Environmental and economic assessment of alternative marine energy pathways using integrated life cycle analysis
NEXT ENERGY, cilt.13, ss.1-19, 2026 (ESCI)
- Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
- Cilt numarası: 13
- Basım Tarihi: 2026
- Doi Numarası: 10.1016/j.nxener.2026.101068
- Dergi Adı: NEXT ENERGY
- Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI)
- Sayfa Sayıları: ss.1-19
- Galatasaray Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet
Özet
The maritime sector faces increasing pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining economic feasibility. In response to the International Maritime Organization’s decarbonization targets, alternative marine fuels have gained significant attention as potential pathways toward low-carbon shipping. This study presents an integrated well-to-wake life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle cost assessment (LCCA) of marine diesel oil (MDO), liquefied natural gas (LNG), biodiesel, methanol, E-methanol, E-diesel, E-ammonia, and hydrogen using real operational data from a 6177 GT general cargo vessel operating in the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions. The environmental assessment was performed using the GREET model and OpenLCA with the Environmental Footprint 3.0 method, while lifecycle costs were evaluated over the vessel's service life. The results indicate that hydrogen achieves the best environmental performance among the ten fuel pathways, ranking first in eight of the nine impact categories assessed and second in climate change, behind E-methanol, which offers the highest greenhouse gas reduction potential (76.2%), followed by hydrogen (45.7%) and E-ammonia (32.4%) relative to MDO. However, hydrogen's environmental advantage comes with substantial economic and practical trade-offs: its lifecycle cost is approximately 2.7 times that of LNG, and its low volumetric energy density requires roughly 3.7 times more onboard tank volume than MDO for equivalent propulsion energy, displacing an estimated 6.8% of the reference vessel's cargo deadweight. A Monte Carlo uncertainty analysis (10,000 iterations) confirms that these environmental and economic rankings are robust to key parameter uncertainties, including fuel-cell efficiency, methane slip, and discount rate. Electro-fuels such as E-methanol and E-ammonia demonstrate considerable decarbonization potential but remain economically constrained, with E-methanol costing approximately seven times more than conventional MDO over the vessel's lifecycle. Overall, the findings highlight that future marine fuel selection should balance environmental performance, economic feasibility, and technological maturity rather than relying on a single evaluation criterion.