaths, research, Science, smokestack, sulfur, tanker

About the Author

Nick Chambers Not your traditional car guy.

http://Web Burton Waxman

We have developed a process to capture SO2 from either land based power plants or ocean based vessils. The process is regenerable, and mitigates the captured SO2 rapidly. All materials are widely available and biodegradable. The ocean based process of sea water scrubbing is not used and the process of capture yields products of commercial value. Due to the rapid reaction which is mildly exothermic, no preditory energy consumption is necessary and the capturing system may be contained on the sea vessiles.