To ensure the compliant of the CO2 regulation,
the IMO set standards for the Energy Efficiency Design Index (EEDI) for
ships that also led to a higher propelling costs and additional
abatement investments for ship owners making energy efficiency and
fuel-saving a high priority in shipping operations.

This
study focuses on the financial analysis of investment on waste heat
recovery that has its origin in the heavy industry especially in power
plants, steel mills and other high-energy fabrics. As with other
industries, the waste heat recovery systems (WHRS) can also be used to
reduce emissions and fuel consumption of ship engines but is still
relatively new in the maritime industry and until now, the economic
assessment of the installations are still not adequately covered in the
scientific literature.

The evaluation of
the investment of the WHRS installations on ships carried out in this
work used the traditional capital budgeting analysis followed by the
real-option approach that includes a fuzzy model. The results were
validated using data from a ferry plying between Tallinn and Helsinki.
The capital budgeting analysis reveals that the investment in maritime
WHR technology is economically favorable only under certain frame
conditions. On the other hand, the real-option analysis shows a
practical and pragmatic assessment of the WHRS investment even when
implemented under high uncertainty and volatility condition in material
resource markets.