Decarbonizing maritime logistics through hydrogen-powered container ships
Reza Babaei, David S.-K. Ting, Rupp Carriveau
Abstract
Maritime shipping underpins global logistics but remains a source of greenhouse gas emissions, motivating the evaluation of low-carbon fuels and port-based supply infrastructure. This study assesses the techno-economic and environmental feasibility of hydrogen-powered small feeder container ships at the Port of Los Angeles (POLA) using a framework combining optimal sizing, techno-economic modeling, and sensitivity analysis. A hybrid hydrogen supply system is optimized, consisting of 500 kW PV, a 438 kW converter, a 7 MW electrolyzer, and a 300 kg H 2 tank, producing 716,538 kg H 2 /yr to meet ship fueling demand. The optimal configuration achieves a levelized cost of hydrogen (LCOH) of $3.54/kg H 2 , a 14-year payback period, and a net present cost (NPC) of $104.9M over a 30-year lifetime. Sensitivity analysis indicates that ship speed is the dominant operational driver: increasing speed from 8 to 24 knots raises hydrogen demand from 89,600 kg/y to 2.42 million kg/yr, while reducing LCOH from $11.99/kg H 2 to $1.33/kg H 2 due to higher utilization. Vessel weight further affects system performance, with favorable cost-power trade-offs observed near 8000–8500 t displacement. Solar resource availability also influences economics, with lower NPC and operating costs occurring near 5 kWh/m 2 /day. Environmental performance is evaluated using the normalized metric grams CO 2 /TEU-nautical mile, highlighting scale-related efficiency effects across vessel classes: small feeder ships exhibit higher emissions intensity (153 g CO 2 /TEU-n.mi) than large container ships (35 g CO 2 /TEU-n.mi), despite substantially lower absolute hydrogen demand. A real-world POLA-Shanghai case study further demonstrates scalability requirements for long-distance routes and port-level hydrogen supply planning.