Written By Matthew McVitty, Head of Business Performance, CATAGEN Green Emissions Testing
The marine industry is under growing pressure to reduce emissions while maintaining operational efficiency and reliability. Catalysts will play an important role in meeting this challenge, but developing a catalyst for a marine application presents a significant testing problem: How can manufacturers build confidence in its performance before it reaches a vessel?
Accessing a suitable vessel can be time-consuming, expensive and operationally difficult. Even when access is secured, onboard testing may provide limited opportunities to adjust conditions, investigate unexpected results or repeat experiments. By the time a catalyst is installed on a ship, discovering a performance problem can have serious financial and scheduling consequences.
A vessel should be the final stage of validation rather than the starting point for catalyst development.
The challenge of representative marine catalyst testing
Marine catalysts must operate in demanding and complex environments. Their performance may be affected by gas composition, temperature, flow conditions and other application-specific factors.
Laboratory testing is essential, but the results are only valuable if the test conditions accurately represent the intended application. If the conditions are too simplified, manufacturers may not obtain a realistic picture of how the catalyst will behave when it is eventually installed on an engine or vessel.
At the same time, relying too heavily on vessel trials introduces unnecessary cost and risk. Vessel time is valuable; operating conditions can be difficult to control and repeating the same test may not be straightforward.
The industry therefore needs a testing stage between conventional laboratory experiments and full-scale onboard validation.
Creating a vessel in the laboratory
CATAGEN’s OMEGA recirculating gas reactor provides a controlled way to evaluate catalysts for marine applications without requiring access to a vessel.
The OMEGA can reproduce representative operating conditions, allowing catalyst developers to investigate performance in an accessible laboratory environment. Acting as a vessel, the system enables companies to develop, compare and refine catalysts before progressing to engine or onboard trials.
This gives development teams the opportunity to answer important questions earlier:
- Is the catalyst delivering the required performance?
- How do different catalyst formulations compare?
- How does performance change under different operating conditions?
- Are further design improvements required?
- Is there sufficient evidence to justify an engine or vessel trial?
Answering these questions before deployment can prevent costly problems later in the development programme.
Why repeatability matters
Conditions onboard a vessel naturally vary, making it difficult to determine whether a change in the results has been caused by the catalyst or the operating environment. This can complicate comparisons and reduce confidence in development decisions.
OMEGA provides highly repeatable testing with low levels of variability. Its controlled environment allows manufacturers to compare catalyst formulations and design changes using dependable data.
When a test is repeated, development teams can have confidence that differences in performance reflect meaningful changes rather than uncontrolled variation. This makes it easier to identify promising formulations, understand catalyst behaviour and make evidence-based decisions about the next stage of development.
Making vessel trials more valuable
Without sufficient pre-testing, companies risk arriving at a vessel with a catalyst that still requires significant development. If it does not perform as expected, the cost goes beyond the catalyst itself. Vessel availability, installation, engineering support, fuel and project delays can all add to the impact.
By using the OMEGA earlier in the process, companies can refine their catalysts under representative conditions and progress to vessel trials with a higher level of confidence.
To Find out more about how CATAGEN Green Emissions Testing can support your needs click here
Supporting our partners obtain certification with
Follow us: