Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (Nasdaq: CLNE) in Newport Beach will take a step toward more environmentally friendly container shipping by supplying natural gas to fuel two new vessels that will service Hawaii from Long Beach.
Clean Energy said Sept. 21 it expects to supply World Fuel Services Inc. with an estimated 78 million gallons of liquefied natural gas (LNG) for the pair of Pasha Hawaii container ships.
When operating from the Port of Long Beach, the two vessels will become one of the first natural gas-powered container ships to call on the West Coast and the first to service Hawaii operating fully on natural gas from day one in service, according to Clean Energy.
“The Pasha ships are our first marine customer,” Greg Roche, Clean Energy’s vice president of sustainable transportation, told the Business Journal on Sept. 22. Â
“The maritime industry is under a mandate to use a cleaner fuel.”
Clean Energy owns and operates two LNG plants in California and Texas and sells the fuel to a variety of customers.
Clean Energy is known for its renewable natural gas (RNG), made from capturing the biogenic methane produced by the decomposition of organic waste from dairies, landfills, and wastewater treatment plants.
In the latest move, Roche said that in the past many ships used “the dirtiest burning fuel. LNG is much, much cleaner.”
LNG Expansion
“This expansion with LNG fits in very nicely with Clean Energy’s strategy to provide cleaner burning fuel—whether it’s for city buses, heavy-duty trucks or cargo ships—and enable our customers to meet their own sustainability goals,” Roche added
“We can’t say if there will be similar agreements with other marine companies but with the added capacity at our LNG plant in Boron (in Kern County), we’re prepared,” Roche said.
World Fuels is responsible for transporting the LNG from Boron to the Port of Long Beach and then transferring the LNG to the Pasha ships’ fuel tanks, Roche said.
M/V George III and M/V Janet Marie are the two LNG-powered container ships that will join Pasha Hawaii’s fleet serving Hawaii.  The George III is expected to begin operation in the last three months of the year and the Janet Marie shortly thereafter. They are part of the Pasha Group of San Rafael.
Amazon Backed
Clean Energy is the largest publicly traded renewable energy public company in OC. It is valued around $2 billion, and the company’s shares were trading at $8.67 apiece as of Sept. 28, up 10% since the start of the year.
It has notable backers.
On April 19, Clean Energy announced a deal to provide low and negative carbon renewable natural gas to e-commerce giant Amazon. So far, Amazon trucks have fueled with RNG at 79 different Clean Energy stations around the country.
Clean Energy issued warrants to Amazon to buy close to $500 million of the company’s stock, a deal that could see Amazon ultimately control about 20% of Clean Energy’s outstanding shares, based on a reading of regulatory filings.
That would make Amazon the company’s second-largest owner of its stock, the filings show.
Some have suggested the Amazon deal could be worth much more.
Clean Energy has “great partnerships” with some of the world’s largest energy companies, including Chevron, BP and TotalEnergies, which will allow the company to meet the growing demand for RNG, according to VP Roche.
Clean Energy, headed by president and chief executive Andrew Littlefair, is the largest provider of RNG as a transportation fuel in North America.
“We continue to be optimistic about the future of alternative fueling, especially RNG in fleets for larger vehicles,” Roche said.
