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  • S7 Ep5: Lara Naqushbandi, CEO of ETFuels

    S7 Ep5: Lara Naqushbandi, CEO of ETFuels
    2026/03/09

    We unveil how some e-fuel producers are progressing their projects despite the uncertainty around the fate of a global pricing mechanism for shipping’s GHG emissions.

    Podcast highlights


    In this episode, Lara explains how the FuelEU Maritime regulation, with its requirements on the GHG intensity of the energy used on ships to ratchet up from 2030, was instrumental in sealing a 10-year binding offtake agreement under which ETFuels will supply e-methanol to shipping company RFOcean.
    The agreement, she says, demonstrates that the EU regulation, with its clear penalties for non-compliance and incentives for e-fuels, is strong enough to incentivise a fuel switch and make e-fuel production projects viable. She warns that companies that opt to do nothing and end up being hit by penalties are likely to see their fuel costs increase by 55% by 2030.
    Lara explains that the biggest challenge for ETFuels isn’t offering a mutually agreeable price for its e-methanol, but rather persuading shipping companies to commit to offtake agreements several years before they receive the fuel. While such long-term deals are essential for e-fuel producers to secure financing, she argues that locking in a long-term price for e-fuels is also a good risk management approach for shipping companies, as supplies of compliant fuels will be limited throughout the 2030s.
    Asked whether shipowners’ appetite for long-term agreements was dampened by the uncertainty around the IMO Net-Zero Framework, she reports that the potential global regulation was never a main driver for early transactions. She reveals that ETFuels currently has terms agreed for over 200% of its first plant’s production capacity and advanced commercial discussions with four additional companies, driven by European regulation.
    She also reflects on the role of public funding in making the first e-fuel production projects financially viable in the short and medium term, and on the reasons why installations in the United States and Europe can be competitive with countries like China.
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    27 分
  • S7 Ep4: Daniel Gent, Marine Fuels Transition Lead, Soya Group

    S7 Ep4: Daniel Gent, Marine Fuels Transition Lead, Soya Group
    2026/02/23
    We ask what a sensible approach to decarbonisation can look like with the new Marine Fuels Transition Lead for Soya Group, which partly owns UECC, Wallenius Wilhelmsen and Wallenius Sol.
    Podcast highlights
    Daniel argues that shipping companies should move ahead of regulatory requirements on decarbonisation and start integrating alternative fuels into their operations despite uncertainty around the IMO Net-Zero Framework. He warns that adopting a ‘sit back and wait’ approach risks creating knowledge gaps, which would lead to those companies being outcompeted in the longer term.
    He makes the case that ‘union is strength’ when it comes to decarbonisation strategies, both in terms of sharing learnings between individual companies and aggregating demand to send stronger demand signals to alternative fuels producers.
    Daniel also shares some key learnings from UECC’s experience trialling and adopting LNG and biofuels. He emphasises that pilots must be designed to generate ‘repeatable learnings’, as well as the importance of mastering data and certification requirements for the use of renewable fuels to be recognised by regulators. He also explains how the company achieved, five years ahead of time, its ambition of having 40% alternative fuels in its energy mix by 2030.
    Reflecting on whether using alternative fuels pays off in business terms today, he acknowledges that first movers are not consistently rewarded commercially yet, with the picture depending on whether each company’s customer base is prepared to pay for decarbonised shipping. However, he highlights that the benefits are ‘more strategic than financial’, and insists that being prepared to introduce alternative fuels is a pragmatic decision.
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    23 分
  • S7 Ep3: FuelEU Maritime turns 1 - Robert Gaina, Ardmore and Filip Feurst, Stena Bulk

    S7 Ep3: FuelEU Maritime turns 1 - Robert Gaina, Ardmore and Filip Feurst, Stena Bulk
    2026/02/09
    Shipping companies Ardmore and Stena Bulk discuss how they have navigated the first year of the FuelEU Maritime regulation.
    Podcast highlights
    Ardmore’s Chief Operating Officer, Robert Gaina, explains how the company, which operates 25 chemical and product tankers, has decided to comply with FuelEU Maritime by bunkering biofuels on selected voyages.
    Describing how the new regulation, which sets a limit on the greenhouse gas (GHG) intensity of the energy used on ships, has impacted crews and onshore teams in practice, he argues that the biggest change was not technical, but ‘behavioural’ – as ensuring compliance requires closer collaboration between different teams on voyage planning and bunker procurement.
    As Ardmore’s fleet is operated primarily on the spot market but also includes vessels on time charters, Robert compares the complexity of ensuring compliance under the two trading models.
    Asked about the commercial repercussions of the regional regulation, he explains why he doesn’t believe that it has made European companies less competitive, and why he expects the additional costs to eventually be passed down as the market adapts.
    Stena Bulk’s Sustainability Manager, Filip Feurst, explains why the tanker operator opted for pooling as its main FuelEU compliance strategy, despite having six vessels capable of using methanol as fuel in its fleet of 58 ships.
    He illustrates how companies that operate the majority of their vessels on the spot market, like Stena Bulk, face additional challenges in planning for their FuelEU Maritime compliance – as a lack of visibility on whether a voyage will call Europe makes it harder for those companies to plan the bunkering and use of alternative fuels. But he explains how the new regulation has nonetheless changed Stena Bulk’s approach to fuel procurement.
    Filip also relates how the industry has leapt forward on data sharing as owners, operators, and pooling parties need to exchange information to ensure compliance and avoid penalties.
    Looking ahead, he sees a commercial potential for companies that are able to monetise and trade the compliance surpluses of their dual-fuel vessels, although he notes that the opportunity might be easier to seize for companies on liner trades.
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    28 分
  • S7 Ep2: Jason Stefanatos, Global Decarbonization Director, DNV

    S7 Ep2: Jason Stefanatos, Global Decarbonization Director, DNV
    2026/01/26

    DNV’s Global Decarbonization Director analyses the main trends from the alternative-fuelled vessel orderbook in 2025, and sheds light on what to expect in 2026.

    Jason Stefanatos

    Jason Stefanatos is Global Decarbonization Director at DNV, a role which he has held since 2023. He joined the classification society 15 years ago, having previously worked in a technical role for the Hellenic Navy and as a research assistant at the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA). Jason holds a M. Sc. in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering from NTUA.

    DNV’s Alternative Fuels Insights (AFI) platform gathers data on the development and uptake of alternative fuels and technology, covering both vessels and bunkering infrastructure. The platform has more than 18,000 users across the maritime industry.
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    26 分
  • S7 Ep1: New Year’s special: three wishes for shipping in 2026

    S7 Ep1: New Year’s special: three wishes for shipping in 2026
    2026/01/12

    Representatives from academia, the bunkering industry and environmental NGOs reflect on some of the positive developments that marked 2025 and share their main wish for 2026.

    Speakers:
    Tristan Smith is Professor of Energy and Transport at the UCL Energy Institute, where he leads a research group focused on the global shipping industry. He attends MEPC meetings as a delegate of IMarEST and is a contributing author to work published by the IMO, UNEP, and the UK Committee on Climate Change. He trained and worked as a naval architect before joining the UCL Energy Institute in 2010.


    Alexander Prokopakis is Executive Director of IBIA – the International Bunker Industry Association, which represents companies across the marine energy value chain, including traditional and alternative marine fuels suppliers, traders, brokers, shipowners and port authorities. Previously, he worked in the bunkering industry, including as the CEO of PRO Holdings, the founder of the Probunkers project, and the lead of Mamidakis Group’s shipping, bunkering and aviation activities. He holds an MBA from St. John’s University.
    Sian Prior is Shipping Director at Seas At Risk and Lead Advisor for the Clean Arctic Alliance, which consists of 24 not-for-profit organisations and is focused on protecting the Arctic from the impacts of shipping. She has 30 years of experience in policy development, primarily in the non-government sector, but was also seconded to government positions. She has a B.Sc. in marine biology and oceanography from Bangor University and a PhD in marine ecotoxicology from Queen Mary, University of London.
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    26 分
  • S6 Ep25: Irene Rosberg, Director, The Blue MBA, Copenhagen Business School

    S6 Ep25: Irene Rosberg, Director, The Blue MBA, Copenhagen Business School
    2025/12/15
    Irene Rosberg, Director of the Executive MBA in Shipping and Logistics at the Copenhagen Business School – which is widely known as The Blue MBA – explains why this globally recognised course came into being nearly 25 years ago, how it has evolved by keeping a finger on the pulse of a rapidly changing maritime sector, and what skills ‘fit-for-purpose’ leaders need today to grow and succeed, and, most importantly, to take their companies forward in a highly competitive and quickly evolving market.

    Over 450 ‘students’ have graduated since the course was launched, and its most recent cohort comprised 48 participants from 25 countries.

    At its launch nearly a quarter of a century ago, leaders in shipping and related sectors were predominantly male and drawn from the countries that had the largest maritime economies, such as Western Europe, the US and Japan.

    As Irene explains, today’s Blue MBA requires a mindset that embraces diversity in terms of nationality and gender but the course is laser focused on providing a holistic view of shipping and its connected industries, and one of its strengths is that its students are drawn from a wide range of industry segments, including owners, operators, freight forwarders, ship managers, lawyers and finance professionals. The students learn from their tutors – and also from each other.

    The MBA also requires its students to have a job in maritime, and this enables them to apply the learning and insights they gain throughout the course to real life challenges and issues within their own companies – education informs practise and vice versa.

    An executive leader today cannot just be an expert in a niche area, they must be able to read the market, put together forecasts, understand risk management, create strategies, understand ESG obligations and environmental regulations – and also recognise the importance of soft skills, emotional intelligence, human capital and taking a collaborative approach to decision-making.
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    34 分
  • S6 Ep24: Paul Hexter, President, Waterfront Shipping

    S6 Ep24: Paul Hexter, President, Waterfront Shipping
    2025/12/01
    In this conversation, Paul Hexter lifts the veil on some of the practical challenges that Waterfront Shipping experienced since the first seven methanol dual-fuel vessels joined its fleet in 2016. He emphasises the central role of onboard teams and shipowners in solving technical teething issues around pilot fuel and lubricating oil, and in helping improve the technology from the first to the second and third generations of dual-fuel ships.
    Today, 19 of the company’s 30 deep-sea tankers are able to use methanol as fuel.
    Paul reports that the company has run its vessels on conventional methanol and some bio-methanol for over 245,000 hours to date, and that the fleet is currently operated on methanol ‘quite often’ in the current fuel price environment.
    He also outlines his vision for the transition to green methanol, revealing that Waterfront Shipping is already using some bio-methanol as fuel to ensure compliance with FuelEU Maritime regulations.
    While Waterfront Shipping does not currently have more vessels on order, the company aims to stick to methanol dual-fuel technology for future newbuild orders.
    Asked about trends in the alternative-fuelled orderbook, which show that LNG has overtaken methanol in newbuild orders since the second half of 2024, Paul argues that ‘there is definitely room for multiple alternative fuels in the market,’ and highlights that methanol ‘makes a lot of sense’ as a fuel option, given that it doesn’t need cryogenic treatment and pressurisation and few modifications are needed to existing bunkering infrastructure and processes.
    He also comments on the IMO member states’ decision to postpone the Net-Zero Framework by a year. While many owners may defer newbuild or retrofit decisions amid the uncertainty, he points out that the industry as a whole remains supportive of a transition towards more sustainable fuels, and believes the delay might give companies a chance to further evaluate their options.
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    22 分
  • S6 Ep23: Vitalii Protasov, Co-Founder and CEO of GENA Solutions

    S6 Ep23: Vitalii Protasov, Co-Founder and CEO of GENA Solutions
    2025/11/10
    The CEO of green analytics firm GENA Solutions examines the impact of the one-year delay of the IMO Net-Zero Framework on renewable fuel production projects, and on future ammonia and methanol volumes available for shipping.
    Podcast highlights
    While it is still too early to measure the full effect of the IMO Net-Zero Framework postponement, Vitalii explains why he has no doubt that the pipeline of renewable fuel projects will be impacted, with likely cancellations and a slowdown in new projects being launched.
    He anticipates that the uncertainty around the adoption of the first GHG pricing mechanism for shipping will make shipping companies more reluctant to sign binding long-term offtake agreements, without which many project promoters will struggle to secure financing and reach a final investment decision.
    Vitalii notes that renewable methanol projects are likely to be particularly affected, as more than 80% of total global demand for the molecule was expected to come from the shipping sector before the MEPC extraordinary session. He expects a mixed picture, where projects that have already secured offtakers for their future production are likely to continue to progress, while others may require more time to attach financing or attempt to reorient their production to aviation or the chemical industry. Even though FuelEU Maritime will maintain some maritime demand and the Net-Zero Framework could still be adopted next year, he warns that some projects will ‘inevitably’ be cancelled as a result of the delay.
    He remarks that the scenario is ‘quite opposite’ for renewable ammonia projects, as only about 10% of global consumption in 2030 was expected to come from the maritime sector. While GENA Solutions has revised its projections for the renewable methanol capacity available by 2030, down from 8-14 million tonnes to 6-13 million tonnes, its predictions for ammonia capacity have remained unchanged at 5-10 million tonnes.
    Vitalii also compares prospects for renewable methanol and ammonia with other alternative fuels, such as bio-LNG and biofuels. He predicts that the delay to the Net-Zero Framework will shrink the market for all renewable fuels, but will disproportionately affect projects that require higher risks and investments, as well as long-term commitments from shipping companies.
    Finally, he reflects on the countries and regions that will be most affected by a potential slowdown in offtake agreements and rise in project cancellations, and on whether governments should jump in to bridge the gap while the fate of the global IMO regulation remains uncertain.
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    25 分