Ships plugging into Aberdeen’s harbour-side electrical grid will cut carbon emissions by 62,000 tonnes over 20 years—equivalent to an 82% reduction compared to burning marine fuel while docked. Ports are major pollution hotspots, with vessels often running diesel engines at berth to power lights, pumps, and cargo handling. This at-scale demonstration project installs shore power systems at seven berths in Port of Aberdeen’s North Harbour, allowing ships to switch off their engines and draw clean electricity from the landside grid. The work follows a feasibility study and aims to prove that the technology is both technically reliable and commercially viable. If successful, the project could transform how UK ports operate. Rolling out fully green shore power across all Aberdeen harbour areas would cut total harbour emissions by 78%—34,000 tonnes of CO₂ per year. The findings will be shared with UK ports, shipping companies, and government stakeholders through reports and webinars, helping other ports overcome grid constraints and replicate the approach. This directly supports the UK’s Clean Maritime Plan targets and strengthens Aberdeen’s role as a hub for the North Sea energy industry, both conventional and renewable.
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Ports and the vessels operating therein play a key role in decarbonisation activities and can be enablers of change across multiple sectors including maritime, transportation, energy and logistics. Our goal is to accelerate transition to Net Zero by eliminating emissions through the development and introduction of innovative technology and processes. This project, an at-scale demonstration project for a landside and vessel-side shore power system in Port of Aberdeen's (PoA) North Harbour will have wider implications across the UK maritime sector and aligns with emissions reductions goals published in the DfT Clean Maritime Plan, 2019\. The demonstrator project follows the previously completed Feasibility Study in CMDC1 which developed an outline system design for demonstration scale shore power facilities for seven berths and an Outline Business Case (OBC). The project aim is to reduce emissions in port, prove technical and economic viability of shore power and will also support Aberdeen's journey to becoming a Net Zero Green Port, cementing the position of NE Scotland as the key support centre for North Sea energy industry, both conventional and renewable. The project will assess and analyse the initial landside and vessel-side infrastructure build and technical performance alongside commerciality assessments, which will also consider needs in respect of subsidies and/or short-term incentives, designed to accelerate uptake of the high TRL technology. The findings will form the base from which roll out of shore power can be achieved at PoA and across other UK ports and the wider vessel community to increase competitiveness on the road to net zero. Implementing shore power in Albert and Mearns Quay saves 62,000 tonnes of CO2e over the scheme lifetime (20 years). This equates to an 82% reduction in carbon emissions compared to the counterfactual of burning marine fuel whilst at berth and equivalent to 8% of total harbour emissions. Rolling fully green shore power out in all areas of the harbour could result in 34,000 tCO2 per annum emissions reduction - 78% of total harbour emissions. The project will also undertake academic research to determine environmental and economic impacts and key lessons across three main areas of project construction and operation, project economics and multi-stakeholder collaboration with dissemination in multi-format: including a written report, and webinar for UK port, shipping, Government stakeholders. And consideration to replicability of the proposed approach within other port environments where grid network constraints need to be addressed to support UK wide port decarbonisation activity.
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