Genco announces completion of scrubber programme

The completion of the programme represents a key pillar of the company’s previously announced comprehensive plan towards compliance with International Maritime Organization (“IMO”) regulations that limit sulfur emissions from vessels to 0.5% down from 3.5% on a global basis to improve air quality.

John C. Wobensmith, Genco’s CEO, commented: “The execution of our scrubber programme marks an important step for Genco in what was the busiest dry docking period in company history. The completion of this initiative has enabled us to comply with IMO 2020 regulations in a manner that meaningfully reduces sulfur emissions and strengthens our future prospects.

“Specifically, given the timely nature of our scrubber retrofits on our capesize vessels, we have been able to capture the differentials between compliant and high sulfur fuel so far in the early stages of compliance, significantly de-risking the initial investment.

“With no scheduled dry dockings for our capesize vessels for the balance of 2020, we plan to maximise fleet-wide utilisation for these vessels while re-implementing our active chartering approach. As such, we strategically repositioned select capesize vessels after the completion of their scrubber installations towards the Atlantic Basin during the end of 2019 to better capture market fundamentals.

“With a sizeable fleet and strong balance sheet, including an estimated US$162 million of cash as of December 31, 2019, Genco remains poised to capitalise on favourable long-term dry bulk supply and demand fundamentals, while creating near-term shareholder value through our regular quarterly cash dividend policy of US$0.175 per share.”

In addition to the installation of scrubbers on the company’s 17 capesize vessels, the balance of the fleet consisting of minor bulk vessels is consuming ultra-low sulfur compliant fuel.

Read the article online at: https://www.drybulkmagazine.com/dry-bulk/31012020/genco-announces-completion-of-scrubber-programme/