The 2007 paper “Sea Water Scrubbing – Does it contribute to increased global CO₂ emissions”[12], carefully assesses the factors involved in seawater scrubbing and compares them with the factors involved in the production of distillate fuel.

The paper draws the conclusion that there appears to be a net CO₂ benefit from the use of high sulphur fuel oil with exhaust gas cleaning systems. It also notes that emissions of SO₂ can be virtually reduced to zero and in addition, particulate emissions are significantly reduced, further contributing to improvements in air quality.