[saalweachter]

An important note: as much sulfuric pollution as all the cars in the world. Which is bad enough, but -- for instance -- cars are (probably) still winning on CO2 emissions.

For those who don't follow the link, the 16 ships in question burn the sludge that's left over after refining all the cleaner burning bits out of petroleum. So it's not so much a "quantity of fuel burned" problem as it is that they're burning the worst possible thing you can burn, as far as this sort of pollution goes.

[Already__Taken]

And yet seems like such a good candidate for nuclear power use.

[darkmighty]

I concur, it's an almost perfect application. So much that most aircraft carriers already use it, not sure what's holding back the private sector (probably safety concerns).

[kyllo]

Nope, it's definitely cost. Bunker is still very very cheap.