Fitting exhaust gas scrubbers is the most commercially viable option open to owners of VLCCs looking to meet the IMO’s 2020 deadline on tougher SOx regulations, market sources said.

Technical managers at shipowning companies say the $2m to $2.5m cost of fitting a newbuilding with a scrubber can be paid down in a year or less.

In contrast, the dual-fuel price, where LNG would be supplied as bunkers, just “doesn’t make sense” at the moment, one said while explaining that it would prove too expensive over too long a payback period.