Maritime Safety News Archives - Page 148 of 259 - SHIP IP LTD

Denmark-based software specialist BunkerMetric has joined the Veson Partner Network as an official Platform Partner. This strategic partnership will see BunkerMetric’s bunker procurement optimisation tool, BunkerPlanner, natively integrated with the maritime world’s leading commercial software platform, the Veson IMOS Platform (VIP), to empower mutual clients with the data-driven insights and connectivity they need to optimize their bunkering decisions.

The integration will help streamline and improve the complex, often fragmented workflows involved with bunker procurement planning, enabling more optimal bunker decisions that save time, money, and resources.

For those joint clients that choose to take advantage of the turnkey integration, relevant voyage itinerary and activity reporting data from VIP can be imported directly into BunkerPlanner, which can then perform analyses within the context of a voyage’s commercial, regulatory, and operational obligations to help improve voyage yields through bunker optimisation. BunkerPlanner does this by combining data such as charterparty agreements, vessel specifics, positions, routes, ETA, tank capacity, bunker prices, port details, and sailing distances to make recommendations for the optimal fuel quantity, ideal ports, dates, and type of fuel to lift at each location.

Direct and secure integration between BunkerPlanner and VIP saves teams time spent coordinating voyage decisions between Chartering, Operations, and Bunker Procurement, helping teams work together more efficiently and prevent costly errors and misunderstandings.

Further, the integration helps provide greater transparency into the environmental impact of bunkering decisions so that organizations can stay up to date with reporting requirements that evolving regulations require. An embedded Carbon Intensity Indicator (CII) calculator within BunkerPlanner helps operators understand consumption effects to not only increase voyage profitability, but also cut down on emissions and improve the fleet’s performance.

Kris Kosmala, Chief Commercial Officer, BunkerMetric, said, “We are very pleased to collaborate with Veson as a Platform Partner. BunkerPlanner and VIP can together streamline workflows and uncover impactful new efficiencies and cost savings for mutual clients. Our use cases indicate that by optimizing the fuel procurement process, the potential operational savings for an organization can reach tens of thousands of dollars per voyage.”

With the ability to integrate commercial voyage plans in VIP with optimal bunkering plans generated by BunkerPlanner, clients can gain greater control over the proactive management of the largest cost component of every voyage: bunkers. Graham Piasecki, Director of Commercial Strategy, Veson Nautical, said: “In an increasingly competitive market landscape, organisations need advanced planning optimization tools that integrate bunker-related information from within the company commercially operating the vessel as well as with external data sources. By working together with BunkerMetric on bunker optimisation, we can put powerful tools into the hands of our clients that provide new transparency and insights into such a significantly strategic component of every voyage.”

Rolls-Royce is launching a range of sustainable mtu propulsion solutions for yachts. The first large yachts are already running with mtu systems based on the mtu Series 4000, which are certified for IMO III emissions regulations.

Brand new on the market from April 2022 will be mtu Series 2000 propulsion systems with exhaust gas aftertreatment for production yachts. “More new technologies will follow to help yacht manufacturers and operators achieve their sustainability goals and those of the Paris Climate Agreement,” explained Nicola Camuffo, who heads the Yacht Competence Centre of Rolls-Royce’s Power Systems business unit in La Spezia, Italy. Rolls-Royce will present its new mtu solutions at the yacht shows in Cannes and Monaco.

A new generation of mtu Series 16V2000M97L engines will be available with an integrated exhaust aftertreatment system from April 2022. This will enable production yachts to sail in particularly protected areas, for example in ECA zones such as the North American coast, the Caribbean and the North and Baltic Seas. The systems with Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) units significantly reduce particulate and nitrogen oxide emissions. The IMO III propulsion system will be delivered for the first time this autumn and tested in a production yacht from the beginning of 2022. Further engine variants of the mtu Series 2000 will gradually become available for IMO III operation.

By 2023, the company will initially offer hybrid solutions for production yachts with mtu Series 2000 engines and variable electric power, which will cover a power range of approximately 1,000 to 1,939kW powertrains. In addition to the engines, the system also includes electric motors, gearboxes, batteries, control and monitoring systems and other electronic components. Rolls-Royce’s concept for an mtu series hybrid system comprises a modular building kit with standardized components and concepts for different vessel types and sizes. For yachts, a hybrid system brings high performance and significant gains in terms of comfort – with quiet, low-vibration and low-emission cruising. In purely electric operation, neither sulphur nor nitrogen oxide or particles are emitted.

The yacht engines of the mtu 2000 and 4000 Series will be approved for sustainable EN 15940 fuels such as e-diesel and second-generation biofuels from 2023, enabling climate-neutral cruising. HVO (Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil), for example, is a biofuel that can be produced from waste in a CO2-neutral way, with low emissions and clean and efficient combustion.

Rolls-Royce Power Systems engineers are working on other new technologies such as fuel cell systems and methanol engines. At its Yacht Competence Centre in La Spezia, the company offers shipyards technical support in the development and integration of new propulsion systems. “There will be different propulsion concepts in the future, depending on the specific needs of yacht owners, shipyards and infrastructure. We are happy to exchange ideas with customers and other experts in order to jointly drive innovations forward, for example by means of pilot installations,” explained Camuffo.

France-based classification society Bureau Veritas (BV) has developed a formalised approach to support the safe carriage of containers in bulk carriers. The move comes as several ship operators have been investigating moving containers due to lack of capacity in the liner sector, and major shippers are chartering dedicated vessel to alleviate blocked supply chains.

BV’s Guidance for Studying and Preparing a Bulk Carrier for the Carriage of Containers provides operators with pathways based on analysis and a thorough understanding of safety, regulatory and operational requirements. The guidance was developed by technical experts based in the Bureau Veritas Piraeus office, in Greece, in collaboration with the Technical Directorate in Paris.

Commenting on the guidance, Piraeus-based Paillette Palaiologou, BV Marine & Offshore’s Vice President for the Hellenic, Black Sea & Adriatic Zone, said, “We have significant experience and knowledge of bulk carrier design, classification, and operations across BV and particularly here in Greece, where we have numerous clients in the dry cargo market. Additionally, our class rules for container lashing and our own associated lashing software are highly sophisticated. The combination of bulker and boxship capability and understanding has enabled our teams to rapidly provide a framework to meet market requirements as demand emerges for bulkers to be able to carry boxes.”

The guidance outlines two main pathways for stowing containers in holds, either as a ‘block’ of lashed cargo without retrofitting of special container securing fittings, or as more conventional stacks of containers, in which case such equipment may need to be fitted permanently or temporarily.

The IMO Code of Safe Practice for Cargo Stowage and Securing (CSS Code) for ships that are equipped with a Cargo Securing Manual, provides a key reference point in its Annex 1 “Safe stowage and securing of containers on deck of ships which are not specially designed and fitted for the purpose of carrying containers”, as well as the calculation methods for forces acting on cargo units and the efficiency of securing arrangements.

However, the fact that bulk carriers are “not specially designed and fitted for the purpose of carrying containers”, combined with the potential need to maximize the intake of containers, may raise concerns related to the integrity of the vessel’s structure and the cargo itself, as well as the safety of the crew and the stevedores.

Palaiologou added, “In many ways, we are going back to the future, as general cargo and multi-purpose ships have always been able to carry containers. In the context of today’s market demands, the capacity to move containers in bulk carriers is a key advantage. With our guidance, we wish to ensure that modern analysis tools and techniques can be applied to support safety as well as modern operational efficiency.”

The full BV Guidance for Studying and Preparing a Bulk Carrier for the Carriage of Containers can be downloaded from the organisation’s website.