Shell’s Fuel Oil Quality Assurance System (FOQAS) is there to give you confidence in the quality of Shell Marine fuels through its tight specifications and strict procedures for:
- Limiting the type of components that can and cannot be blended.
- Monitoring the source of the different components.
- The management of all aspects of the supply chain, including pipelines, storage tanks, barges and truck tanks, to avoid possible contamination.
- Approval of laboratories that are regularly monitored, using an accredited qualityassurance scheme.
- Sampling and testing of fuel oil quality and performance to ensure the fuel oil meets customers’ expectations.
Residual fuels provide a cost effective energy source to power your fleet, but if certain key quality parameters are not met, the fuel will give poor engine performance. The consequences of this can range from smoking stacks to inefficient operation or even mechanical damage and engine failure. This threatens not only your mechanical assets, but also potentially your vessel safety and schedule if debunkering or extensive repairs should be required.
Two key trends are impacting the composition and quality of the global bunker fuel pool:
- Legislation mandating the use of additional low sulphur fuel grades
- Ongoing investment in refineries around the world to increase the production of lighter (distillate) fuels through increased cracking of residual fuel components
These factors will in some cases change the way in which residual fuels are blended, and will potentially increase the scope for fuel quality problems to occur.
This is why Shell takes fuel quality so seriously - wherever we supply in our operations around the world.
This is why our global Marine Fuel Oil Quality Assurance System (FOQAS) goes beyond the numbers in the ISO standards– to ensure we provide our customers with quality fuel, every delivery and wherever we operate.
The accepted industry standards for marine fuels are set out in ISO 8217:2005, where bulk physical properties are set out in two tables. Sometimes, fuel suppliers and customers think these two tables alone encapsulate the entire ISO standard, but the standard also covers such issues as safety, machinery performance and environmental protection.
As the ISO specification identifies only bulk properties rather than performance parameters, it is possible for a fuel to meet all the requirements of the tables and yet still cause operational problems through centrifuge/filter blockage, damage to engine components and poor ignition. You need to know that the fuel you buy will power your operations efficiently and without problems... that’s why Shell combines tight internal supply specifications with strict quality assurance systems.
- We test our Fuel Oils for more properties than ISO 8217:2005 requires. And where our experience shows it to be important, we set standards that are stricter than required by the ISO specifications.
- FOQAS covers the complete fuel oil supply chain, from manufacture to final delivery, wherever we operate in the world.
• Every storage and delivery location is regularly audited by our experienced specialist Shell staff, to ensure FOQAS compliance.
• FOQAS incorporates vital tests, such as acid number, the P-value test for Residual Fuel Oil Stability and where necessary new techniques for assessing the ignition and combustion characteristics of residual fuels.
All of this is designed to eliminate interruptions and inconvenience to your business, to allow your team to focus on delivering against their commitments and tight timelines without the distractions and expense caused by problems with your primary source of energy.
Ensuring customers benefit from both years of experience and the latest developments, FOQAS is built on more than a century of Shell experience, both as one of the largest refiners in the world and as a major fleet operator. This gives us an in-depth understanding of fuel oil components and their chemistry, and how these affect performance in a marine engine.
Our fuels R&D program and direct cooperation with Engine Manufacturers ensure that we continue to develop our understanding of Marine fuels, including the new grades being mandated, and their performance in all the latest types of diesel engines.
