First hydrogen cargo vessel cleans up Paris

Due to be deployed by European innovation project Flagships later this year, the inland cargo hydrogen vessel will be owned by French inland shipowner Compagnie Fluvial de Transport (CFT), a subsidiary of the Sogestran Group, and put to work moving goods on pallets and in containers along the River Seine in Paris. CFT is currently developing a new business for urban distribution with transport vessels in the Paris area. The ship will be loaded in one of Paris’ inland ports.

“The demand for more sustainable technologies in inland waterway transport is on the rise,” said Matthieu Blanc, director of CFT. “As part of the Flagships project, we are happy to be leading the way on reducing emissions from transport and demonstrating the superior features of hydrogen fuel cells in waterborne applications.”

Simple refuelling

Jyrki Mikkola, project coordinator at the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd, part of the Flagships consortium, explained: “For refuelling, the storage system is actually a container installed on deck and refuelling will be done by removing the container and recharge it on an existing hydrogen filling station.”

The Flagships project was awarded EUR5m in 2018 from the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme, under the Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (FCH JU), to deploy two hydrogen vessels in France and Norway.

Zulu project

The project draws on a similar initiative in Belgium, where Sogestran Group subsidiary, Blue Line Logistics (BLL) operates three cargo vessels under the concept name ‘Zulu’. One Zulu vessel has been put into operation in Paris, and an additional two Zulu ships are currently under construction for the same market. The Flagships project will install a hydrogen power generation system on one of the newbuilds, scheduled for delivery in September 2021. BLL plans to have the ship operating on hydrogen before the end of 2021.

The vessel will operate on compressed hydrogen produced from electrolysis for zero-emission operations. The power generation system will be supplied by ABB Marine & Ports, with fuel cells from Ballard. LMG Marin is responsible for detail design drawings, with hydrogen provided by suppliers in the Paris region.