Onshore Power Supply (OPS) is one of the most effective solutions to decarbonise and reduce particulate matter and noise emissions from ships while berthed at ports. However, although the technology is fully mature, EU ports are currently facing difficulties in implementing these systems due to the lack of a harmonised framework on shore-side electricity.
EALING -European flagship action for cold ironing in ports- , a 42-month project ending in December 2023 and co-funded by the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) EU Programme, has aimed to conduct all the technical (including Front-End Engineering Designs, energy requirements analysis and clean power supply plans), environmental, socio-economic, and financial studies necessary to accelerate the preparatory works for the construction of OPS facilities in 16 EU ports, while working together towards a common framework for their transition to OPS.
EALING has enabled the 16 participating ports to be ready, at the end of the project (some even earlier), to launch their tenders for the construction works of more than 30 OPS installations. The planned OPS installations will mitigate more than 2.7 million tonnes of CO2eq, 32,000 tonnes of NOx, 8,000 tonnes of SOx and 1,600 tonnes of PMx from being released by vessels at berth.
Numerous entities, such as DG MOVE, EMSA and ESPO, have collaborated on this initiative which has also served as a platform for sharing information and best practices, assisting ports in their progress towards OPS deployment. Finally, all the information generated throughout this project has been compiled in a series of comprehensive public reports which are available on the EALING website, thus providing valuable resources to stakeholders in the port and shipping sectors.