September 1, 2022 IMO
IMO Secretary-General Kitack Lim is scheduled to visit the port of Odesa on Monday (29 August), to see at first-hand the implementation of the Black Sea Grain Initiative and hear how ship safety and port management is being implemented. IMO Secretary-General Lim is expected to board a ship and speak to seafarers. The IMO Secretary-General will be hosted by the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine.
Source: https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/Pages/WhatsNew-1744.aspx
September 1, 2022 BIMCO
Canadian-owned Ports America, the largest marine terminal operator and stevedore in North America, has announced the appointment of Matthew Leech as its new president and CEO, effective this coming November. Leech will take over from Mark Montgomery, who will retire from his previous role and support the firm in an advisory capacity going forward.
Leech has more than 25 years of experience in the maritime industry. In his last post, he served as CEO and managing director for the Americas for DP World. Before DP World’s acquisition of CSX World Terminals in 2005, Leech served as VP of operations and development, and he led an important expansion initiative.
“Ports America is poised for growth, and Matt is the right leader to take this exceptional business forward,” said Montgomery.
“I am honored to be named as the next CEO of Ports America,” said Leech. “Ports America is a highperforming organization that values its long-standing relationships with its customers. I look forward to working with leadership and the entire team to continue driving strong performance.”
Leech joins another company newcomer, Andrew Clarke, who became chairman at Ports America earlier this year.
“Matt brings strong industry experience and will be an outstanding addition to the team as we deliver on our mission to provide the highest
quality operations for our customers. We also thank Mark for his years of service and leadership during a period of unprecedented growth for the company,” said Clarke.
Ports America is the largest marine terminal operator in North America with operations in 33 ports across the U.S. It is based in New Jersey, but it is owned by the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board (CPP Investments), a Crown corporation founded by the Canadian government. CPP Investments is one of the largest private equity investors in the world, with more than $400 billion in assets under management.
Source: https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/matthew-leech-named-ceo-of-top-u-s-terminal-operator-ports-america
September 1, 2022 Maritime Safety News
Washington State Ferries (WSF) is embarking on an ambitious initiative to transition to a hybrid electric ferry system. This transition will improve local air quality and reduce greenhouse gas emissions 76% by 2040.
To shift the largest ferry system in the United States to hybrid electric, WSF is working on three key elements of the electrification system – building new hybrid electric vessels, converting existing vessels to hybrid electric, and electrifying the terminals.
WSF is currently developing the Request for Proposal (RFP) for the construction of five new hybrid electric Olympic Class (HEOC) vessels. These new vessels, along with plans for 11 additional new vessels and six converted vessels, are required to be built in Washington in accordance with state law.
To encourage collaboration among existing and future Washington maritime firms, WSF will co-host an Industry Day with Maritime Blue on October 6, 2022, in downtown Seattle from 9 AM to noon in advance of the release of the RFP.
Matt von Ruden, WSF’s Electrification Program System Administrator commented, “The development of this RFP, and future selection of a shipbuilder for these five new vessels, is an exciting milestone not only for our electrification efforts, but for the maritime industry as a whole. We look forward to working with new partners to support the development of a greener maritime industry here in Washington state.”
To learn more about the electrification program and the upcoming Industry Day, visit WSF’s electrification webpage or watch our video below.
Source: https://gcaptain.com/washington-state-ferries-journey-to-hybrid-electric/
September 1, 2022 CONSULTANCY
By Subhadip Sircar (Bloomberg) –India and China traded insults over their diverging interests in Sri Lanka, after a controversial Chinese scientific research ship called at the island nation despite New Delhi’s security concerns.
Sri Lanka “needs support, not unwanted pressure or unnecessary controversies to serve another country’s agenda,” the Indian embassy in Colombo said on Twitter late Saturday, referencing the ongoing political and economic turmoil the nation is already battling after defaulting on its debt for the first time.
On Friday, the Chinese embassy in Sri Lanka tweeted that the South Asian country had every right to approve a foreign vessel docking at its port.
“External obstruction based on so-called ‘security concerns’ but without any evidence from certain forces is de facto a thorough interference into Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and independence,” the Chinese mission wrote.
“Some countries, far or near, always make groundless excuses to bully Sri Lanka, and trample on Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and independence repeatedly,” it said, without directly naming India.
Sri Lanka cleared the Yuan Wang 5 to dock at the Hambantota port from Aug. 16 to 22 after initially deferring a request from the Chinese embassy to allow the ship a call in mid-August for replenishment purposes.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs said last month that the ship’s movements could have a bearing on its security and economic interests.
The Hambantota port that the vessel stopped at has been plagued by controversy, with the Sri Lankan government having to borrow heavily to construct it. When Sri Lanka couldn’t repay the loans, it granted China a 99-year lease on the facility for debt relief.
Sri Lanka is currently negotiating with the International Monetary Fund for assistance amid its worst ever economic crisis.
Source: https://gcaptain.com/china-india-spar-over-controversial-ships-call-in-sri-lanka/
September 1, 2022 Maritime Safety News
Explosion occurred in funnel section of tanker TORC on Aug 28 during wielding maintenance works, at Bandirma, Turkey, Marmara sea. Two crew including Second Engineer were injured, and hospitalized. Explosion was followed by fire, extinguished by port firefighters. Tanker remains docked at Bandirma, she arrived at Bandirma from Ukraine via Istanbul. Photo of TORC at port: Deniz Haber.
Source: https://www.fleetmon.com/maritime-news/2022/39329/tanker-explosion-fire-2-injured-marmara-sea/
September 1, 2022 GENERAL
May Darwich, Jutta Bakonyi (The Conversation)–Berbera port is the main overseas trade gateway of the breakaway Republic of Somaliland. The port city is located on the Gulf of Aden – one of the globally most frequented seaways connecting the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean.
Only a few years ago, Berbera port was a dilapidated runway, originally built by the British empire, and then modernised first by the Soviet Union and later the US. The port is the lifeline of Somaliland, which imports most of what it needs, from food to construction material, cars and furniture. Its main export is livestock to the Arabian Peninsula.
This picture changed considerably after the Emirates-based Dubai Ports World (DP World), a leading global port operator and logistics giant, took over the port management in 2017. It expanded the quay by 400m, established a new container terminal, designed a free zone, and started to manage the port’s operations.
Lined up alongside the quay are the latest crane models, which have become operational since June 2022. DP World employees practise operating the cranes every day. The hope is that the port will attract 500,000 TEU (unit of cargo capacity) per year, about one third of the capacity of neighbouring Doraleh port in Djibouti. This would allow Somaliland to become a logistical hub on the Gulf of Aden competing with other ports in the region such as Djibouti, Mogadishu and Mombasa.
The cranes are crucial for the speedy handling of cargo required in a modern port. The staff training, however, takes place in a port that is yet to get busy. So far, container ships arrive only infrequently.
We have been studying the Horn of Africa’s emerging port infrastructures. The boost that the revamped Berbera port needs is for Ethiopia to come to the party. Ethiopia has been landlocked since Eritrea gained independence in 1993, and relies on the port of Djibouti – 95% of its trade goes through the port.
In 2017, a concession agreement was signed between DP World, Ethiopia, and the government of Somaliland to rebuild and modernise the port of Berbera. The 30-year concession involves: a commercial port, a free zone, a corridor from Berbera to Ethiopia’s borders, and an airport in Berbera.
The concession allowed Somaliland’s government to retain 30% of the shares in the port, 19% for Ethiopia, and 51% for DP World. But in June 2022, Somaliland announced that Ethiopia had failed to acquire its 19% share of Berbera port. Ethiopia failed to meet the conditions.
Somalilanders remain optimistic, nonetheless. The infrastructure project means a great deal to the country. It promises to foster its ambition to receive international recognition, achieve economic development, and fulfil hopes for improved living conditions of its citizens.
DP World’s expansion in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden is taking place in the context of turbulent political transformations in the Horn of Africa.
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018 on the back of popular protests and awakened hopes of a democratic transition in the country. He ended the two-decades-long rivalry between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which brought him the Nobel Peace Prize. With a population of more than 100 million and one of the fastest growing economies in Africa, Ethiopia’s transition brought prospects of developments across the Horn of Africa.
DP World’s will to expand its operations in the region coincided with conflicts between DP World and Djibouti. In 2006, DP World had signed a 30-year concession to design, build, and operate the Doraleh container terminal in Djibouti. Growing tensions led the government of Djibouti to cancel DP World’s concession in 2018.
DP World shifted its interest from the port in Djibouti to Berbera in Somaliland and Bosaso in Somalia (Puntland). In 2017, a concession agreement was signed between DP World, Ethiopia, and the government of Somaliland to rebuild and modernise the port of Berbera. The projects covered by the 30-year concession included a commercial port, a free zone, a corridor from Berbera to Ethiopia’s borders, and an airport.
These projects are steadily progressing. Berbera port has already completed its first expansion phase. The DP World-owned free zone is under construction. Large parts of the Berbera corridor, a highway linking Berbera to Toqwajale at the Ethiopian-Somaliland border; and from there to Jigjiga and Addis in Ethiopia are finalised. According to Somaliland officials, the airport is also completed, but its original designation as a military outlet for the UAE remains ambiguous.
The infrastructure project means a great deal to Somaliland, promising to put the country on the path to international recognition and achieve economic development. However, these aspirations will not materialise without Ethiopia on board, which has not met the conditions under which it was to get a 19% share of the Berbera port. In addition it has not yet opened its markets to Somaliland traders.
Somalilanders remain optimistic, nonetheless, expecting that especially trade from eastern parts of Ethiopia will redirected to Somaliland. But this plan is not without risks. The pandemic and war in Tigray has slowed down Ethiopia’s economic growth, and the stability of the country is on the brink.
While DP World’s strategy to control ports along the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden is already transforming the political geography of the Horn of Africa, the success of its strategy largely hinges upon Ethiopia, and so do the hopes and aspirations of Ethiopia’s coastal neighbours.
Everybody, so it seems, is currently waiting for Ethiopia.
September 1, 2022 VRP
The U.S. Coast Guard and Global Diving and Salvage are preparing to raise the wreck of a commercial fishing vessel that went down in Haro Strait on August 13.
The fishing vessel Aleutian Isle began taking on water near Sunset Point on the west side of San Juan Island at about 1400 hours on the 13th. The Coast Guard received a report that the vessel needed assistance and dispatched a helicopter, a response boat and a small cutter. All personnel aboard the vessel were rescued safely, and it sank shortly after; it had about 2,600 gallons of diesel and oil on board, and a sheen of nearly two miles in length was visible by 1700 hours.
Courtesy USCG
The Coast Guard formed a unified command for the response and tapped the National Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund for $130,000 in support. The funds have covered the cost of cleanup contractors, both along the shoreline and on the water. Over the course of the last two weeks, the vessel has continued to release modest quantities of diesel – too little to recover – and contractors have contained it with booms as needed. One additional wrinkle: one of the wreck’s 1,400-foot nets floated up to the surface, and the USCG had to deploy a buoy tender to haul it in.
The unified command has made a decision to seal up the vessel’s tanks and raise it from the bottom, eliminating the risk of future pollution. Using sidescan sonar, the search team found the wreck in about 200 feet of water just off Sunset Point. An inspection with a small ROV confirmed its identity and found that it is sitting upright on the bottom.
Courtesy USCG
The depth poses challenges for a wreck recovery mission: for technical reasons, it will have to be a heliox commercial dive, according to the Coast Guard. The proper heliox mix has taken time to get, so the dive operations are only just now beginning. A crane barge barge, the heliox tanks and the dive team all arrived Sunday to begin work.
The operation will not be easy. In addition to depth, the divers will also have to contend with changing tidal currents, which will limit the number of hours a day that dive operations are possible. Due to this constraint, the preparations and the recovery operation are expected to take ten days.
Since the area is within the habitat of the Southern Resident killer whale population, NOAA and Washington State Department of Ecology have also set up preparations to deter whales using an acoustic device (oikomi pipes).
Source: USCG
The giant utility Dominion Energy has found itself in a disagreement with state regulators over a proposed performance guarantee for its $10 billion Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project, one of the largest planned wind farms in the U.S. development pipeline. The clause is enough of a concern for Dominion that it has threatened to scuttle CVOW altogether and walk away – a seismic shock for the budding U.S. offshore wind industry.
Dominion has historically been one of the most committed players in the U.S. offshore wind business. It was an early and enthusiastic entrant, beginning its planning for a small pilot project as early as 2012. The pilot stage was completed in 2020 and is one of only two (small) offshore wind farms operating in the U.S. today.
To build the full-scale 2.6 GW facility, Dominion is buying the only U.S.-built wind turbine installation vessel on the market, the future Charybdis, at a price of half a billion dollars – a financial commitment that no other developer or shipowner has been willing to match yet. Construction on the vessel is already well under way.
However, the Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC) – a regulator with a broad mandate governing insurance, railroads and utilities – has made a decision that may make CVOW untenable, according to Dominion. The SCC will allow Dominion to bill the cost of CVOW’s development to household ratepayers in the form of a miniscule rider fee – but only if its turbines perform at a 42 percent capacity factor or better in any three-year period. Any shortfalls would be Dominion’s to cover.
Dominion has appealed the decision, describing it as unprecedented and “unlawful.” The firm warns that the guarantee is so broad that it would leave Dominion on the hook for any decline in power output – whether caused by a hurricane, cyberattack, climate change or any other factor.
“The Commission’s unprecedented imposition of an involuntary performance guarantee condition on its approvals, however, is untenable. As ordered, it will prevent the project from moving forward, and the company will be forced to terminate all development and construction activities,” Dominion wrote in an appeal. “As recognized by the Commission, the project is favored by the General Assembly’s support for offshore wind generation as a cornerstone of the Commonwealth’s plan for a clean and reliable energy future.”
The disagreement follows a just few weeks after Dominion celebrated formal approval from the SCC for the project to move forward. The initial order was released August 8, and it noted that there would be some form of performance requirement, but did not give any details – until now.
Dominion’s appeal to the SCC begins a rehearing process, and the company sounded an upbeat note in a statement to local TV media.
“We look forward to completing the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project as a regulated project to build on our long record of affordability and reliability,” a Dominion spokesperson told local media.
On Sunday, U.S. warships made a transit of the Taiwan Strait for the first time since the visit of U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to Taipei in early August.
Pelosi’s diplomatic stopover drew furious rhetoric from Beijing, along with missile test launches, mass naval exercises and warplane flights. By comparison, the transit of two U.S. Navy cruisers through the strait this weekend drew a relatively muted response – less even than China’s typical pushback on American freedom of navigation operations (FONOPs).
USS Antietam and USS Chancellersville were assigned to this transit, and 7th Fleet emphasized that they passed through “waters where high seas freedoms of navigation and overflight apply” with the intent to demonstrate the U.S. commitment to a “free and open Indo-Pacific.”
The PLA responded in a brief statement that it “conducted security tracking and monitoring of the U.S. warships’ passage in the whole course” and had all of their movements “under control” throughout. China’s foreign ministry issued no formal response – a departure from the usual practice of condemnation.
The Global Times, the most overtly nationalistic branch of China’s state media, dismissed Antietam and Chancellorsville as “old ships” and suggested that their presence was not an issue. “As long as the US vessels follow the rules of ‘innocent passage’ to keep low profile and pose no harm, turn off weapons and fire-control radar system, and bring no actual threat to China’s security, the PLA would just follow and monitor,” Global Times wrote.
The U.S. Navy is all too aware of the age of the Ticonderoga class, and it wants to decommission all of them by 2027 – if Congress will allow it.
September 1, 2022 Maritime Safety News
During a joint fishery patrol in the South Pacific last week, a U.S. Coast Guard cutter requested permission to call in the Solomon Islands – and was denied. The cutter USCGC Oliver Henry had a scheduled replenishment port call in Honiara, intended to enable its mission to help the Solomons prevent illegal fishing. A Coast Guard press officer told Reuters that Solomons officials “did not respond” to a request to enter port, so the vessel diverted about 500 nm from its course to call in Papua New Guinea instead.
The unusual snub follows months after the Solomons government signed a security pact with China, which allows Beijing to stage forces on the island nation’s territory. A leaked draft of the agreement suggests that it will also allow Chinese naval vessels to call for replenishment at Honiara. The deal has raised serious concerns for officials in the U.S. and Australia, since the Solomon Inslands are a natural jumping off point for military operations in the Coral Sea and the South Pacific. In WWII, the U.S. had to engage in a fierce fight to dislodge Japanese forces from the Solomons, and the islands’ strategic location is well-remembered.
The diplomatic brush-off may also have extended to the Oliver Berry’s partner vessel, the Royal Navy patrol ship HMS Spey. The Royal Navy would not confirm whether or not Spey had been turned away, saying only that it is “routine practice” for itineraries to change.
A spokesperson for the Coast Guard told the AP that the U.S. State Department is in dialogue with the Solomons government, and that in future it expects that clearances will be provided for American ships.
HMS Spey, Oliver Berry and personnel and assets from 15 other nations were in the area as part of Operation Island Chief, one of four annual patrols focused on deterring illegal fishing. It was the first time the Royal Navy had joined the 10-day mission.
