FUELEU Maritime could make shipping companies money, according to carbon compliance company OceanScore.

The firm said emissions charges were now included in COAs in many cases, with some linked to the FuelEU penalty levels.

“It’s not a universal practice, but we’ve seen a significant number of surcharges that shadow the penalty rates,” OceanScore managing director Albrecht Grell said.

“And when you run the numbers, even conservatively, the revenue side starts to look pretty interesting.”

OceanScore’s model assumed just half of operators applied surcharges at two thirds of the penalty rate, equating to about €640 ($717) per tonne of CO2e. Under these conditions, total additional revenue could reach €450m.

Subtracting compliance left a potential net gain of €250m, but for how long was uncertain.

“Windfalls like this don’t last forever,” Grell said. “But in the short term it’s clearly value on the table. The trick is knowing how to capture it.”

The ability to pass on compliance costs varied between shipowners, charterers and managers. But managers were “uniquely exposed” because they carried the responsibility for compliance but worked on tight margins. OceanScore said the added cost of tools, processes and reporting systems could reach €3,000-€4,000 per vessel per year.

“Managers shouldn’t be shy about asking for their share of the upside,” Grell said. “They’re doing the heavy lifting and it’s in everyone’s interest that they’re properly resourced to do it well.”

OceanScore estimated the initial FuelEU compliance deficit across vessels to be around 2.1m tonnes of CO2 equivalent, while more efficient vessels, mainly LNG and LPG carriers, generate a surplus of about 1.3m tonnes of CO2e.

That left a compliance gap of 800,000 tonnes, likely to be closed using biofuels, which cost more than HFO but lead to savings under FuelEU and the EU emissions trading system.

Yesterday, Kongsberg Maritime strategy and business development vice-president Oskar Levander said selling compliance with FuelEU would make fully electric ro-pax vessels cheaper to run than conventional ro-paxes.

Levander said this meant electric ferries would now be viable without government support on several northern European routes, owing to the costs and rewards of FuelEU and the ETS, and the falling cost of batteries.