Japan’s oil companies appear to be turning to scrubbers for their VLCCs to meet the new global sulphur emissions regulations, which will be enforced from 2020.

The move is the latest sign that an increasing number of the 730-strong fleet could opt for scrubbers to extract the sulphur from exhaust gas emissions rather than taking a risk on the price of low-sulphur marine gas oil to meet the regulation restricting the sulphur content of fuel to 0.5%.