Shipowners on Pace to Scrap $1 Billion in Oil Tankers This Year
This article by Costas Paris for the Wall Street Journal may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:
Some 1,000 vessels are broken up every year and their steel and other metals are melted or simply stacked up and sold to factories. The yards in the Indian subcontinent recycle around 80% of all ships, with the remainder going to China and Turkey, although Beijing has said it will suspend scrapping starting next year.
The average age of VLCCs going to scrap this year is 18.8 years, the youngest since 2013, according to VesselsValue. A ship’s average operational age is around 25 years, but after 15 years in the water, the vessel has to go through an extensive survey to determine if it is seaworthy. “An average survey costs about $2 million, and you have to do it again at 20 years, so a number of owners opt to scrap instead,” Mr. Sharma said.
The oil glut is also sending offshore rigs to scrapyards. It is a relatively new business that has boomed over the past five years, as the cost of drilling at sea is much higher than inland exploration. At least 18 rigs have been broken up so far this year, compared with 46 last year, according to GMS.
The cost of maintaining a fleet of aging ships has risen considerably over the last few years because of the imposition of the long-awaited restrictions on bilge water discharge and environmental restrictions on diesel fuel. That is in addition to the cost of supporting vessels in a hostile maritime environment. These costs are helping to remove excess inventory from the market after a lengthy bear market.
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