Stena Line, Port of Trelleborg inaugurate shore power supply

As the first ferry company in the Port of Trelleborg, Stena Line will now be connecting up its two vessels, M/S Skåne and M/S Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, to the electricity grid during calls into port, in a bid to enhance sustainability and reduce emissions.

At present, four of Stena Line’s six ports in Sweden are now connected to the local electricity grid. Throughout Stena Line’s route network, 17% of the ports are connected.

    “Sustainability is one of the cornerstones of our strategy and this is an important contribution to our efforts by reducing emissions and cutting down on noise in port. On many of our ferry routes our vessels call at locations close to cities and this makes it especially important to be able to shut off the engines when docked. Planning work is under way to enable us to connect vessels in more of our ports,” says Stena Line’s CEO Niclas Mårtensson.

According to Mr. Mårtensson, the objective is for 25% of the ports that the company uses to have an electrical connection by 2020 and 75% by 2030.

Stena Line’s vessels in Trelleborg are docked for more than two hours 10 times out of 16 per week and will connect up to the electricity grid at these times.

The connection means that the machinery on board is completely shut down, bringing emissions down to practically zero, and for maximum total environmental gain green electricity is used, which is also the case in Trelleborg.

In 2016, all Stena Line’s electrical connections in port contributed to a reduction in CO2 emissions of 12,500 tons, which equates to the annual consumption of 6,500 average passenger cars.