Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

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Atmospheric Environment
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/atmosenv

Real-world emissions of inland ships on the Grand Canal, China

Mingliang Fu a, *, Yan Ding b, Yunshan Ge a, Linxiao Yu a, Hang Yin b, Wentao Ye a,
Bin Liang a, c
a

National Lab of Auto Performance and Emission Test, School of Mechanical and Vehicular Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology,
Beijing 100081, China
b
Vehicle Emission Control Center, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Beijing 100012, China
c
Beijing Automotive Research Institute Co., Ltd., Beijing 100079, China

h i g h l i g h t s

Distance-based and fuel-based emission factors of gaseous and PM from 7 inland ships were measured using PEMS.

Average distance-based emission factors of CO, HC and PM for manoeuvring mode are higher than those for cruise mode.

NOx in this study is nearly twice of estimated Tier 1 standard limit (in unit of g kg1 fuel).

Distance-based emission factors of four pollutants are higher with the increase of engine loads.

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 17 December 2012
Received in revised form
21 August 2013
Accepted 24 August 2013

Ship emissions are widely recognized as a relevant source of the total air pollution and have a remarkable
impact on air quality of the sea, territorial waters and coastal areas. To assess this impact, various
emission models have been developed to calculate the emission inventory of ship based on ship activity
data. However, few studies in China have collected the emission factors of local ship which are decisive
factors in accurate assessment of ship emission inventory. This study intends to obtain emission data of
inland ships on the Grand Canal of China by conducting on-board emission tests. We measured CO, HC
NOx and PM emission from 7 inland ships of different engine powers, and derive distance-based and fuelbased emission factors on the basis of the cruise and manoeuvring (including port departure and port
arrival) operating modes. The results show that average distance-based emission factors of CO, HC and
PM for manoeuvring mode are higher than those for cruise mode. For NOx, average distance-based
emission factors for cruise mode are higher than those for port arrival mode but lower than those for
port departure mode. Particular number (PN) distribution analysis indicates that larger amounts of small
size PM (Dp < 0.01 mm) appeared on manoeuvring mode, which can affect regional air quality and human
health. The average fuel-based emission factor of NOx in this study is 1.4e4.3 times higher than those in
on-board studies. When compared with estimated Tier 1 standard limit (in unit of g kg1 fuel), NOx in
this study is nearly twice of Tier 1. The higher NOx emission indicates that stricter emission strategies and
policies should be implemented to control ship emission in China. It is noticeable that distance-based
emission factors of four pollutants are higher with the increase of engine loads.
Crown Copyright 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Inland ships
Emission factors
PEMS
Operating modes

1. Introduction
With the rapid growth of water-borne commerce, marine activities, particularly those in Asia, have risen dramatically over the
past decade (Yau et al., 2012; Streets et al., 2000). However, various
research studies which attempt the estimation of global emissions
from shipping indicate that ship emission is one important source
of the total air pollution worldwide (Poplawski et al., 2011; Marmer
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 86 138 1097 1063; fax: 86 10 6891 2035.
E-mail address: fumingliang160@163.com (M. Fu).

and Langmann, 2005; Tzannatos, 2010a; Hulskotte and Denier van

der Gon, 2010; Butt, 2007; Corbett, 2003; Howitt et al., 2010). IIASAs research (Cofala et al., 2007) on exhaust pollutants from global
shipping estimated that the levels of NOx and PM emissions are
24.3 and 1.9 million tons, respectively. Moreover, part of shipping
emissions occur in coastal areas, thus dispersing directly onto the
mainland and causing environmental problems that affect both
human health and ecosystems (Lonati et al., 2010; Miola and Ciuffo,
2011). Due to close proximity to the container port, approximately
3.8 million people risk direct exposure to shipping and port-related
emissions in Hong Kong (Galbraith et al., 2008).

1352-2310/$ e see front matter Crown Copyright 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2013.08.046

M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

Numerous studies on the evaluation of the impact of atmospheric shipping emissions on air quality at the local scale and on
climate at the regional scale have been reported in literature over
the last decade. Some studies have focused on emission measurements for ships and the estimation of the magnitude of shipping
emissions to the atmosphere. Van der Zee et al. (2012) by measured
Nitrogen oxides (NO and NO2) and ultrane particles (particle
number (PN) concentration) at ve measuring sites in Amsterdam,
illustrate that ship exhausts have an impact on air quality near
houses along waterways. Other works have addressed the characterization of emissions from ships and their impact of ports on
adjacent urban areas by means of dispersion modeling. Studies in
Sweden (Isakson et al., 2001), Los Angeles (Minguilln et al., 2008),
Turkey (Kesgin and Vardar, 2001), Alaska (Mlders et al., 2010),
Greece (Tzannatos, 2010b), Vancouver (Lu et al., 2006) and Scotland
(Marr et al., 2007) assessed the contribution of ports to measured
concentrations of air pollution in cities.
In China, some papers focus on the impacts of ships emission
characteristics on air quality. Zhao et al. (2013) indicates that ship
trafc has a non-negligible contribution on ambient levels of ne
particles on Shanghai port. Meanwhile, other studies focus on
emission inventory of ships in China. Yang et al. (2007) develops an
air pollutant emission inventory for marine ships in the Shanghai
Port in 2003 based on the marine activity statistical data from 1998
and other experts previous studies. Zhang et al. (2010) develops
the Pearl River Delta regional ship emission inventory by categories
with the use of appropriate estimation and the collection of activities data. Yau et al. (2012) develops a detailed maritime emission
inventory for ocean-going vessels (OGVs) in Hong Kong by a
network model based on a bottom-up activity-based network
model. Unfortunately, emission factors used in the three papers are
taken directly from previous European and US ship emission
database, which might not reect the local conditions and performance of technologies. Therefore, it is of great importance to
improve the understanding of the emission characteristics of ships
in China for accurate estimation of ships emissions inventory.
The objective of this study is to improve the understanding of
inland ships emission levels in China by acquiring their real-world
emission factors on the Grand Canal. The Grand Canal, the longest
articial waterway in the world, is more than 3500 km long. Excavated over 1400 years ago, it links Hangzhou and Beijing, and has
strongly been beneting regional development since its accomplishment (Fig. 1(a)). In modern era, the Grand Canal still plays an
important role in supplying water for irrigation, transporting
cargoes, and recreational activities. The Grand Canal offered ample

223

facility to transport food and goods from south to north in the early
times. Meanwhile, it also greatly improved the administration and
defense of China as a whole, strengthening the economic and cultural intercourse between north and south, and contributing to the
prosperity of the area along the route (Yang et al., 2012; Wang, 2012).
In this work, we measured tailpipe of CO, HC, NOx, and PM
emissions of ships using a portable emission measurement system
(PEMS), then analyzed emission levels of inland ships on the basis
of the measurement results, and generated distance-based and
fuel-based emission factors for ships. We also compared fuel-based
emission factors with those presented in previous studies, and
compare these emission factors under different engine loads.
2. Experimental section
2.1. Study area
Sunan Canal, a part of the Grand Canal, is one of the busiest
transporting cargo waterways in China. This section of the canal
crosses the south of Jiangsu Province from Zhenjiang to Suzhou,
with its length 211 km and over 80 m width (Fig. 1(b)). As a result of
the rapid economic development of the Yangtze River Delta region
and subsequently intensive use of marine transportation, more
concerns have been focus on the air quality along the waterway.
In this study, typical sailing routing was selected to have on
board emission test, which are about 14 km from Zhenjiang to
Danyang.
2.2. Portable emission measurement system
A combined on-board emission test system was employed to
measure the emissions from inland ship under real driving conditions. This system has two main parts: SEMTECH-DS and Electrical
Low Pressure Impactor (ELPI). SEMTECH-DS is able to test instantaneous emissions of gaseous pollutants, such as CO2, CO, HC, and NOx.
This equipment is used for on-road emission monitoring of diesel
vehicles, and uses heated ame ionization detector (HFID) for total
hydrocarbon (THC), non-dispersive ultraviolet (NDUV) analyzer for
nitric oxide (NO) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2), non-dispersive infrared
(NDIR) for CO and carbon dioxide (CO2) measurements (Liu et al.,
2011). In addition, a temperature/pressure sensor and a GPS device
were included to monitor environmental situation and instantaneous location and speed. A whole-exhaust, mass ow measurement
device (SEMTECH EFM) built by Sensors Incorporated, was used to
measure the exhaust ow rate based on pitot tube technology. To

Fig. 1. (a) The territory of the Grand Canal of China, (b) The detail of test routing.

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M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

Table 1
Technical parameters of the ships.
ID

Ship type

Built
year

Engine rated
power (kw)/
rated speed
(rpm)

Ship
gross
weight
(ton)

Ship Length 
width (m)

Test route

Cargo ship

2005

136/850

298

36  7

Cargo ship

2004

136/850

258

36  8

Cargo ship

2010

136/850

237

35  7

Cargo ship

2011

136/850

261

36  8

Cargo ship

2008

260/1200

399

43  5

Cargo ship

2009

300/1200

521

45  8

Cargo ship

2009

300/1000

493

45  8

Zhenjiang
to Danyang
Zhenjiang
to Danyang
Danyang
to Zhenjiang
Zhenjiang
to Danyang
Zhenjiang
to Danyang
Zhenjiang
to Danyang
Zhenjiang
to Danyang

assure the accuracy of the test results, the SEMTECH-DS was zeroed
with pure nitrogen before each test and was calibrated with standard
gases before the rst day of test (Huo et al., 2012a, 2012b).
ELPI is a real-time particle size spectrometer designed for real
time monitoring of aerosol particle size distribution, and measures
airborne particle size distribution in the size range of 7 nme10 mm
using 12 channels. It consists of three main components: a corona
charger, low-pressure cascade impactor and multichannel electrometer. Before testing, the instrument must be zeroed. Prior to
ELPI, the exhaust gas was diluted by two ejector dilutors (Dekati,
Finland) in series. The dilution air and diluted exhaust in the rst
dilutor were heated to 200  C in order to prevent condensation and
the second ejector dilutor was at room temperature to cool the
sample. The dilution ratio during test procedure was around 64,
which essentially inhibited all post-dilution particle dynamics, such
as coagulation and adsorption. This system has been successfully
used for emission measurements of diesel engines in China. More
details on experiment instruments were presented in our previous
studies (Wang et al., 2011; He et al., 2011; Zhang et al., 2009).
During the experiments, ELPI, dilution system and SEMTECH-DS
were supplied to the equipment through a 5 KVA YAMAHA
generator.
2.3. Test ships
Extensive work was undertaken on Zhenjiang port to ensure
that the tested ships are of the typical types on Grand Canal before
the experiment started. Result shows that percentage of cargo ship
on ship eet are more than 90%, while engine power ranges from
120 to 300 kW. The specication of selected equipments that had
been tested is given in Table 1.

Fig. 2. The global view of the experimental installation.

operating modes are only classied as cruise and manoeuvring modes

(including port departure, and port arrival). When docked on the
berth, ship owners generally use storage batteries (12 V) and inverter
(an apparatus that can convert the direction current (12 V) into
alternating current (220 V)) to supply the life services.
2.5. Installation of PEMS
In this study, SEMTECH-DS, ELPI and dilutor system were
installed on the top of engine room at the back of ship, while
generator was fastened on shipboard. The general installation is
shown in Fig. 2.
2.6. Data processing
The primary purpose of this study was to obtain CO, HC, NOx and
PM emission data, including instantaneous emission rates,
distance-based emission factors and fuel-based emission factor.
The fuel consumption (Fang and Zheng, 2005) was calculated according to the carbon balance formula (eq (1)).

FCl=s

0:866  HCg=s 0:429  COg=s 0:273

.


1000  CWFF  rdiesel
 CO2g=s

(1)

Where, FC(l/s) represents the fuel consumption, 0.866, 0.429 and

0.273 are the mass rations of carbon in HC, CO and CO2 from
exhaust gas, respectively, CWFF represents the mass ratio of carbon
in diesel (Here use 0.866), and r(diesel) represents the diesel density,
generally 0.848 kg L1.
2.7. Fuel types

2.4. Test operating modes

Some studies (Deniz and Durmusoglu, 2008; Winnes and Fridell,
2010; Lonati et al., 2010) indicate that the methodologies for estimating shipping emissions commonly consider four different modes:
(a) approaching and docking in port; (b) hotelling (or berthing) in
port; (c) departing from the port; and (d) cruising. The manoeuvring
modes, which include modes (a) and (c), are assumed to start when
the ships deceleration begins and to end at the moment of docking,
recommencing with the departure from berth and then ending when
cruising speed has been reached. The hotelling in-port phase spans
the time the ship is at the dockside with its main engines working at
reduced load or auxiliary engines working to generate power in order
to supply the ships main on-board services. In this study, ship

The fuels used in all test inland ships are general diesel fuels,
which came from oil ships near the dock. The test objects were
fueled with petrodiesel, which could fulll the national standard
for light diesel oil. Basically, the fuel consists of about 86.0% carbon
and 13.4% hydrogen, with respect to the sulfur contents are
generally below 2000 ppm.
3. Result and discussion
3.1. Instantaneous emissions for different operating modes
To describe the real-world emissions prole of the tested ship,
an example of time traces of ship speed, exhaust ow rate and

M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

concentrations of CO, HC, NOx and PM from No. 4 ship for different
operating modes is given in Fig. 3 (For cruise mode, we only show
part of data because all measured data are stable on this mode). As
shown in Fig. 3, ship speed on port departure mode continuously
accelerate until reach cruising speed, while decelerate from
cruising speed to docking on port arrival mode. On cruise mode,
ship speed is approximately 7 km h1. For exhaust ow rate and
four pollutant concentrations, the large peaks occur on manoeuvring mode (port departure and port arrival modes). The possible
reasons can be as follows: On port departure mode, ship rstly
moves backward to leave the berth, and then keep on acceleration
on the waterway. On port arrival mode, propeller churned backward to reduce ship speed. When driving speed slow down and
stop on berth. On the whole Manoeuvring mode, ship speed and
driving direction are variable to avoid trafc crash. In this case,
engine load and engine speed uctuate greatly on the process,
which results in the variation in pollutant concentrations. Note that
NOx concentration is higher during cruise mode, which can affect
human health, ecosystems and the environment of the coastal
areas.

Table 2
Average emission rates and fuel consumption for different operating modes.
Operating mode

respectively. The higher emission rates of CO, HC and PM can be

explained as follow: on manoeuvring mode, variable engine speed
and engine power cause the poor combustion, which results in
higher emission rates. On the contrary, average emission rate of

Cruise

Exhaust flow rate (l/s)

Ship speed (km/h)

200
Port departure

Port arrival

(a)

9
6
3
0

Port departure
150

Port arrival

(b)

100
50

500

1000

1500

2000

500

Elapsed time (seconds)

0.3
Port departure

Cruise

Port arrival

(c)

0.2

0.1

0
0

500

1000

1500

Port departure
900

Port arrival

(e)

600
0
500

1000

1500

Elapsed time (seconds)

Port arrival

300
0
500

1000

1500

2000

Elapsed time (seconds)

1200

Cruise

(d)

2000

PM concentration (mg/m3)

1800

2000

600

2000

2400
Cruise

1500

1200

Elapsed time (seconds)

Port departure

1000

Elapsed time (seconds)

HC concentration (ppm)

CO concentration (%)

Cruise

0
0

200 < P  300

1

Manoeuvring Port
197.8  67.2
248.2  46.3
departure
192.7  64.0
260.7  112.7
Port
arrival
Cruise
151.1  80.8
236.7  91.7
Manoeuvring Port
41.5  11.1
67.2  40.9
HC (g h1)
departure
Port
37.8  6.9
57.0  29.0
arrival
Cruise
40.0  10.7
57.8  41.6
Manoeuvring Port
709.1  191.9 826.4  276.8
NOx (g h1)
departure
Port
413.6  91.4
309.4  224.0
arrival
Cruise
1041.8  522.2 1549.6  730.8
Manoeuvring Port
47.3  41.3
70.8  13.2
PM (g h1)
departure
49.1  22.4
109.4  141.3
Port
arrival
Cruise
26.7  20.0
57.2  28.1
9.6  2.3
13.6  5.2
Fuel consumption Manoeuvring Port
departure
(l h1)
Port
6.1  1.8
6.9  1.7
arrival
Cruise
11.6  4.0
18.8  6.7
CO (g h

12

NOx concentration (ppm)

Engine power range (kW)

100 < P  200

3.2. Emission rate for different operating modes

Table 2 shows the average fuel consumption and emission rates
of CO, HC, NOx and PM for different operating modes. As shown,
average emission rates of CO, HC and PM during manoeuvring
mode are mostly higher than those during cruise mode, especially
for PM. Emission rates of PM during port departure and port arrival
mode are 1.8 and 1.9 times than those during cruise mode for
100 kw < P  200 kw engines, and 1.2 and 1.9 times higher than
those during cruise mode for 200 kw < P  300 kw engines,

225

1500
Port departure

Cruise

Port arrival

1200

(f)

900
600
300
0
0

500

1000

1500

2000

Elapsed time (seconds)

Fig. 3. Instantaneous ship speed, exhaust ow rate and emission concentrations from No. 4 ship on different operating modes.

226

M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

Table 3
Average emission factors for different operating modes.
Operating modes

Engine power range (kW)

100 < P  200 200 < P  300

1

Manoeuvring Port
Port
Cruise
1
HC (g km ) Manoeuvring Port
Port
Cruise
NOx (g km1) Manoeuvring Port
Port
Cruise
1
PM (g km ) Manoeuvring Port
Port
Cruise
CO (g km

departure
arrival

37.0
42.2
15.2
departure
6.9
arrival
7.8
4.4
departure 162.5
arrival
94.9
104.8
departure
11.9
arrival
10.5
2.7














14.3
4.0
4.9
2.8
3.3
1.7
29.4
26.9
33.1
13.4
1.8
1.7

55.2
67.1
35.1
11.5
13.6
10.7
184.0
98.0
170.0
21.6
27.4
6.4














9.9
29.3
13.7
5.9
7.6
2.8
88.6
57.9
69.2
11.9
40.2
2.8

NOx and fuel consumption during manoeuvring mode are lower

than those during cruise mode. Since NOx emissions from ships are
temperature-dependent, and more powerful combustion systems
operate at higher temperatures, the emission rate of NOx depends
on the power of the ship engine (Sinha et al., 2003). Thus, stable
engine speed and larger engine power on cruise mode lead to
longer period of time at higher temperature, which leads to higher
NOx emission. It was worth mentioning that the greater the engine
power becomes the higher pollutant emission rates tend to be. The
possible explanation is that larger engines used more fuel and air to
meet the engine power demand, which causes higher emission
rates.
3.3. Emission factors for different operating modes
Based on the gaseous and PM emission rates and sail distance,
we calculate the distance-based emission factors of CO, HC, NOx and
PM for different operating modes (Table 3). Because of the higher
emission rates and shorter sail distance, distance-based emission
factors of CO, HC and PM for manoeuvring mode are higher than
those for cruise modes. As for NOx, distance-based emission factor
for cruise mode is higher than those for port arrival mode, but
lower than those for port departure mode.
The particles emitted from a diesel engine are usually divided
into three modes. These are called nucleation mode
(0.01 mm < Dp<0.1 mm), accumulation mode (0.1 mm < Dp<1 mm)
and coarse mode (1 mm < Dp<10 mm). The nucleation mode is
usually dominated by volatile compounds, such as sulfate and
un-burnt hydrocarbon, which form particles as the exhaust is
cooled and diluted, but it also contains ash and soot particles.
However, most soot particles agglomerate and are usually found
in the accumulation mode, while the larger particles can be a
break-up of larger soot particles from the engine (Cooper, 2003;
Fridell et al., 2008). Fig. 4 and Table 4 are the number concentrations of PM emissions over time for manoeuvring and cruise
modes. It is clear that there are large amounts of small size PM
(Dp<0.01 mm), formed during nucleation mode, and emit from
ship engine during manoeuvring modes. The same phenomenon
is observed in Winnes (2010) study. There is increasing evidence
that the negative effects on human health are associated with the
PM with diameters below 100 nm (Brown et al., 2001). Recent
research shows that they can penetrate the cell membranes,
enter into the blood and even reach the brain (Oberdrster et al.,
2004). Some investigations indicate that particles can induce
inheritable mutations (Somers et al., 2004; Burtscher, 2005).
Therefore, more stringent emission regulations and emission
control technologies are needed to reduce the PM emission from
ships.

Fig. 4. PM number distribution on different operating modes from No. 3 ship engine. I
is port departure mode; II is cruise mode; III is port arrival mode.

3.4. Comparison of fuel-based emission factor with previous studies

In recent few years, fuel-based emission factors are widely used
in comparison of different types of engine emission because it is
easier to exclude the inuence of engine size (Liu et al., 2009; Huo
et al., 2012a, 2012b; Yao et al., 2011). Fig. 5 compares the fuelbased emission factors of ships generated from this study with
those in other studies (Sinha et al., 2003; Moldanov et al., 2009).
Though those studies have different types of diesel oils, they have
the similar operating mode under real-world cruise condition. It
can be seen that fuel-based emission factors of CO and HC we
obtained in this study are in the middle of the emission levels.
However, NOx emissions from this study are 1.4e4.3 times higher
than those from other studies. With the increasing of marine
transportation, considerable attention has been placed on NOx
emission from ship emission. In 1997, International Maritime Organization (IMO) developed Annex VI to MARPOL 73/78 convention and its integral part technical code on Emission of Nitrogen
Oxides form Marine Diesel Engine in order to prevent the Negative
inuence of those compounds on the environment and on health
(Kowalski and Tarelko, 2009) In 2003, EPA adopted Tier 1 standards for Category 3 marine engines, which went into effect in
2004, establishing NOx standards based upon internationally
negotiated emissions rates and readily available emissions-control
technology. The nal near-term Tier 2 NOx standards for newlybuilt engines began to apply in 2011 and required more efcient
use of current engine technologies, including engine timing, engine cooling, and advanced computer controls. The Tier 2 standards will result in a 15 to 25 percent NOx reduction below Tier 1
levels. In 2010, China Classication Society (CCS) has published the
measurement methods and test guideline for NOx emission from
marine diesel engine, which suggest that ship built after Jan 1,
2000 should meet the Tier 1 emission standard. Since there are no

Table 4
Average number concentrations of PM from No. 3 ship for three operating modes.
Operating modes

Nucleation
mode

Accumulation
mode

Coarse mode

Manoeuvring Port
(5.6  6.4)  106 (3.1  4.4)  105 (1.2  3.2)  103
departure
Port
(6.4  4.4)  106 (2.4  1.9)  105 (1.7  3.2)  103
arrival
Cruise
(2.4  0.3)  105 (1.3  0.1)  105 (2.8  0.7)  102

HC emission factor (g/kg fuel)

30

20

10

NOx emission factor (g/kg fuel)

120
100
Estimated Tier 1
emission limit

80
60
40
20
0
A

227

10
8
6
4
2
0

PM emission factor (g/kg fuel)

CO emission factor (g/kg fuel)

M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

8
6
4
2
0
A

Fig. 5. CO, HC, NOx and PM fuel-based emission factors for cruise mode of several studies. Note that A is the fuel-based emission factors for cruise mode of this study; B is emission
factors for cruise mode of Moldanovas study (2009); C and D are the fuel-based emission factors of a tanker ship named Royal Sphere and a container ship named MSC Giovanna of
Sinha et al. (2003).

Tier 1e3 NOx emission standards in unit of g kg1 fuel, we only

used the estimated NOx fuel-based emission factor by emission
standard from Faber et al. (2012) for comparison (Fig. 5). Average
NOx fuel-based emission factors from this study are nearly twice of
Tier 1 standard. There are several reasons caused NOx emissions
exceeding allowable value. One of the important factors is lack of
available emission regulation of marine engine. Since 2000, the
Ministry of Environment Protection of China (MEP) had implemented a series of emission regulation for on-road vehicles, called
China 1e4 (Wu et al., 2011). Unfortunately, there are no emission
control strategies and policies for newly-built ships in the
nationwide. Without stricter emission regulation, marine engine
manufacturers have little initiative to make a breakthrough in
reducing emissions from marine engine.
Due to the lack of the PM emission data from Sinhas study, we
only use Moldanovas result for comparison. As seen in Fig. 5, PM
fuel-based emission factor from this study is a little lower than it
from Moldanovas study. Test ship in Moldanovas study used heavy
fuel oil with sulfur content of 1.97%. But our test ships generally
used light fuel oil with lower sulfur content (blow 350 ppm). Zhang
et al. (2009) indicates that lower sulfur diesel have lower fuel-based
PM emission, which may explain the lower PM emission in this
study. Further studies are still needed to verify the inuence of fuel
quality on PM emission.

3.5. Comparison of fuel-based emission factors on different engine

loads
On cruise mode, ship generally can not reach rated power and
engine speed. This is because with the increase of engine load,
marine propellers often generate cavitation which causes great
noise and pressure uctuation around the ship propeller. The cavitation can also result in severe erosion to propeller blades and devices in the slipstream of the propeller like rudders (Chang et al.,
2010; Ji et al., 2010; Zhu and Fang, 2012). In this study, we only
compared high engine load (approximately 75%), middle engine
load (approximately 50%) and low engine load (approximately 38%)
of No. 1, No. 2, No. 4 and No. 7 tested ships, respectively. On realworld operating condition, high engine load is commonly used on
acceleration and deceleration modes, while middle and low engine
loads are used on cruise mode. Table 5 illustrates that distancebased emission factors of four pollutants are increasing with the
rise of engine load. For instance, CO, HC, NOx and PM distance-based
emission factors on high engine load are 2.6e3.8, 1.8e2.8, 1.6e3.0,
10.2e94.4 times higher than those on low engine load, respectively.
The increasing CO, HC and PM emissions on high engine load can be
attributed to the incomplete combustion caused by lower air/fuel
ratio. In the meantime, continuously higher pressure and temperature on combustion process leads to the rise of NOx emission.
4. Conclusions

Table 5
Distance-based emission factors on different engine load from No. 1, No. 2, No. 4 and
No. 7 tested ships.

No. 1

No. 2

No. 4

No. 7

Engine load

CO (g km1)

HC (g km1)

NOx (g km1)

PM (g km1)

Low load
Middle load
High load
Low load
Middle load
High load
Low load
Middle load
High load
Low load
Middle load
High load

12.5
15.1
47.6
8.5
9.5
23.4
10.4
14.8
27.3
16.2
21.4
52.4

5.2
6.3
14.9
3.4
4.5
6.1
4.2
4.4
7.5
3.2
4.0
5.8

96.2
123.4
208.8
48.2
75.9
78.2
48.3
78.0
145.7
68.4
92.2
192.3

1.6
1.6
146.2
0.4
0.9
15.8
1.3
4.2
50.7
1.2
6.3
12.4

On-board emission tests were performed on 7 inland ships on

the Grand Canal of China by using portable emission measurement
system (PEMS) to determine their emission characteristics. Large
peeks of instantaneous emission concentrations of CO, HC, NOx and
PM can be observed on manoeuvring modes (including port departure and port arrival modes). Average emission rates and
distance-based emission factors of CO, HC and PM for manoeuvring
mode are higher than those on cruise mode. Due to the shorter sail
distance for port departure mode, average distance-based emission
factor of NOx on port departure mode are higher than those for
cruise mode, although NOx average emission rates for cruise mode
are higher than those for manoeuvring modes. In addition, average
distance-based emission factors of each of the four pollutants tend
to be higher with the increase of engine powers on each mode.

228

M. Fu et al. / Atmospheric Environment 81 (2013) 222e229

According to the tests, there are large amounts of small size PM

(Dp < 0.01 mm), which formed by nucleation mode, emit from ship
engine on manoeuvring modes. The nucleation mode of PM is
composed of un-burnt hydrocarbon, as well as ash and soot particles, which have a great effect on air quality human health.
NOx average fuel-based emission factors for cruise mode from
this study are 1.4e4.3 times higher than those from other studies.
In addition, NOx emissions in this study are nearly twice as much as
that regulated in Tier 1 standard in unit of g kg1 fuel, which is
resulted form the lack of available emission regulation of marine
engine. Comparison of distance-based emission factors under
different engine loads shows that distance-based emission factors
of four pollutants are increasing with the rise of engine load. The
higher emission can be attributed to the incomplete combustion, as
well as the higher pressure and temperature on combustion
process.
Ocean going ship emission should be tested in further studies to
understand theirs emission levels. Furthermore, ship activity
studies are needed to provide derail information for developing the
ship emission inventory and emission model in China.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41275133). The authors are grateful to Jiankang
Shen, Yanxia Yu at Jiangsu Environmental Monitoring Center for
their corporation. In addition, the authors thank Zhenxian Xu,
Hongkun Liu, Xin Wang, Yao Zhang and Chenglei Yu at School of
Mechanical and Vehicular Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology for their help with this study.
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