Marine Log June 2019

arine oG M L www.marinelog.com

R e p o r t i n g o n M a r i n e B u s i n e s s & T e c h n o l o g y s i n c e 18 78

June 2019

Meet Maritime's

New & Next

GENERATION

Yearbook & Maritime Review Ferries & Passenger Vessels: An advancing market

West Coast Shipyards: A healthy mix of orders

St. Johns Ship Building

Full-Service Construction and Repair of Steel and Aluminum Vessels

Recently Launched 152’ Ferry

560 Stokes Landing Rd. Palatka, FL 32177 Tel: 386-456-6699 stjohnsshipbuilding.com

CONTENTS

10

18

Departments

Features

2E DITOR’S LETTER Trending into the Future

18

PASSENGER VESSELS & FERRIES A Market of Growth The passenger vessel and ferry market continues to expand with advanced technology, green initiatives and newbuilds

20

NEW AND NEXT GENERATION AWARDS Meet the New and Next Generation People determine the success of any marine enterprise, and it’s the new generation that will be the face of the industry

22

WORLDWIDE SHIPBUILDING China Tops the League; Niche Construction Elsewhere Asian shipyards control the lion’s share of the world orderbook, but Europe still dominates cruise construction

24

GOVERNMENT SHIPBUILDING Shipyards Look Beyond the Navy for Government Orders It’s no secret who is American shipbuilding’s biggest customer—the U.S. government

27

TANKER, BULK AND LNG TRENDS It’s All in the Trends What are the major dynamics determining today’s markets?

29

WEST COAST SHIPYARDS West Coast Shipyards Book a Healthy Mix of Orders The last in a three-part series on U.S. shipyards, including Vigor, Nichols Brothers Boat Builders, NASSCO and others

32

OFFSHORE ROUNDUP Offshore Industry Shows Signs of Improvement The tide appears to be slowly turning for the offshore oil and gas industry

4 INDUSTRY INSIGHTS 6 MARINE INNOVATIONS 8 VESSEL OF THE MONTH Nichols Brothers Boat Builders Delta Teresa 10 INLAND WATERWAYS Waterways Are Worth Fighting For

11 WELLNESS Healthy Eating Part I—The Sweetness 12 Update BS Uses AI for Corrosion Detection A Largest LNG-Fueled Aluminum Ship • No FF(X) Build for Lockheed Martin • •

Left: Shutterstock/ Susan McAnnally, Right: Metal Shark

17 Inside Washington Committee Approves MarAd Authorization and Enhancement Act 34 Newsmakers Crowley Gets New Manager of Business Development 35 Tech News Viega Cuts Time on Bilge Piping Replacement Job

40 SAFETY High Rivers Impact Mariner Safety Cover Photo: Margaret Pattillo June 2019 // Marine Log 1

EDITOR’S COLUMN

MarineLoG June 2019 Vol. 124, NO. 6 ISSN 08970491 USPS 576-910 Subscriptions: 800-895-4389

Tel: +1 (402) 346-4740 (Canada & International) Fax: +1 (402) 346-3670 Email: marinelog@omeda.com PRESIDENT Arthur J. McGinnis, Jr. amcginnis@sbpub.com

NYC Ferry under construction at Metal Shark’s Franklin, La., shipyard.

Trending into the Future

T

his Yearbook & Maritime Review issue once again looks at trends and developments from multiple sectors of the maritime industry. While not all sectors of the industry are on the up, and some are struggling, others are on the rebound. But one thing is constant: Without teams of dedicated, hardworking maritime people, none of the industry’s successes would be possible.

Recognizing this, Marine Log has introudced its New and Next Generation (NNG) leadership awards. At our Tugs & Barges conference, held last month in Philadelphia, we presented our first three NNG awards to DJ Kurz of Keystone Shipping Company, Marjorie Zoretic of Foss Atlantic, and Johan Sperling of Crowley Marine Services. You can read more about them on pages 20-21.

All three award winners demonstrated vision, leadership, dedication and significant contributions to the maritime industry. With our annual Ferries conference just around the corner later this fall, another round of NNG awards will be presented to individuals nominated by the ferry and passenger vessel segment. More will follow from other industry sectors.

As you read through the pages of this issue, you’ll see both new and old bylines (and in my second month as editor in chief, I consider my byline “new” still). Also contributing this month for the first time is Sarah Michelle Hattier

of Dupre Marine Transportation in Houma, La., where she oversees the company’s safety and compliance. She contributed this month’s safety column aptly focused on high-water events as much of the inland system deals with record flooding and related accidents.

With more than a decade of experience in the oil and gas and offshore markets, Jennifer Pallanich returns with an overview of the offshore industr y’s recent challenges and activities. It’s not all doom and gloom for these markets as you’ll discover on page 32.

Long-time European contributor Paul Bartlett looks at international shipbuilding news and examines China’s competitive edge over other Asian and European shipyards.

Our coverage of U.S. shipbuilding continues with a look at West Coast shipyards and at what the industry can look for from its largest customer: the U.S. government.

Elsewhere in the issue, we look at the ferry and passenger vessel industry and at LNG, dry bulk and tanker market trends.

EDITOR-In-Chief Heather Ervin hervin@sbpub.com web EDITOR Nicholas Blenkey nblenkey@sbpub.com CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Paul Bartlett paul.bartlett@live.co.uk European EDITOR Charlie Bartlett charlie.bartlett@runbox.com Art Director Nicole D’Antona ndantona@sbpub.com Graphic Designer Aleza Leinwand aleinwand@sbpub.com MARKETING DIRECTOR Erica Hayes ehayes@sbpub.com PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Mary Conyers mconyers@sbpub.com REGIONAL SALES MANAGER MIDWEST/WEST COAST Jim Kingwill jim@kingwillco.com Barry Kingwill barry@kingwillco.com Integrated account manager; east coast & international David Harkey dharkey@sbpub.com SALES REPRESENTATIVE KOREA & CHINA Young-Seoh Chinn corres1@jesmedia.com CLASSIFIED SALES Jeanine Acquart jacquart@sbpub.com Circulation DIRECTOR Maureen Cooney mcooney@sbpub.com CONFERENCE DIRECTOR Michelle M. Zolkos mzolkos@sbpub.com

Heather Ervin Editor-in-Chief hervin@sbpub.com

Marine Log Magazine (Print ISSN 0897-0491, Digital ISSN 2166-210X), (USPS#576-910), (Canada Post Cust. #7204564; Agreement #40612608; IMEX Po Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2, Canada) is published monthly by Simmons-Boardman Publ. Corp, 55 Broad St. 26th Floor, New York, NY 10004. Printed in the U.S.A. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and Additional mailing offices.

PRICING: Qualified individuals in the marine industry may request a free subscription. For non-qualified subscriptions: Print version, Digital version, Both Print & Digital versions: 1 year, US $98.00; foreign $213.00; foreign, air mail $313.00. 2 years, US $156.00; foreign $270.00; foreign, air mail $470.00. Single Copies are $29.00 each. Subscriptions must be paid in U.S. dollars only.

COPYRIGHT © Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation 2019. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reproduced without permission. For reprint information contact: PARS International Corp., 102 W 38th St., 6th Floor, New York, N.Y. 10018 Phone (212) 221-9595 Fax (212) 221-9195.

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POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Marine Log Magazine, PO Box 1407, Cedar Rapids, IA. 52406-1407.

2 Marine Log // June 2019

Publisher Jeff Sutley jsutley@sbpub.com

CONFERENCE ASSISTANT Stephanie Rodriguez srodriguez@sbpub.com CONTRIBUTORS Emily Reiblein Crowley Maritime Corporation Capt. Matthew Bonvento Good Wind Maritime Services Judy Murray John Wooldridge Michael J. Toohey Waterways Council, Inc. Simmons-Boardman Publishing CORP. 55 Broad Street, 26th Floor, New York, N.Y. 10004 Tel: (212) 620-7200 Fax: (212) 633-1165 Website: www.marinelog.com E-mail: marinelog@sbpub.com

Rule the Sea

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Learn more about how MegaPress CuNi can help you rule the sea at Viega.us/RuleNow. Viega. Connected in quality.

INDUSTRY INSIGHTS In this yearbook issue, we take a look at a couple of big picture trends in world shipping and shipbuilding. In May, Clarksons reported that the world fleet had passed the 2 billion dwt capacity market. Capacity has been growing rapidly since 2006 when it hit the billion-ton market. Around 50% of the growth in capacity since 2006 has been accounted for by dry bulkers and another 27% by tankers. Can world seaborne trade sustain a 2 billion dwt fleet? How many more bulkers and tankers are in the pipeline? The figures below give some insights.

Bulk Carrier Orderbook As A Percentage Of The Current World Fleet

Tanker Orderbook As A Percentage Of The Current World Fleet

Handymax

4.75

Handymax Supramax

MR

0.70

Panamax Postpanamax

10

7.72

SUEZMAX

13.63

5

4.93

AFRAMAX

12.92

Capesize

11.15

LR2/PANAMAX

19.67

0

2.8

4.72

VLCC

15

20

13.05

0

Source: Alibra

5

10

15

20

Source: Alibra

Recent U.S. Shipyard Contracts Shipyard

Qty

Type

Owner

Est. $

Est. Del.

Burger Boat Company

2

90 ft all-electric catamaran sightseeing boats

Maid of the Mist``

N/A

Summer 2019

Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding

1

124 ft Passenger/vehicle ferry

Washington Island Ferry Line

N/A

May 2022

U.S. Workboats

1

Crew transfer vessel

WindServe Marine

N/A

Summer 2020

Senesco

1

Crew Transfer vessel

WindServe Marine

N/A

2021

2 + 8 options

ASD tugs

Moran Towing

N/A

2020

Washburn & Doughty

Source: Marine Log Shipbuilding Contracts

4 Marine Log // June 2019

Marine Innovations DELTA “T” SYSTEMS Louvered Closure Has Ultra Reliable Actuator Suitable for any size vessel, the new Louvered Closure from Delta “T” Systems has the outward appearance of a traditional vent, but features an integrated, vertically oriented aluminum damper within that allows closure in events such as heavy weather or fire. Manufactured in the U.S. from fully welded marine grade aluminum, it has a wide flange for easy installation and a clean appearance. Available powder coated to any color or with a paintable mill finish. It uses power to open and spring-activated closing in the event of power loss. www.deltatsystems.com

JOTUN Predictable Long-Term Antifouling Protection Jotun unveiled the next generation of its SeaForce biocidal antifouling range, with three new products—SeaForce Shield, SeaForce Active and SeaForce Active Plus—featuring breakthrough Hydractive technology that slows down the water uptake of the antifouling so that biocides are released in a more predictable pattern over the lifetime of the coating. SeaForce Active and SeaForce Active Plus also feature a triple biocide package. Developed in-house, the new solution provides predictable, long-term performance for diverse vessel needs. www.jotun.com

Wärtsilä Adds Reverse Osmosis to Fresh Water Generator Options Wärtsilä has expanded its range of fresh water generators and now offers reverse osmosis (RO) plants, as well as its existing line of evaporators. Reverse osmosis uses a semi-permeable membrane to remove salts and ions from seawater to provide fresh water. Customers are now able to source both RO and evaporator systems from the same supplier, while the two technologies can be combined into a Wärtsilä developed Smart Fresh Water Generation System for a cost-effective and fully automatic solution. www.wartsila.com

CHELSEA TECHNOLOGIES FastBallast Can Give Shipowners Assurance that BWMS is Effective Chelsea Technologies says that its FastBallast portable ballast water analyzer is capable of determining the phytoplankton cell density of ballast water at the IMO D2 and USCG Discharge Standards, with a higher degree of confidence than laboratory analysis. Already being adopted

by Port State Control authorities, it can also provide shipowners with the assurance that their ballast water management system is operating effectively, mitigating the risk of potentially significant fines and costly delays. www.chelsea.co.uk

MAN ENGINES Low-Cost SCR-Only IMO Tier 3 Workboat Engine MAN Engines is now offering 12-cylinder workboat engines meeting IMO Tier 3 emission standards. Spanning a power range from 551 kW to 1,213 kW, the engines meet the IMO Tier 3 limits by using an “SCR only” approach: MAN Engines’ modular exhaust gas after treatment (EAT) system. The modular EAT allows for a wide range of installation possibilities, as the individual SCR catalytic converter components can be positioned differently, enabling flexible system integration tailored to specific customer needs. www.engines.man.eu 6 Marine Log // June 2019

44th ANNUAL

INTERFERRY

CONFERENCE

LONDON

OCT. 5-9, 2019 • REGISTRATION IS OPEN

INNOVATION

PLATINUM SPONSORS

Registration is open for the 44th Annual Interferry Conference in London, which will focus on Transformational Innovation. Our program of networking and social events includes a Welcome Reception on the River Thames aboard the Silver Sturgeon, a networking reception at the Cutty Sark, the Farewell Dinner at the Old Royal Naval College Painted

Hall and the Technical Tour featuring Thames Clippers vessels and facilities as well as a look at nearby Woolwich Ferries operations. The conference website has all the information you’ll need about this year’s conference including the networking events, activities, sponsorship and our outstanding venue, the InterContinental London – The O2.

SPONSORS

PLATINUM

PRESIDENT’S

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SPEAKER GIFTS

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DELEGATE APP

MEDIA

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Vessel of the month

DELTA TERESA First Hybrid Tractor Tug in Long Running Nichols Brothers Series

By Nick Blenkey, Web Editor C

T

hough the 100- by 40-foot Delta Teresa is the seventh tractor tug built for San Francisco’s Baydelta Maritime by Nichols Brothers Boat Builders (NBBB), Freeland, Wash., it’s the first with hybrid drive.

The tug is based on the Valor Class, originally designed by Jensen Maritime to provide a 90t bollard pull tug for ship assist in the San Francisco Bay. The ability to provide that same bollard pull, without demanding an intermittent or high-performance duty rating on main engines, was a chief goal for the hybrid configuration.

The tug is powered by two Caterpillar C3516 C Tier 3 diesel engines, each rated at 1,995 kW at 1,600 rpm, and by two 424 kW Marelli Motori B5M400LD6 electric motors to provide combined diesel and electric drive.

The Z-drive system, two Kongsberg (formerly Rolls-Royce) 255FP units, can accept power from the diesel engines, electric motors and from both power sources. There are no drive batteries.

The electric motors are powered by three Cat C9.3 (300 kW each) 480 V 3-phase at 1,800 rpm generators, and a C7.1 150 kW 480 V 3-phase at 1,800 rpm harbor generator.

The hybrid system allows for the vessel to operate in different power modes, directdiesel, diesel-electric or fully-electric.

Additional aims in switching to hybrid 8 Marine Log // June 2019

M

were to increase maintenance intervals as a result of operating at a continuous engine rating, to provide the ability to transit to and from jobs using PTI (power take in) motors to reduced noise and vibration for the majority of operating time, and to gain increased low-speed maneuverability.

The generators can operate at power levels below main engine idle to allow fuel consumption savings at low speeds.

Total available power is 6,568 bhp (4,838 kW), and although this is slightly less than 6,772 bhp (5,050 kW) of the earlier vessels in the series, on trials Delta Teresa delivered a bollard pull of 90.3t against the goal of 90t. Free running speed of 14.5 knots at full power was faster than earlier variants of the design. The free running speed of 9 knots, electric drives only, was above the 7 knots goal.

The tug also demonstrated excellent maneuverability, while low-speed operation on PTI motors only allows propeller rpm to start from zero (with no idle speed limitation as with a diesel only drivetrain).

Operation during bollard pull was very smooth, with lower rpm main engines and a different gear ratio contributing to this.

Reduced vibration was noted throughout the sea trials.

Major equipment on board the vessel includes; Rapp Marine electric hawser winch, and a single drum tow winch, and the drivetrain is connected with Centa

carbon fiber shafts.

In addition to the drive units and hybrid system, Kongsberg supplied the control system and main switchboard, electric motors and their control cabinets.

The tug carries an ABS loadline certificate and complies with Coast Guard requirements.

Main Changes The major changes required to adapt the design to hybrid drive were concentrated in the engine and Z-drive spaces, with the vessel having much larger generators (and one more than earlier vessels).

An extensive update of the Z-drive room saw the switchboard and VFD (variable frequency drive) cabinet being located in the space to keep the main components in a common, relatively clean location Several significant components on the Z-drive upper unit required remote mounting due to the PTI. Structural modifications were required around the Z-drive units, with the drive shaft angle being increased from 5 degrees to 7 degrees, allowing the use of straight carbon fiber shafts. All earlier variants had bolt-in units.

Structural changes were required to accommodate the PTI motors and keep the vessel at less than 200 U.S. gross tonnage.

The Z-drive room main vent trunks were modified to accommodate the switchboard and VFD cabinet.

Y

CM

MY

CY

CMY

K

inland waterways

Waterways Are Worth Fighting For

T

he recent flooding on the Mississippi River, Illinois Waterway and other tributaries has dealt another blow to waterways shippers and particularly, the American family farmer. And while it pains us to see locks and dams literally underwater and barge tows sitting idly waiting to move, this latest crisis underscores the critical importance of this vital part of the transportation supply chain. Without the waterways, commerce slows or ceases, exports lag, costs increase to more expensive modes if they are even available to haul the freight, and congestion grows.

While the inland waterways are often out of sight, out of mind, floods and droughts bring the temporary picture of transportation hiatus front and center. This situation could become a more permanent reality if our nation’s lawmakers ignore the opportunity we have ahead to modernize aged lock and dam infrastructure.

While there still is not a plan for how to fund fixes for the inland waterways, nor the rest of the nation’s infrastructure, there is no shortage of rhetoric on all sides of the political aisle. But the country’s infrastructure needs are expensive and getting more so with each passing year (or decade) we don’t invest in their recapitalization.

FY20 Requests to be Released In the absence of a defined infrastructure package, House and Senate appropriators will soon release their Fiscal year (FY) requests for 2020 as mark-ups are announced. Waterways Council Inc. (WCI) will vigorously engage in the FY20 rollout of the Energy & Water Development (E&WD) appropriations 10 Marine Log // June 2019

bill that funds the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, responsible for maintaining the inland waterways system. Our congressional champions have restored administration cuts to the Corps’ program over the last eight fiscal years and we are working to achieve that outcome again this fiscal year. For FY20, the House approved a “deeming resolution” to allocate $1.3 trillion for all FY20 appropriations bills in the House. The Senate has not announced its spending levels.

As we are reminded of the importance of the waterways while shippers and operators are flooded out, work goes on in the nation’s capital to keep the Corps efficiently funded...

The Trump administration’s FY20 budget request proposed a cut of 31% to the Corps’ Civil Works program to $4.827 billion from the FY19 appropriated funding level of $7 billion. Proposed funding in the FY20 request for Inland Waterways Trust Fund (IWTF) projects was $55.5 million, when matched by General Fund revenue yields a total investment of $111 million

requested for the Lower Mon Project in Pittsburgh, funding it to completion. In the FY19 minibus appropriations bill, Congress appropriated $329.8 million for five IWTF-funded projects, despite the fact that in FY19, the president’s request for construction was just $35 million for the Olmsted project. Congress increased that FY19 amount by 842.3%, enabling full and efficient funding for Lower Mon, Kentucky Lock, Chickamauga Lock, and funding to completion for Olmsted Locks and Dam and for major rehabilitation of LaGrange Lock. If the President’s FY20 budget were to be enacted, the Lower Mon project would be the only IWTF project to receive FY20 funding while ongoing work at Kentucky Lock and Chickamauga Lock would go unfunded, causing potential shutdown and furloughs.

Progress for Ports In the port arena, progress is being made. On May 8, the House Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) Committee approved a bill (H.R. 2440) by voice vote aimed at spending all of the harbor maintenance tax receipts for their intended purpose instead of diverting a portion of the funds for other unrelated things. The bill was crafted by House T&I Chairman Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) and Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-Calif.), chair of the House Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment, and co-sponsored by Committee Ranking Member Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.) and Subcommittee Ranking Member Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.).

This bi-partisan measure would bolster our Nation’s ports and harbors to be fully and properly maintained.

So as we are reminded of the importance of the waterways while shippers and operators are flooded out, work goes on in the nation’s capital to keep the Corps efficiently funded for the next fiscal year. The U.S. is uniquely blessed with our vast inland waterways system. It’s important to raise your voice with your members of Congress and urge investment in locks and dams, and ports, for the future.

Michael J. Toohey President/CEO, Waterways Council, Inc.

Jon Fleshman

A 2,700-ton shell is loaded onto a barge headed to Olmsted Lock and Dam behind 1st Lt. Ian McBride with the Corps of Engineers.

Wellness Column

Healthy Eating Part I—The Sweetness consumption of processed foods. Where we have food choices, we need to choose wisely.

Where we can influence the food choices of others, we need to do so smartly.

Education

T

his month, we start a series of articles on healthy eating. Over the next few issues, we will progress through research on diet and how it affects our health, longevity and quality of life.

Chronic Disease People in the United States live to an average age of 74 years old. What takes lives are predominantly chronic diseases, such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, Alzheimer’s disease and diabetes. These chronic diseases share a metabolic component whereby energy production in a cell is not functioning well and as a result, the output and use of energy is disrupted. The direct causes of our accelerating number of deadly chronic diseases are mostly unknown, but all indications are that the nutrients in food impact their progression or regression. As the saying goes “good food is good medicine.” The biggest question is what foods are considered “good?”

Shutterstock/ Ana D

What We Evolved to Eat Humans have been hunters and gatherers going back millions of years. What humans ate was a function of climate that yielded availability. Meat, tubers, fruits, greens, bugs, and more were all in various diets and the adaptations existed within our biology to use these foods as nutrients for energy production. Up until the 1940s, our ancestors ate predominantly whole, unprocessed foods from the Earth. Food had little processing or refining happening before consumption.

Today, processed foods account for 58% of the average American’s diet, which is causing a problem in our cellular energy production.

Processed foods have long been associated with weight gain. Weight gain is a risk factor for multiple chronic diseases with a metabolic component, including heart disease, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, dementia and cancer. There are now at least a dozen different cancers that are caused by excess body weight. One cause of this weight gain appears to be a byproduct of added sugar. These sugars contribute about 21% of the calories we

Where we have food choices, we need to choose wisely.

get from all those ultra-processed boxes in the pantry. Take for example a breakfast of two packets of maple instant oatmeal, a glass of orange juice and a cup of coffee with a teaspoon of sugar in it. This breakfast contains roughly 45 grams of added sugar not inherent to the food but added in processing. Forty-five grams of sugar equates to 11 teaspoons. By comparison to recommendations, a healthy individual can process added sugar amounts of nine teaspoons for men, six teaspoons for women, and four for children in a 24-hour period according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Reduction of added sugars means less

Take 30 seconds to read the nutrition label of your food. Good food is good medicine, and bad food can be deadly. The 30 seconds you use to read the label will tell you which road your food is taking you down. “Added sugars” are noted under the “carbohydrates” section. Where it is labeled as just “sugars,” you may need to examine the ingredients list of the product to tell if there are “added sugars.”

Look for the names of sugar in the list, such as maltose, dextrose, sugar, honey, organic honey, etc. Note that sugars often hide in packages marked “heart healthy.” There is little regulation that identifies what this term really means. Reading the label and not just the box cover is critical.

Calculate Your Added Sugars Sugars are marked on a product label in grams. To convert grams to teaspoons, take the number of sugars in grams and divide by four. This will tell you how many teaspoons of added sugars are in the product and can be aligned with WHO recommendations. Where there is no nutritional label on food, it is most likely a “whole food,” and therefore would not contain “added sugars.” For example, an apple has sugar, but it is matched up with the fiber and water that can mitigate its effect on the body. Whole foods are designed by nature with balanced ingredients.

As for substitute sugars available on the market, some have been identified as safer than processed sugar while others have shown to be harmful. If you are looking for a sweet alternative, alcohol sugars, allulose and stevia may warrant some research and a discussion with your doctor. Keep in mind, they have benefits and drawbacks, and all except Stevia are fairly new to the market.

The article is for educational purposes only.

Nothing in this article constitutes medical advice. All medical advice should be sought from a medical professional.

Emily Reiblein

Crowley Maritime Corporation, Labor Relations-Union Wellness Programs/ Operations Integrity

June 2019 // Marine Log 11

Update NMA says MS Magellan entered two world heritage fjords with sulfur values far beyond the legal limit values.

Sulfur Violation in Fjords Brings $80,000 Fine The Norwegian Maritime Authority (NMA) has hit a Greek owned cruise ship that violated new sulfur emissions limits with a NOK 700,000 ($80,000) fine. The ship, the MS Magellan, is operated by Global Cruise Lines Ltd. The fine is the first imposed under new environmental requirements for emissions and discharges that came into effect March 1 and cover the world heritage fjords Nærøyfjord, Aurlandsfjord, Geirangerfjord, Sunnylvsfjord and Tafjord.

On April 16, the NMA received notes of concern about smoke emissions from the Bahamas-registered Magellan, which was berthed in Flåm. These were followed up by an inspection on board when the ship arrived at Geiranger the next day. The NMA surveyors measured the sulfur content of the ship’s fuel to be 0.17%. In the world heritage fjords, the maximum allowed sulfur content is 0.10%.

Tracking of the vessel’s AIS signal showed

that it made ports of call at both Eidfjord and Flåm in the days preceding the port of call at Geiranger. Both ports are located within the North Sea ECA. The ship came to Eidfjord from Tilbury in the U.K., where it left port on April 13.

“Our documentation shows that the ship has entered two world heritage fjords with sulfur values far beyond the legal limit values,” said Bjørn Pedersen, head of Department of Legislation and International Relations in the NMA. NMA says the violation by the Magellan is significant as the ship had sailed a considerable distance within the emission control area using a fuel with an excessive sulfur content. It says that the fact that the new rules concerning the world heritage fjords were violated is an aggravating factor.

“Overall,” says NMA, “this implies that violation fines at a historic high level be imposed on the company.”

BIZ NOTES KVH SELLS VIDEOTEL BUSINESS M i d d l e t o w n, R . I .- b a s e d K V H Industries Inc. has sold its Videotel maritime training business to an affiliate of Oakley Capital for a base purchase price of $90 million. K VH has retained cer tain rights to continue including the Videotel training content with its AgilePlans program. The Videotel group includes Super Dragon Ltd., Videotel Marine International Ltd., Videotel Training Ser vices Ltd., Videotel Consultants and Rentals Ltd., Videotel Marine Asia Ltd., and Videotel Pte Ltd.

The U.S. Coast Guard has issued a Marine Safety Bulletin warning that commercial vessels are being targeted by email phishing and malware intrusion attacks.

Cyber adversaries are attempting to gain sensitive information including the content of an official Notice of Arrival using email addresses that pose as an official Port State Control authority such as “port@pscgov.org.”

12 Marine Log // June 2019

The Coast Guard has also received reports of malicious software designed to disrupt shipboard computer systems.

Vessel masters have diligently reported suspicious activity to the Coast Guard National Response Center (NRC) enabling the Coast Guard and other federal agencies to counter cyber threats across the global maritime network.

As a reminder, says the bulletin, suspicious activity and breaches of security must be reported to the NRC at 800-424-8802.

For cyber attempts/attacks that do not impact the operating condition of the vessel or result in a pollution incident, owners or operators may alternatively report to the 24/7 National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center.

NMA

Coast Guard Warns of Cyber Attacks on Commercial Vessels

Update

Lockheed Martin Reportedly Drops Out of FFG (X) Build Race

Freedom-variant FFG (X) won’t be built.

Lockheed Martin will not compete in the bidding to design and build the Navy’s next-generation guided-missile frigate, the

FFG (X), reports the U.S. Naval Institute (USNI). USNI News cites Joe DePietro, Lockheed Martin vice president of small combatants and ship systems, as saying that, rather than pushing forward with a frigate design based on its Freedom variant LCS, the company will focus on developing the frigate’s combat and other systems.

Clicking on the link to the Freedom-Variant Frigate on the Lockheed Martin Web page now produces the message “4O4: We can’t seem to find that page.”

Lockheed Martin, which builds its LCS variant at Fincantieri Marinette Marine, has been one of five competitors involved in the FFG (X) conceptual design phase.

The others are: Austal USA, builder of the Independence variant LCS; Ingalls Shipbuilding, General Dynamics, and Fincantieri Marinette Marine.

Although Fincantieri Marinette Marine is the builder of the Lockheed Martin LCS, it has been competing to become the prime contractor for the FFG (X) with a design based on the FREMM frigate, in service with the Italian Navy since 2012.

BIZ NOTES SAME SHIPYARD, DIFFERENT RUSSIAN OWNERS F i n l a n d ’s A r c h t e c h H e l s i n k i Shipyard is to get a new ownership and a new name. The yard’s ef for ts to win new orders have been hit by the fact that it is currently owned by Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corporation, which is subjec t to both U.S. and EU sanctions. Now, it is to be named simply Helsinki Shipyard and will be owned by a different Russian entity that is not subject to those sanc tion: Algador Holdings.

That company is owned by Rishat Bagautdinov and Vladimir Kasyanenko, whose companies including Russia’s largest river cruise ship operator, Vodohod LLC. Its board will be chaired by Victor Olerskiy, a former deputy minister of transport of the Russian Federation.

World’s Largest Aluminum Ship Will Be LNG Fueled as their primary fuel.

Work is underway on designing and engineering the ship. Physical construction will commence as soon as the detail d e s i g n d r aw i n g s a re co m p l e te d a n d approved by the customer.

New Vessel for Trinidad, Tobago

Top: Lockheed Martin , Bottom: Incat Tasmania

130-meter-long cat will have a maximum speed of over 40 knots.

Australian shipbuilder Incat Tasmania Pty Ltd. has won a contract worth about $130 million to build what it says will be the world’s largest aluminum ship for longstanding customer Buquebus.

At a probable 13,000 gross registered tonnes, the 130-meter-long, 32-meterwide catamaran vessel will carry 2,100 passengers and 220 cars. The duty-free

shop will be world’s largest to be fitted on a ship, with over 3,000 square meters of retail floor space. Buquebus will operate the vessel between Argentina and Uruguay, joining other Incat ships already serving various ports on the River Plate.

Predicted to have a maximum speed of over 40 knots, the cat will be powered by four dual-fuel engines that will burn LNG

Earlier this year, the company announced plans to build a new vessel to the Government of Trinidad and Tobago to be delivered in 2020.

The fast passenger/cargo ferry will have capacity for 1,000 persons, including 224 VIP seats, and will carry 239 vehicles.

Not all passengers w ill get the VIP treatment. The vessel will also include a pr isoner holding cel l for t r ansfers between Trinidad and Tobago.

The Trinidad & Tobago inter-island seabridge has previously been served by two Incat vessels, the T&T Express and T&T Spirit and, like those, the new vessel will incorporate a range of onboard catering facilities with restaurant, kiosk and bars serving the central and aft cabins and the forward VIP area.

June 2019 // Marine Log 13

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Canada To Build 18 More Coast Guard Ships Canada is to invest up to C$15.7 bil-

AOPS under construction.

lion (about US$11.7 billion) to add up to 18 new large ships to the Canadian Coast Guard fleet.

The ships will be built at the two shipyards currently designated to build large ships under Canada’s National Shipbuilding Strategy (NSS), Seaspan’s Vancouver Shipyards and Irving Shipbuilding of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Third Yard For NSS Contracts Buried away in the middle of last month’s announcement from the office of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, was the disclosure that, “to support future shipbuilding needs and attract more talent and good jobs to our communities, the Government of Canada intends to add a third Canadian shipyard as a partner under the NSS” and will move forward with a competitive process to select the third shipyard in the coming months.

Two More AOPS The C$15.7 billion funding for the 18 new large ships represents early estimates of project budgets including construction, logistics

and support, contingency, project management and infrastructure costs. The costs of each ship will be announced following contract negotiations.

Two of the ships will be new Arctic and Offshore Patrol Ships (AOPS), which will be adapted for the Coast Guard to perform tasks including offshore patrols. These ships will be built by Irving Shipbuilding, which is already building the initial three AOPS for

the Royal Canadian Navy.

Canada will also order 16 Multi-Purpose Vessels. These ships will be built by Vancouver Shipyards.

Canada will also proceed, through a competitive process, with the design of a new class of smaller ships, the new Mid-Shore Multi-Mission Ship. This would complement the work of the large fleet in shallow areas and deliver mid-shore science activities.

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June 2019 // Marine Log 15

Update

Eastern Shipbuilding , Panama City, Fla., has delivered the first new construction towboat in a long-running series to be issued a Coast Guard Subchapter M Certificate of Inspection (COI). The vessel, M/V Brian Boudreaux, (Hull 198) is the 68th in a series of 90- by 32- by 10-foot inland

16 Marine Log // June 2019

towboats built by Eastern for Florida Marine Transporters LLC, of Mandeville, La. With a total of 70 towboats contracted since 2006, the program has become the largest single owner, single shipbuilder, new construction program with the same class towboat design in U.S. history.

Built to a design by Gilbert Associa te s In c . , B o s ton , Ma s s . , M / V B r i a n Boudreaux was constructed at Eastern’s Allanton shipyard.

Saying that he was “very pleased with how the delivery went,” Jeff Brumfield, director of vessel engineering and construction at Florida Marine, noted that Eastern Shipbuilding “did a great job working through all the new Coast Guard Sub-M challenges.”

M/V Brian Boudreaux is powered by two Caterpillar 3512C Tier 3 diesel engines rated at 1,500 hp at 1,600 rpm, provided by Louisiana CAT Power Systems of Reserve, La. The reduction gears are direct coupled Twin-Disc Model MG-5600 with a 6.04:1 reduction, supplied by Stewart Supply Inc. of Harvey, La. Electrical power is provided by two 99 kW John Deere 4045AFM85 99 kW Tier 3 generator sets rated for 60 Hz, at 208 V AC, provided by Kennedy Engine Company of Biloxi, Miss.

Florida Marine Transporters ships a variety of cargoes such as petrochemicals, chemicals, LPG, crude oil, agricultural liquids and dry cargo.

Eastern Shipbuilding

Eastern Delivers First FMT Subchapter M Newbuild

inside washington

MARAD Authorization and Enhancement Act Approved

O

n May 15, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation approved the Maritime Administration (MARAD) Authorization and Enhancement Act, authorizing appropriations for MARAD for Fiscal Year (FY) 2020, as well as four additional bills. Chairman Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and ranking member Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) provided the following statements on the committee approval of the MARAD Authorization and Enhancement Act: “The Maritime Administration is critical to a strong economy in the United States,” said Wicker. “This bill would reauthorize MARAD while strengthening programs vital to its mission. I appreciate Sen. Cantwell’s help on this important issue. The language in this bill includes amendments offered by committee Republicans and Democrats and is

an important step in maintaining the continued viability of the maritime industry and our nation’s security.”

“With 70% of purchasing power outside the U.S., it is imperative that we improve our port efficiency,” said Cantwell. “U.S. products need to reach global markets without d e l a y. D o u b l i n g t h e p o r t g r a n t authorization program and giving new tools to small ports will help the U.S. be more competitive.”

Highlights of the MARAD Authorization FY2020 Some highlights of the MARAD Authorization for FY2020 includes a 10-year reauthorization of the Maritime Security Program, a cadre of U.S.-flagged commercial oceangoing ships critical for national defense sealift operations. It also codifies the administration’s Military to Mariner Executive Order into law, streamlining the process for transitioning

active-duty and retired members of the uniformed services into high-paying merchant marine jobs.

The authorization includes the Port Operations, Research and Technology (PORT) Act, authorizing grants for port and intermodal infrastructure projects. Also included is the Maritime SAFE Act to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing through better interagency coordination and tougher enforcement of lawbreakers. Another highlight of the authorization is the increased funding for the Small Shipyard Grant program and the full funding for the Title XI maritime guaranteed loan program to support the maritime industrial base.

It also enacts a number of reforms to support the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. A final highlight includes the approval of a program to support infrastructure development at Department of Defense-designated Strategic Ports.

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June 2019 // Marine Log 17

Ferries Twin catamarans will be the first all-electric passenger vessels to be built in the U.S.

The Evolving World of

Ferries & Passenger Vessels From battery to hybrid and all-electric, passenger vessels are going green

An American First Early last month, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that sightseeing tour operator Maid of the Mist has ordered the first two new all-electric, zero-emission passenger vessels constructed in the United States.

Designed by Propulsion Data Services, Marblehead, Mass., the new totally integrated vessels are currently under construction at Burger Boat Company shipyard in Manitowoc, Wisc.

The Maid of the Mist boats operate from April through November and depart for the base of Niagara Falls every 30 minutes with an estimated 18 Marine Log // June 2019

1.6 million passengers on board annually.

The new vessels use ABB zero-emission technology that will allow guests to experience the falls undisturbed by engine noise, vibration or exhaust.

“Maid of the Mist’s decisive move towards e-mobility signals a new era in the future of transportation and complements ABB’s commitment to power the world without consuming the earth,” said Peter Terwiesch, president of the industrial automation business at ABB. Each of the vessels will be powered by a pair of battery packs, with a total capacity of 316 kWh, split evenly between two catamaran hulls, providing reliability and redundancy.

The batteries will be charged using locally produced hydrogenated electricity, making the energy cycle for the operation of the new vessels entirely emission-free.

In addition to the lithium ion batteries, ABB’s scope of supply will include an onshore charging station, switchboards, drives and the integrated control system, as well as the ABB Ability Marine Remote Diagnostic System for remote equipment monitoring and predictive maintenance.

All-Electric Ferries In Alabama, the first all-electric vehicle ferry in the U.S. is now in operation, following the recent conversion of the state’s historic Gee’s Bend Ferry from geared-diesel to zero-emission electric-powered.

Owned by the Alabama Department of Transportation (ALDOT) and operated by HMS Ferries of Bainbridge Island, Wash., the 15-vehicle, 132-passenger ferry runs on the Alabama River between Camden and Boykin, Ala. Seattle-based naval architecture and marine engineering firm Glosten provided the concept through contract design and shipyard technical support for the conversion to all-electric, while HMS Ferries partnered with HMS Consulting and managed the project from start to finish. The bulk of the conversion took place at Master Marine’s shipyard in Bayou la Batre, Ala. Marine Interface, East Northport, N.Y., integrated the ferry’s new electric propulsion system with help from American Traction Systems on the power conversion and Spear Power Systems on the batteries.

Glosten said the conversion of the ferry was made possible by a grant from the EPA. Funded through ALDOT, the EPA supported the project

NY State Governor’s Office

I

t’s been a year of firsts for the ferry and passenger vessel maritime industry. Not only was it announced that the U.S. would see its two first all-electric, zero-emission passenger vessels in New York and its first hydrogen fuel-cell vessel in California, but the nation’s first all-electric vehicle ferry entered service in Alabama last month.

Meanwhile, new ferries, cruises and passenger vessels have been popping up on both coasts. What’s clear across the sector is that everyone is going green either out of good corporate citizenship or by regulation.

By Heather Ervin, Editor in Chief

Ferries with a $1.09 million DERA grant in 2016.

Closer to its Washington State headquarters, Glosten has been busy working with Skagit County Public Works with the design of an all-electric ferry to replace its existing M/V Guemes. In operation between Anacortes and Guemes Island, Wash., since 1979, the ferry has a capacity of 99 passengers and 21 vehicles and is a primary mode of transit for residents of and visitors to Guemes Island.

Maggie Moon, business development manager for Glosten, said the company performed a transportation system assessment in 2016 to address the overall transportation system.

Following the county’s selection of a battery-electric propulsion system, Glosten helped prepare several funding requests and grant applications, resulting in the award of millions in state funds. Currently, the new design is being progressed through preliminary and contract details. Moon said the design carries 28 standard vehicles and up to 150 passengers, has a length of 160 feet and a beam of 53 feet.

The new ferry will eliminate consumption of 2 million gallons of diesel fuel over the 40-year lifespan of the vessel and achieve near-zero emissions.

First Hydrogen Fuel-Cell Vessel Back in November, Golden Gate Zero Emission Marine (GGZEM) announced the beginning of construction of the Water-GoRound, a first-of-its-kind hydrogen fuel-cell passenger boat. The 70-foot catamaran is being built at Bay Ship & Yacht Company in Alameda, Calif., and is currently going through sea trials and Coast Guard inspections. With construction expected to be completed later this fall, the vessel was funded from a $3 million grant to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD) from the California Air Resources Board (CARB).

GGZEM said that BAAQMD is administering the project, alongside other partners including Bay Ship & Yacht, BAE Systems, Hydrogenics, Red and White Fleet (whose president and owner is a co-founder of GGZEM), Incat Crowther, Hexagon Composites, the Port of San Francisco, and Scandia National Laboratories. Red and White Fleet said it intends to use the Water-Go-Round as the first of several vessels with GGZEM integrations in order to meet its commitment to build a 100% zero-emission fleet by 2025.

Ferry, which is operated by Hornblower, with much of the details still under wraps. In April, Metal Shark announced the delivery of HB 114; a 350-passenger NYC ferry named Traversity.

Entertainment Cruises It’s not just ferries that getting attention for newbuilds and emerging technologies. The low-wake, high-speed Potomac Water Taxi in Washington, D.C., unveiled details of its expansion earlier this year. To accommodate growth, Entertainment Cruises, which owns the water taxi service, said it has incorporated more daily frequencies to its schedule.

Last year, the water taxi service carried over 250,000 guests—its best year to date.

Entertainment Cruises also recently announced that its revamped Odyssey III has returned to the nation’s capital after a multimillion dollar transformation as a luxurious on-the-water dining cruise experience.

“Over the last five years, we have invested over $50 million in our fleet, our technology and our efforts to continuously elevate our guests experience,” said Kenneth Svendsen, CEO of Entertainment Cruises. The Odyssey III, which can carry up to 600 guests, now has Tier 3 clean diesel technology to improve efficiency and reduce air pollution.

Challenges and Solutions According to the Passenger Vessel Association (PVA), there are several thousand U.S.flagged Coast Guard inspected passenger vessels across the U.S. “The passenger vessel industry is enjoying strong economic health and a prosperous business climate,” PVA told Marine Log. “As

a result, we are hearing about new growth in the industry, with new vessel construction and capital investment in facilities.”

Despite this, PVA said the industry does have its challenges, which includes a trend in the increase in illegal charter operations in ports around the country.

“These operators are skirting regulations and causing an unnecessary risk to public safety,” PVA said. “PVA has been engaged with the Coast Guard to increase enforcement action.”

Karl Senner, Kenner, La., which has considerable experience with various builds for passenger vessels, says that operators are under high pressure to reduce emissions. It also notes that reliability remains critical to the sector.

While there is a strong interest in a variety of alternative propulsion for passenger vessels, Senner says hybrid solutions seem to be attracting the greatest interest at the moment.

Sounding a note of caution amid all the greenness that’s going on, naval architectural and marine engineering consultancy BMT Designers & Planners, Alexandria, Va., says a key challenge for the passenger vessel industry is to build alternative fuel vessels concurrent with the development of the bunkering and charging infrastructure.

“We have seen some agencies ‘put the barge before the tug,’ so to speak, and contract for new vessels without the appropriate landside facilities to support them,” said Kai Skvarla, president of BMT. Another challenge most companies interviewed for this feature noted was the requirement for inclusion aboard vessels. BMT said that all passenger vessels it has designed in the last five years and those currently under contract meet U.S. Access Board guidelines.

Metal Shark

Metal Shark Since 2017, Metal Shark, Jeanerette, La., has delivered nearly twenty 150- and 350-passenger ferries for New York City; Washington, D.C.; and New Orleans. The company is currently building a number of vessels for NYC

Metal Shark has delivered nearly twenty 150and 350-passenger ferries for New York City, Washington, D.C., and New Orleans since 2017.

June 2019 // Marine Log 19

Tugs & Barges - NNG

NNG Meet the

New and Next Generation

F

rom optimized ship designs to performance monitoring and from improved maintenance to more effective voyage management, Europe’s maritime sector is pioneering a range of new technologies that are transforming all aspects of global ship operation.

SoLast month, Marine Log held its inaugural New and Next Generation (NNG) award ceremony during the annual Tugs & Barges conference in Philadelphia, where we recognized three exemplary maritime employees for their outstanding contributions to the commercial marine industry.

As an industry, the maritime world knows that it’s the people who determine the success of any marine enterprise, and with an aging leadership, it’s the new and next generation that will face the ever-changing challenges and regulations of the industry.

Each of the award winners was nominated by the industry for their vision, leadership, dedication and significant contributions to the maritime trade.

We would like to take this time to introduce you to the winners as they outline their careers and answer some of the industry’s toughest questions.

As a family business, Kurz has grown up working for Keystone. “I was 5 years old when first stepped foot onto a commercial vessel,” he says. He began his career there as an intern before attending college at Villanova University. Upon his graduation, he returned to the company and began managing contract renewals and asset acquisitions for fleet expansion projects. During this time, he successfully completed his MBA from Boston College.

Marine Log (ML): What are some highlights of your maritime career to date?

DJ Kurz (DK): My professional highlights have included the management contracts of our Great Lakes operation and purchase of a 125,000 dwt tanker. In addition to my time at Keystone, while pursuing my MBA

DJ Kurz Donald Kurz Jr., better known as DJ, manages business development and strategy for Philadelphia-based Keystone Shipping Company. The company currently manages a fleet of more than 20 owned and operated oceangoing vessels worldwide, including tankers, dry bulk vessels, tugs, tank barges, and roll-on/roll-off vessels.

20 Marine Log // June 2019

DJ Kurz

from Boston College, I worked on a pilot program to incorporate a short sea shipping model into the supply chain of an automobile manufacturer. My current dayto-day role includes cargo management and performance analytics for our operations, assessing new projects, and ensuring that management activities are aligned with the company’s strategic objectives.

ML: In your experience, what are some of the biggest challenges for the new and next generation in the maritime industry and how have you solved them?

DK: The maritime industry faces many challenges. The most imminent challenge is to reverse the diminishing allure of shipping. The world relies on waterborne transportation for approximately 95% of all cargo movements, and the industry must continuously attract new mariners into its workforce. While standards of safety, efficiency, emergency preparedness, and pollution prevention have progressed exponentially over the last 30 years, the industry is still, for the most part, vilified. With the retirement of the baby boomer generation of seafarers approaching, my generation is in a unique position to showcase the economic benefits of shipping with modern approaches to technology and efficiency.

Another significant issue that I actively work to resolve in our industry is the rising cost of doing business in maritime today. The influx of investment that poured into the shipping industry, driven by desire to capitalize on economic cycles has led to bankruptcies and unsustainable debt structure risks. This has pushed control of shipping away from experts and into the

Margaret Pattillo

Catching up with the recipients of Marine Log’s first NNG Awards

Tugs & barges - NNG

Marjorie Zoretic hands of institutional analysts, driven by margin instead of quality operation. In short, maritime has become a high capex industry, with low margins and high risk. Keystone has navigated cyclicality in the industry for more than 100 years by staying on course as a privately held company, with a focus on high quality and lasting operations.

Marjorie Zoretic With new emissions standards in the commercial marine industry, Foss Maritime says it believes LNG is going to become an ever more critical part of the maritime landscape.

The company is currently a leading contender with the Clean Jacksonville, the first LNG bunker barge ever built in the United States. As general manager for Foss Atlantic, a division of Foss Maritime, Marjorie Zoretic is directly involved in the ongoing operations of the barge.

At present, Zoretic manages all business operations for the Foss Atlantic region, which includes all marine transportation operations in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean; operations of the Delta Mariner, which transports rocket boosters for the United Launch Alliance; and the operation of the Clean Jacksonville, which fuels LNG capable TOTE ships.

She’s a 2008 graduate of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and worked on the LNG regasification vessels as a tankerman for Chevron and as a second mate for Noble Drilling in support of Shell’s offshore drilling in Alaska.

ML: What makes the maritime industry an attractive career for the new and next generation?

Marjorie Zoretic (MZ): In the conscious of the American public, the term maritime

often conjures thoughts of the Navy, fishing, historic tall ships and pleasure boats.

This perception is changing as traditionally shore-based technology and industry looks even more to the ocean, bringing more and more Americans into contact with our industry. This expansion of industry further offshore can be seen in the past few decades in the tourist industry, with cruise industry growth, technological leaps observed in ultra-deepwater drilling, the space industry, and with the growth of alternative energy (i.e. wind power). A maritime career will bring young professionals into contact with nearly every industry as they adapt to fit the ever-advancing needs of our customers.

ML: What are some things (business practices, technologies, techniques, etc.) that you would like to see change in the maritime industry?

MZ: Before coming ashore to a management role, I found that technology often brought efficiency to the vessels that I served aboard, but also placed additional burdens on us through unnecessary bureaucracy or distraction. As costs continue to increase in our industry, we look to technology to create efficiencies. I would like to see the maritime industry focus on using technology to empower our mariners instead of burdening them.

At Foss, we are creating efficiencies for our operators by combining our existing systems into one program—Helm Connect. This will combine vessel dispatch, billing, maintenance, compliance, crewing and payroll into a single system that is shared between the vessel and shore.

Johan Sperling Johan Sperling started out in the maritime industry working for the American Bureau of Shipping in New Orleans, La., 20 years ago. In 2001, he relocated to Seattle to join Jensen Maritime Consultants Inc. as a naval architect and marine engineer and eventually became one of 10 owners of the firm.

In 2008, Crowley Maritime acquired Jensen.

Since then, Sperling has held multiple roles at Crowley, including serving as vice president of marine solutions. In that capacity, he led Jensen Maritime, Crowley’s naval architecture and marine engineering subsidiary, the company’s new construction group, and the offshore project management team.

In 2018, Sperling transitioned to Crowley Shipping, where all of Crowley’s vessel operations are managed under Senior Vice President and Gener al Manager Rob Grune. Sperling is responsible for Crowley’s marine services group, where he leads the ship assist and escort services. He also oversees the ocean-class tug and flat-deck barge fleets, which provide specialized cargo

transportation to diverse shipping companies and projects. He has a bachelor’s degree in naval and marine engineering Thearchitecture 228-passenger Scenic Eclipse, fromset theto University of New Orleans. debut in 2018, will be built at ML:Uljanik How should the maritime industry in Croatia and feature two be recruiting new3MW and talented professionals?

Azipods from ABB Johan Sperling (JS): I believe that this is a much trickier and more critical challenge than most people in the maritime industry are willing to admit. First, I think that we need to make each position into a rare career opportunity. We as companies and organizations often think of the first job out of school as a position where we start to learn about the company and industry, which is the first step toward a career. The younger generation wants their new job to be a unique opportunity where they are challenged and where the company trusts them to do their job. This is very different from the traditional marine industry career path.

Second, we should level up technologically.

The younger generation wants to work with the latest technology that is intuitive to use and easy to learn. If companies don’t embrace new technology, the young professional does not feel like the company is maximizing his or her talents. Finally, you should set yourself, as a company, apart from the competition. If you figure out a way to develop an exciting brand that stands out with an exciting culture, good training programs and high expectations, the talent will come.

ML: What is the most valuable piece of knowledge you have learned from your experiences so far?

JS: It’s that you will never stop learning in this industry. Every time I feel like I am becoming an expert at something, I get humbled and realize that there are so many things that I can still learn.

Johan Sperling June 2019 // Marine Log 21

World ShipBuilding

China Tops The League; Niche Construction Elsewhere

By Paul Bartlett, European Contributor

Asian shipyards control the lion’s share of the world orderbook, but Europe still dominates cruise construction

22 Marine Log // June 2019

today are more sophisticated than 10 years ago, but also the rising share of LNG carriers, container ships and cruise ships, compared with the traditional workhorses of commercial shipping—tankers and bulk carriers. Bulk shipping’s share of the orderbook has declined from more than 60% of ships on order 10 years ago, to a little over 40% today.

Clarkson’s April figures showed a tally of 3,202 ships booked at the world’s shipyards, totalling 81.2 million cgt. Chinese builders had work in hand involving 1,500 ships of 29.9 million cgt; South Korea had 452 vessels of 21.3m million cgt; and Japan had 622 ships on its books, totalling 14.2 million cgt.

The figures illustrate the fact that South Korea is building a smaller number of sophisticated vessels whereas, despite the closure of a large number of Chinese yards, there are still many medium- and small-sized construction facilities in China involved in building vessels of all sizes.

Overall, the global orderbook today is smaller than it has ever been since 2004, the Clarkson figures reveal. But growing ship sophistication, “upsizing,” and a greater

share of specialized vessels are key features of the ships on order today.

The booming sectors of LNG and cruise are the best examples. Each of these ship types made up just 2% of cgt in 2009, but the 141 LNG ships on order today represent 10.9 cgt—13% of the total—whilst the 112 cruise vessels under construction total 10 cgt, or 12%.

South Korea a Hot Spot for LNG In what is likely to be the largest-ever ship construction program, it is South Korean yards which are sharpening their pencils as they prepare to respond to the Qatargas request for bids on up to 100 new LNG carriers required over the next 10 years. The tiny Middle East nation is currently the world’s largest producer of LNG, although it may well be overtaken by Australia this year.

However, the Qataris recently announced plans to raise production from 77 million metric tons a year to 110 million metric tons and almost all of the new gas will be destined for export. South Korean yards are now in the process of bidding for the first batch of

Shutterstock/Steve Heap

T

he development of new vessel types is providing a lifeline for specialized builders whose past focus has been the offshore energy sector. Recent figures from Clarkson Research, a leading analyst, reveal that China is well ahead of its closest rival, South Korea, both in number of ships on order and tonnage, and the supremacy of Asian shipyards is clear with a total share of the orderbook, in tonnage terms, of almost 84%. Between them, the three leaders— China, South Korea and Japan—hold just over 80% of current shipbuilding contracts (see table on next page).

The London analyst calculates orderbook share on the basis of compensated gross tons (cgt), a measure not only of a ship’s size but also the volume of work required in its construction. In separate analysis recently, Clarkson revealed that the growing sophistication of the world fleet over the last 10 years has seen the cgt of ships on order today increase by 42% over the period although the orderbook itself is substantially smaller.

This reflects not only the fact that ships

World Shipbuilding Feature Orderbook by Builder Country Rank

Country

m. CGT

1,500

29.9

1

China P.R.

2

South Korea

452

21.3

3

Japan

622

14.2

4

Italy

40

4.1

5

Germany

33

2.5

6

France

10

1.4

7

Finland

10

1.2

8

Philippines

45

0.9

9

Vietnam

42

0.8

10

Russia

62

0.7

11

Norway

36

0.6

12

Taiwan

18

0.5

13

Singapore

20

0.4

14

Croatia

22

0.3

15

Netherlands

64

0.3

16

Spains

17

0.3

Other

209

1.8

3,202

81.2

GLOBAL TOTAL

Top Left: Clarkson, Bottom Right: Acta Marine/Benny Banen

No.

orders, likely to consist of about 40 vessels for delivery between 2023 and 2026. At this stage, sources suggest that the other vessels are likely to remain as options.

Reports indicate that the Qataris will require large high-end vessels incorporating the latest sophisticated fuel technologies and advanced automation, adding to their complexity. The Qatargas shipping subsidiary, Nakilat, already owns the world’s largest fleet of LNG carriers—some 70 vessels making up about 12% of the 567-vessel total.

The huge Qatari contract is not the only LNG-related business likely to be captured by the South Koreans. A record number of final investment decisions on future LNG export capacity are likely to be made this year, generating potential demand for large numbers of vessels significantly in excess of those on order today.

Although the current orderbook represents about a quarter of existing LNG fleet capacity, Clarkson estimates that new liquefaction projects already under construction will require close to 150 new ships and other projects that are likely to proceed could generate demand for a further 270 vessels, many of which could be needed before 2025.

Meanwhile, recent analysis by energy consultant Wood Mackenzie indicates that projects likely to get the green light this year

include those generating new LNG exports in Australia, Nigeria, Qatar, Papua and New Guinea, Russia and the United States, which only exported its first LNG in 2016. Liquefaction projects under construction in the United States and Canada are likely to require 128 new LNG carriers, according to Clarkson figures.

Mozambique is likely to take a seat at the LNG exporters top table in 2022 when its first LNG project, the Coral South floating LNG facility comes on stream. This will have an initial capacity of 3.2 million tonnes per annum (mpta) but there is potentially a further 20 mpta to be developed in the future, generating demand for many more LNG carriers.

Europe Feasts on Cruise Boom Traditional cruise ship builders in Europe are sweeping the board in the construction of record numbers of cruise vessels ordered recently. According to the authoritative cruise contract listing compiled regularly by Seatrade Cruise Review, there are 111 ships on order worth a total of almost $64 billion.

Prominent European builders include Germany’s Meyer Werft, which also has a shipyard in Turku, Finland, and MV Werften, owned by Malaysia’s Genting Group. Italy’s Fincantieri group has the largest number of cruise ships on order—48 in total in a forward book extending until 2027.

Fincantieri’s acquisition of the Vard group in 2013 gives it control of five Norwegian shipyards—two facilities in Romania, one yard in Brazil and one in Vietnam. France’s Chantiers de l’Atlantique, with 10 contracts in hand, also features prominently in the cruise construction sector.

While most of these specialist yards are focused on the construction of mega-cruise ships and smaller high-end luxury vessels, the booming expedition cruise market has fueled demand for new types of small and sophisticated ships that are being built at relative newcomers to the cruise sector.

The expedition vessels are typically small

and designed to take passengers to remote parts of the world inaccessible to most ships, often in the northern and southern seas. The vessels, designed to the International Maritime Organization’s demanding Polar Code requirements with high ice-class notation, are under construction at yards including Fincantieri Vard (Norway and Vietnam), Kleven Verft, now owned by coastal and expedition cruise company, Hurtigruten, and Ulstein Verft.

These yards are perhaps some of shipbuilding’s most surprising success stories.

Not only are they located in one of the world’s most expensive regions with high labor costs and a challenging climate, but they have also been forced to cope with the loss of most of their principal business.

All three of the Norwegian companies now building expedition cruise vessels were previously front-runners in the construction of the world’s most complex offshore vessels. But when the oil price crashed in 2014, this steady stream of orders disappeared virtually overnight. The small and highly specialized builders were left with almost nothing to do except perhaps a few hightech fishing vessels.

Unlike some other high-cost shipbuilding nations in Europe, however, the Norwegians demonstrated record response times, switching from their traditional offshore business to high-end cable layers, deep-sea mining vessels, expedition cruise ships and offshore wind service vessels.

Meanwhile, there has, of course, been some corporate restructuring. The familyowned Kleven business, for example, has now been split up and expedition cruise company Hurtigruten now owns the company’s main facility in Ulsteinvik.

Just across the fjord, family-owned Ulstein Verft has now successfully delivered five wind farm service vessels, with another one on order. It is also building two, option one expedition cruise ships, a ropax ferry and a high-end cable layer.

The Acta Centaurus at delivery.

June 2019 // Marine Log 23

gov shipbuilding TOTE Services, just chosen as vessel construction manager for a new series of MARAD training ships, aims to issue a shipbuilding contract for the first of these National Security Multi-Missions vessels before the end of 2019.

U.S. Navy & Government Shipbuilding

By Nick Blenkey

t’s no secret who is American shipbuilding’s biggest customer—it’s the U.S. government, and the U.S. Navy in particular. But while the Navy spends billions on U.S. shipyards each year, most of its new construction funding is spent on just seven shipyards, controlled by four prime contractors, with most of the spending going on battle force ships.

That would appear to mean that outside the seven yards getting most of the money— Newport News, Ingalls Shipbuilding, GD Electric Boat, GD Bath Iron Works, Fincantieri Marinette Marine, Austal and GD NASSCO—everyone else in the industry has to scratch around for breadcrumbs. In fact, some of those breadcrumbs are more like quite tasty pieces of cake, particularly for smaller shipyards.

missile frigate, two John Lewis-class oilers; and two T-ATS towing, salvage and rescue ships. There are also two large unmanned surface vessels funded in the Research Development Test and Evaluation line in FY2020.

The plan from FY2020 to FY2024 is shown in the table on page 24.

Assuming that what the Navy asks for is what is eventually appropriated by Congress, that would seem to take care of the big seven yards quite nicely for the next few years.

Except for one thing. No Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) acquisitions are planned for after FY2019. From FY2020 they are replaced by the Future Frigate, the FFG (X). Currently, two shipyards build the two variants of the LCS. Just one shipyard will build the single variant of the FFG (X)—and it may not be either of the present LCS builders.

Big Ticket

Sealift Ships

Before we look into that more closely, though, let’s look at the big-ticket items. The Navy’s fiscal year (FY) 2020 shipbuilding budget procures 12 battle force ships, including one Ford-class aircraft carrier, three Virginia-class submarines two of which include Virginia Payload Module (VPM)—three Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, one FFG (X) guided

An appendix to the Navy’s latest 30-year shipbuilding plan says that recapitalizing the Navy’s auxiliary and sealift fleet has become a top priority.

The Navy is looking to build a new class of vessels that it calls Common Hull Auxiliary Multi-Mission Platforms using common hulls to potentially recapitalize five different

24 Marine Log // June 2019

missions: sealift, aviation logistics support, hospital, repair tender, and command and control. It has outlined its top line requirements for these ships and is in the early stages of discussions with industry that indicate that two hull designs may be needed to meet both RO/RO and non-RO/RO requirements.

Initial plans are for a procurement of the sealift variant in FY2025 and delivery in FY2028, with the intention to accelerate procurement for a FY2026 delivery.

“This acceleration,” says the long-range shipbuilding plan, “would meet the conditions of the FY2019 NDAA (National Defense Authorization Act) option authorizing Navy to buy an additional five used, foreign-built vessels if able to deliver a new, U.S.-built product by FY2026, a potentially expensive and problematic option within the context of the struggling U.S. commercial shipbuilding industry ... ” All this is promising news for U.S. shipbuilders and good news for lobbyists as the stage is set for a battle over the Navy’s need-to-get new ships in a hurry and the fundamental principle that U.S. Navy ships be built in the U.S.

Coast Guard Though it may trail the Navy, the shipbuilding

Herbert Engineering

I

Shipyards look beyond the Navy for government orders

gov shipbuilding industr y’s second largest customer is the Coast Guard. Back in 2016, the big reminder of this was the award of a contract to Eastern Shipbuilding to build up to 25 new offshore patrol cutters with a total value of $10.5 billion.

Since then, all eyes have been on whether the Coast Guard would get the funding to build its much needed new heavy polar icebreakers—and who would get to build them. Those questions were answered in April when VT Halter Marine was awarded a $745.9 million contract to build the first polar security cutter that included options for a further two ships, bringing its total potential value to $1.9 billion. Coast Guard Adm. Karl Schultz described the award as “an important first step towards building the nation’s full complement of six polar icebreakers to meet the unique mission demands that have emerged from increased commerce, tourism, research, and international activities in the Arctic and Antarctic.”

Waterway Commerce Cutters Another significant acquisition program underway by the Coast Guard is a new class of waterway commerce cutters.

The Coast Guard’s current inland tender fleet consists of 35 ships that support the

(Dollars in Billions)

FY 2019

FY 2020 FY 2021 FY 2022 FY 2023 FY 2024

FY 20-24

Columbia Class Submarine

-

-

1

-

-

1

2

CVN78 (Ford class)

-

1

-

-

-

-

1

SSN 774 (Virignia class)

2

3

2

2

2

2

11

DDG 51

3

3

2

2

3

3

13

LCS

3

-

-

-

-

-

-

FFG (X) (SSC)

-

1

2

2

2

2

9

LHA(R)

-

-

-

-

-

1

1

LPD Flight II / LX (R)

-

-

1

-

1

-

2

Expeditionary Sea Nase (ESB)

1

-

-

-

1

-

1

Expeditionary Fast Transport (EPF)

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

T-AO 205

2

2

1

1

2

1

7

T-ATS

1

2

1

1

1

-

5

T-AGOS(X)

-

-

-

1

1

1

3

New Construction Total QTY

13

12

10

9

13

11

55

New Construction Total ($B)

$22.3

$22.2

$20.4

$18.9

$23.8

$23.5

$108.9

Large Unmanned Surface Vessel (LUSV)1,2

-

2

2

2

2

2

10

Total Unmanned QTY

-

2

2

2

2

2

10

Total RDTE,N ($B)

-

$0.4

$0.5

$0.6

$0.6

$0.6

$2.7

LCAC SLEP

1

-

-

-

-

-

-

Ship to Shore Connector

8

-

4

7

5

5

21

LCU 1700

2

4

4

4

4

4

20

CVN RCOH

-

1

-

-

-

-

1

T-ARC Cable Laying/Repair Ship

-

-

-

1

-

-

1

Other Construction Total QTY

11

5

8

12

9

9

43

Total Shipbuilding QTY

24

19

20

23

24

22

108

Total Shipbuilding, SCN only ($B)

$24.2

$23.8

$23.5

$22.3

$25.0

$24.9

$119.5

New Construction:

Unmanned:

Other Construction:

1 Contains

offensive missle capability

2 Budgeted

in RDTE,N

Towing Pins OCIMF Roller Fairleads

Chart courtesy of the U.S. Navy

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June 2019 // Marine Log 25

gov shipbuilding service’s aids to navigation mission in federal inland waterways. These tenders play a vital role in directing the traffic of the nation’s Marine Transportation System (MTS) and support the U.S. economy by enabling the efficient flow of goods nationwide. The fleet is responsible for maintaining more than 28,200 marine aids throughout 12,000 miles of inland waterways, which move 630 million tons of cargo annually. While the MTS accounts for more than $4.6 trillion in U.S. economic activity, the current inland tenders have been in operation for an average of more than 50 years.

The Waterways Commerce Cutter (WCC) program has partnered with the Naval Sea Systems Command to conduct an analysis that will look at renewing and standardizing the Coast Guard’s inland maritime mission capability with modern, state-of-the-market tenders. The Coast Guard says the WCC program is working under a heavily accelerated program schedule to reach initial operational capability by FY2024.

new class of National Security Multi-Mission Vessels (NSMV), the first of which is to be assigned to New York’s SUNY Maritime College. In May, MARAD appointed TOTE Services as vessel construction manager (VCM) for the program. When appointed, the VCM will then enter into a contract with a U.S. shipyard to build the vessels. TOTE Services says it will soon issue a request for information to interested shipyards with the goal of awarding a contract to build by the end of 2019. Delivery of the first of these new class vessels is expected in 2022.

A further $300 million was appropriated for the second ship in the FY2019 appropriations legislation. However, in its FY2020 budget request, MARAD seeks only $205 million for “for the design and construction of a training ship scaled to meet the at-sea training needs of the smaller SMAs,” with no mention of the multi-mission capabilities beyond training designed into the NSMV.

MARAD to Build Training Ships

The Army, too, is a sizable buyer of things that float. As we note in this month’s feature on West Coast shipyards, the largest ever contract booked by Vigor is the contract to build the Army’s next generation landing

The FY2018 omnibus appropriations bill contained $300 million to kicked off a program to replace the aging training ships at the U.S. state maritime academies with a

Army Gave Vigor Its Biggest Order Ever

craft, worth nearly $1 billion over 10 years.

Most Army contracts are not on that scale.

Still, scarcely a week goes by without a post on the Federal Business Opportunities website indicating that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is looking for some kind of boat.

Agencies Need “Marine Craft” Many of the smaller vessels needed by various agencies come under the rubric “Marine Craft” in the listings maintained by the General Services Administration (GSA), the Federal Acquisition Service. Widely used by state and local administrations and federal agencies, it provides officials with at least a place to start looking when they find they need to buy a workboat. They can also use GSA schedule contracts—which contain pre-negotiated prices, delivery terms, warranties, and other terms and conditions—to streamline the purchase process and leverage the buying power of the federal government.

An $11 million contract awarded Silver Ships Inc., Theodore, Ala., in April for the construction and delivery of up to 160 high-speed maneuvering surface targets, accessories and deployment spare parts was competitively procured as a competitive small business set-aside via the GSA eBuy website, with three offers received.

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26 Marine Log // June 2019

bulk shipping Feature

It’s All In

The Trends:

Dry Bulk, Tanker and LNG What Are the Major Dynamics Determining Today’s Markets?

By Rebecca Galanopoulos Jones, Head of Research, Alibra Shipping Ltd.

Shutterstock/ Mark Stephens Photography

F

ollowing a relatively strong end to 2018 for bulk carriers, dry bulk rates have spiralled downwards since the start of the new year.

This is particularly for the larger Capesize vessels that are more responsive to fluctuations in the supply and demand for coal and iron ore. Historically there tends to be a lull for dry cargo markets in the first quarter, as the Far East winds down for the lunar New Year celebrations.

This year however, the seasonal low has been further amplified by a series of events that have proved catastrophic for the markets, causing spot rates to fall to an all-time low and period rates to plunge to the lowest levels seen in over two years. The first blow to the market came in the form of the tragic dam collapse at a Vale-owned iron

ore mine in Brazil that killed hundreds.

This was further impacted by a cyclone that hit western Australia, forcing major iron ore ports to close and causing additional problems for iron ore supply. At this point, earnings for bulk carriers were below opex, with Capesize rates falling below those of much smaller vessels.

Earlier this month, Vale reopened, giving the Baltic Dry Index (BDI) and Baltic Capesize Index (BCI) a much-needed boost, only for a court injunction to close the mine once again pushing rates back down, causing further volatility in the market.

As this article went to press, bulk carrier rates although comparatively low, have improved somewhat compared to the lows seen earlier this year.

Going forward, there is some light at the

end of the tunnel in terms of the stimulus measures put in place by the Chinese government that are already having a positive effect on the domestic economy, following concerns of a slowdown in growth. In the past, a rebound in the Chinese economy has signalled an upturn in the fortunes of the dry cargo market but it remains to be seen how the ongoing crisis in Brazil will affect the market.

After years of oversupply, the good news for the supply-demand balance is that the bulk carrier orderbook is looking more modest than it has been in recent years.

According to Alibra’s fleet data, the overall bulk carrier orderbook currently stands at 95 million dwt or approximately 11.7% of the fleet, the lowest proportion in over 15 years. The majority of newbuildings are on June 2019 // Marine Log 27

Bulk shipping

The lack of tonnage on the water due to vessels being committed to long-term charters or as storage facilities provides a boost for spot trades in the coming months.

Tanker Market Picks Up Last year was weak for tankers overall for both spot and time charter, with rates remaining relatively flat. However, towards the end of the fourth quarter (Q4), the market picked up slightly and earnings improved for the larger tankers. Q1 2019, although subdued, in contrast to Q1 of the previous year, the one-year rates for Very Large Crude Carriers, or VLCCs, have increased by 24% from Q1 2018 and the average for Q1 2019 was $30,538 per day per rata (pdpr). The largest improvement in earnings was seen in the Suezmax sector that has seen an increase of 46% since Q1 2018. The average earnings for one year for Q1 2019 were $23,885 pdpr.

Despite timecharter rates having shown a marginal uptick in the last few quarters, the market has failed to hold any significant momentum due to uncertainties on the demand side. U.S. sanctions on Venezuela and Iran continue to affect crude supply, and last month, the U.S. announced that it would not renew waivers that have allowed some countries to buy Iranian oil despite sanctions. OPEC and Russia have further restricted supply due to planned production cuts, at least until the next OPEC meeting this month. Although there are concerns for a slowdown in global economic growth, oil demand continues to rise worldwide. The latest report from the International Energy Agency shows a cut in oil demand growth 28 Marine Log // June 2019

to 1.3 millions of barrels per day (mb/d) but adds that this is still a healthy figure and that they expect slower demand growth to be short-lived and will pick up again at the end of the year. The U.S. is now the largest crude oil producer, having overtaken both Russia and Saudi Arabia and the crude tanker market will likely see a shift towards long-haul exports from West to East from non-OPEC

After years of oversupply, the good news for the supplydemand balance is that the bulk carrier orderbook is looking more modest than it has been in recent years. producers in the Atlantic.

In terms of supply, there has been limited ordering in the tanker sector over the last few years, which is helping to bridge the gap between supply and demand. Currently, the orderbook accounts for 8.3% of the total fleet. That is welcome news for the tanker market as the balance between supply

and demand determines the health of the market overall. The largest orderbook is for the VLCC sector, where the orderbook is currently 13.05% of the trading fleet; the average age of the fleet is 10 years of age indicating that this is a relatively modern fleet. This is followed closely by the Medium Range (MR) sector where the orderbook accounts for 11.15% of the trading fleet, which also has an average age of 9 years. In contrast to MRs, the handysize fleet has the smallest orderbook, demonstrating a shift towards larger vessels. There are currently only 20 handysize vessels, or 2.8% of the fleet, on order.

LNG and Spot Trades In the past, the LNG vessels were entirely dedicated to long-term charters. However, in recent years the structure of the market has changed as several companies have ventured into the spot market, with some owners highlighting their strategy to trade only in this market. Last year saw some owners take advantage of spot trades as the market surged to record highs of $200,000 per day. In contrast, the first two quarters of 2019 have been relatively low but there is hope that the market will pick up once again as owners and operators are already trying to book vessels ahead for the winter period. Furthermore, there is also a lack of tonnage on the water due to a number of vessels being committed on long-term charters or as storage facilities and this lack of supply should also provide a boost for spot trades in the coming months.

Avigator Fortuner

the larger end of the scale, from Panamax and above. In the Panamax sector, the orderbook to fleet ratio is 19.6%.

West Coast Shipyards

Vigor’s 60-acre Swan Island shipyard in Portland, Ore., is one of largest and most capable on the West Coast.

West Coast

Shipyards

Book A Healthy Mix Of Orders

By Nick Blenkey, Web Editor

T

he South China Morning Post recently reported that the Hong Kong Marine Police is investing $21.5 million in 12 new fast patrol boats. That’s bad news for the smugglers, but it’s good news for SAFE Boats International of Bremerton, Wash., which is to supply eight of the boats.

Although it may come as a surprise that an American shipyard is winning export orders from China, Hong Kong is just the latest in SAFE Boats growing list of worldwide customers. Founded in 1997, the company makes aluminum boats used by military units, law enforcement agencies and fire departments all over the U.S.—and all over the world.

What distinguishes the company’s vessels is that, unlike RIBS with their inflatable collars, SAFE Boats have a patented buoyant polyurethane collar that not only helps make them unsinkable, but that have also been shown to withstand small arms fire.

That patent is a world-beating advantage, attested to by the fact that SAFE Boats are in service with organizations in over 50 countries around the world, with expansion into new countries every year. The 1,900 boats

currently in service worldwide have racked up a cumulative 5 million-plus operating hours without a hull failure.

Though the West Coast’s larger shipyards may not be able to emulate SAFE Boats’ export achievements, overall the industry seems to be in a lot better shape than it was not that long ago, building just about every kind of vessel other than battle force Navy ships.

Geographically, the industry is anchored, o n t h e s o u t h , by G e n e r a l D y n a m i c s NASSCO in San Diego and, on the north, by Vigor, whose reach extends into Alaska.

The two operations are different in many ways. NASSCO, or National Steel and Shipbuilding Company, is a division of defense industry giant General Dynamics, while Vigor describes itself as “privately owned and publicly minded.”

While those two may be the largest players, there are also other significant yards on the Pacific Coast with a broad range of vessels, including the building of the world’s first hydrogen fuel cell ferry.

Nassco Looks To The Future NASSCO is one of a comparatively small

number of large shipyards that has successfully managed to balance both Navy and commercial shipbuilding.

At the start of this year, NASSCO commissioned a new panel line that expanded its steel production capabilities for both commercial and government ships.

The new line enables distortion-free welding of plates as thin as 5 millimeters, using hybrid laser arc welding and numerically controlled robots to mill, seam and weld steel panels in a highly automated production line. These features improve capacity, quality, accuracy and cycle time, and are expected to double steel processing rates.

“This facility, the only one in the world with this unique combination of technologies, is already beginning to transform our business while reducing energy consumption and emissions,” said NASSCO President Kevin Graney.

At the time the panel line was inaugurated, three ships were under construction at the yard that will all include steel from the line: two containerships for Matson Inc. and the first TAO-205-class oiler for the Navy.

Also under construction was an expeditionary sea base for the Navy.

June 2019 // Marine Log 29

West Coast Shipyards NASSCO is also a significant player in the ship repair arena, with operations in both San Diego and Bremerton, Wash., on the West Coast and Mayport, Fla., and Norfolk, Va., on the East Coast.

The other major repairer in the San Diego area, the former Continental Maritime, is now a unit of Huntington Ingalls Industries.

What’s hard to see is how successful NASSCO can be in winning new commercial orders to follow the Matson ships. Like Philly Shipyard, it finds itself in a situation where nobody is seeing much of a market developing for further replacement oceangoing Jones Act containerships or tankers.

A World First Takes Shape In Alameda, with two floating drydocks, a Syncrolift, and 1,000 feet of rails, Bay Ship & Yacht is best known as a refit and repair specialist for a broad range of commercial and government customers—and the “Yacht” in its name reflects its capabilities in the superyacht market. The yard offers dry land workstations for repairs to vessels measuring up to 200 feet (62 meters) and 1,200 tons, as well as drydock service for vessels measuring up to 390 feet (120 meters) and 3,000 tons.

Currently under construction at Bay Ship & Yacht is America’s first zero-emission ferry, the Water-Go-Round. The 70-foot Incat Crowther designed ferry is being built for Golden Gate Zero Emission Marine to showcase the advantages of hydrogen fuel cells for the commercial maritime industry.

Elsewhere in the San Francisco Bay area, the former BAE San Francisco shipyard has now been out of service for some two years after a sale to Tacoma, Wash.-based Puglia Engineering fell through and efforts by the San Francisco Port Commission to find another tenant went nowhere. Puglia, however, offers mobile ship repair services from Oakland, Calif., though its main operation is Fairhaven Shipyard, located on the Puget Sound, just south of Bellingham, Wash.

Nichols Brothers: Coastal Cruisers, Hybrid Tugs And More For a medium-size yard, Nichols Brothers Boat Builders (NBBB), Freeland, Wash., notches up some notable achievements. Last year, for example, it delivered the second of two 100-passenger cruise vessels ordered

by Lindblad Expeditions. Named National Geographic Venture, the 238-foot, 6-inch by 44-foot by 10-foot Jones Act coastal cruise vessel is a state-of-the-art, purpose-built expedition cruise vessel made for exploring coastal waters, shallow coves, and fast-moving channels where wildlife congregates.

30 Marine Log // June 2019

This year’s noteworthy deliveries include Baydelta Maritime’s new 100- by 40-foot Delta class hybrid tractor tug Delta Teresa.

The vessel is the seventh tractor tug NBBB has built for Baydelta and its affiliated companies, but the first hybrid.

The tug is powered by two Caterpillar C3516 C Tier 3 diesel engines, each rated at 1,995 kW at 1,600 rpm and by two 424 kW electric motors.

The Z-drive system, two Kongsberg (formerly Rolls-Royce) 255FP units, can accept power from the diesel engines, electric motors and from both power sources.

The electric motors are powered by three CAT C9.3, 300 kW each, 480 V 3-phase at 1,800 rpm generators, and one harbor generator a C7.1 150 kW 480 V, 3-phase at 1,800 rpm.

The hybrid system allows for the vessel to operate in different power modes, directdiesel, diesel-electric or fully-electric. This delivers fuel savings and reduced exhaust emissions, while supplying Baydelta with the power and vessel characteristics needed for its operations.

“The Delta Teresa hybrid tractor tug is a notable vessel,” says Peter Sinclair, NBBB’s director of production control and planning.

“She is the first hybrid vessel we have built and met or exceeded all expectations with all the performance of conventional variants of the vessel and new benefits not seen before,” says Sinclair.

Currently, the shipyard’s order book includes four 90-ton bollard pull tractor tugs for Foss Maritime, with an option for four more, an ATB tug for Island Tug & Barge, two high-speed catamaran ferries for Kitsap Transit (with an option for a third) along with a life extension program on three high-speed catamarans for Golden Gate and a similar refurbishment for Catalina Express. There are other ferry operators in the San Francisco Bay area who are starting similar overhaul programs, says Sinclair.

“Typically, we have found that our market cycles between tugs and workboats and then passenger vessels,” he adds. “At the moment, both these markets are making concurrent strides in our area.”

Recently, NBBB expanded its paved building area with a concrete extension of around 20,000 square feet and plans to add a further 40,000 square feet and erect new fabrication buildings in the same area.

Last year, the yard was awarded a MarAd grant for a new crawler crane, a 250-ton Linkbelt 298. It has also purchased and installed a new pipe bender capable of bending up to 6-inch schedule 80 pipe and plans to invest in an additional crane.

From Low-Wake Ferries To The Texas Navy All American Marine, in Bellingham, Wash., got its start some 30 years ago building aluminum fishing vessels, but when that market started drying up, it successfully transferred its expertise to other vessel types. A key move was to partner with innovative New Zealand naval architect Nic de Waal and gain exclusive North American rights to build his Teknicraft Design Ltd. vessels. The unique Teknicraft design incorporates the use of a cuttingedge hull shape and an optional hydrofoil system in catamarans to create lift and enhance performance.

Earlier this year, All American delivered the second in a series of three low-wake and high-speed passenger vessels for Kitsap Transit. On trials this vessel, the Reliance, an aluminum catamaran with a composite superstructure, was capable of speeds in excess of 45 knots, over 50 mph. What’s impressive about the design, though, is not only its speed, but its low-wake wash characteristics, which are particularly important in the environmentally sensitive Puget Sound area served by Kitsap Transit.

Another Teknicraft vessel nearing completion at All American is a 76-foot research vessel for Duke University, while an order booked this past January demonstrates that the Teknicraft concept also has law enforcement applications. It’s an 80- by 27-foot aluminum catamaran that will operate in Texas State waters and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico for the law enforcement division of Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, also known as the “Texas Navy.”

Vigor Grows Its Portfolio The biggest player in the northwest, Vigor, has grown to its present size by a series of acquisitions as well as organic growth and; with shipyards in Oregon, Washington State and Alaska; basically has the ability to build or repair just about anything that floats up to 800 feet long.

Recent deliveries include the 280-foot MV Tazlina, the latest addition to the Alaska Marine Highway fleet, which seats up to 300 passengers and carries 53 standard vehicles. Built at the Ketchikan Shipyard

by Vigor Alaska, which operates the facility on behalf of the city of Ketchikan, it is the first of two sister ferries, with the second, the Hubbard, nearing completion.

The two ferries are the first of their kind ever built in Alaska by Alaskans. The vessel design for the Alaska Class Ferries had to overcome the challenges of Alaska’s heavy seas, high winds and freezing spray.

West Coast Shipyards Testing was performed on the hull form in a wave tank at Force Technology Denmark to allow designer, Elliott Bay Design Group, to optimize performance in heavy seas and improve passenger comfort.

Vigor is also the leading ferry builder in the state of Washington, having delivered the last 12 ferries for Washington State Ferries (WSF), the largest ferry system in the United States. Last year, it delivered the 362-foot, 144-vehicle, 1,500 passenger Suquamish to the system. Meeting EPA Tier 4 emission standards, the Suquamish is the fourth, and last funded, WSF Olympic Class ferry. However, under a long-range plan delivered to the state legislature this past January, WSF called for the construction of 16 new vessels in the next 20 years—starting with five more Olympics.

Way down the size scale from the Olympic Class ferries, and underscoring Vigor’s versatility, one of the shipbuilder’s most recent orders was for two 56-foot pilot boats for the Port of Los Angeles. They are being built to a design by Camarc Design of the U.K. and feature a twin chine heavy weather hull form for excellent seakeeping.

In January this year, the Navy awarded Vigor the contract to execute the Drydocking Selected Restricted Availability (DSRA) for

the USS Coronado (LCS-4) at its Portland, Ore., shipyard. With options, the contract had a potential total value of $60 million and was Vigor’s first as prime contractor in the LCS program.

In January, too, the U.S. Coast Guard polar icebreaker, Healy (WAGB-20), arrived at Vigor’s Seattle shipyard for maintenance under a $7.3 million contract set to continue through June 2019.

$1 Billion Army Job Vigor’s largest ever contract, booked in 2017, was the award of the contract to build the U.S. Army’s next generation landing craft series, the Maneuver Support Vessel (Light), or MSV(L), with a total value of nearly $1 billion over 10 years.

The award, marked “the culmination of a five-year process of research and development that first began with Kvichak prior to its merger with Vigor,” said Frank Foti, Vigor CEO, at the time, referring to Vigor’s 2015 acquisition of Seattle-based Kvichak Marine Industries.

Since then, the MSV(L) program has been moving along and in February, Vigor reported it had agreed to take over the former home of Christensen Yachts in Vancouver, Wash., following a search for the best

location to build the new landing craft.

Vigor expects to eventually employ approximately 400 workers at the site and will be investing millions in capital upgrades and equipment. It plans to transfer all its marine aluminum work to the location, phasing it out from its Seattle (Ballard) and Clackamas, Ore., locations.

In addition to the Army landing craft production, other programs to be constructed at the site will include ongoing production of the Combatant Craft Medium (CCM) for the U.S. Navy as well as for U.S. allies, the Response Boat-Medium (RB-M) for the U.S. Coast Guard and export markets, Vigor’s Fast Interceptor, aluminum fast ferries and commercial workboats.

The opportunity for Vigor to bring its entire aluminum fabrication team together in one location was a primary driver in the choice of the Vancouver site. Vigor says that the planned consolidation of aluminum hull work at the Vancouver facility is on track and that it sees its most promising markets in the year ahead as including high-performance aluminum patrol boats, autonomous vessels and passenger vessels.

In ship repair, it sees service life extension in the defense sector and cruise ship repair as growing opportunities.

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Offshore A trenchformer used to trench, install and bury subsea electrical cables.

Offshore Industry

Shows Signs of Improvement

After a prolonged “lower for longer” bust since 2014, the tide appears to be turning for the offshore oil and gas industry

C

ertain sectors of the offshore industry—such as supply vessels—are lagging others—such as oilfield operators—in the recovery. Yet there are signs that the global oil and gas downturn is over.

Oil prices have remained above $40 per barrel since April 2016, and in mid-May were around $60 a barrel.

The first Outer Continental Shelf lease sale of 2019 for oil and gas drew considerably more interest than the sales in 2018. The sale for offshore wind leases at the end of 2018 brought in record bids. Operators are posting profits.

Executives with some companies have complained about employee poaching. Activity at the Offshore Technology Conference in Houston last month reflected a cautious sense of optimism for the coming years.

IHS Markit shows that in the Gulf of Mexico in mid-May there were 72 available jackups, semisumbersibles and drillships, of which 42 were marketed, and 34 of those marketed were contracted for a marketed utilization rate of 81%. Last year, there were 83 available units, with 46 being marketed.

32 Marine Log // June 2019

Of those marketed, 35 were contracted, for a marketed utilization rate of 76%.

“The overall state of the offshore industry is good, not great, but it’s a lot better than it was three years ago,” says Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA).

If oil and gas operators begin drilling new wells, Luthi says, they will need support from vessels for equipment and supplies.

Specialized equipment for project development, such as pipelay and other installation vessels will be required as operators approve final investment decisions (FIDs) on projects that were postponed during the downturn or more recent discoveries that have been working their way through the front-end engineering and design process. Seismic vessels will be needed to help petroleum engineers find the sweet spots in the reservoirs below the Gulf of Mexico seabed. Vessels will also be needed to decommission older fields that are no longer producing.

“What we’re hearing is that things are finally looking up, and that contracts are

being let,” Luthi says.

One such example is BP’s May announcement that it had greenlighted the Thunder Horse South Expansion Phase 2 project in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico. A flurry of contract announcements typically follows in the wake of an operator sanctioning a project. Already, TechnipFMC has announced a contract for integrated engineering, procurement, construction and installation of subsea equipment while Nexans reported winning the umbilicals contract for Thunder Horse South.

Other FIDs are expected in the near future, including Chevron’s Anchor field in 5180 feet of water.

Another positive is the end of the ban on the U.S. exporting crude anywhere but to Canada. Since 2015, when the ban was lifted, U.S. production has to increase, due to the combined output of the onshore shale plays, which tend to play out quickly, and the larger oil reservoirs in the Gulf of Mexico, which manage to produce much larger volumes over longer periods of time. Through early 2016, the U.S. exported about 250,000

Boskalis

By Jennifer Pallanich

OffShore offshore barrels per day (b/d) of crude, but after the ban was lifted, exports ramped up to 500,000 b/d. In 2017, exports exceeded 1 million b/d.

Much of the crude went to Asia with some to Europe.

“That’s another area where vessels are going to see a nice uptick in their business,” Luthi says.

Tidewater

An Issue of Oversupply While it seems the offshore oil and gas industry is trending up, some sectors aren’t recovering at the same pace. One such group are offshore supply vessel (OSV) and platform supply vessel (PSV) owners, many of whom have struggled with stressed balance sheets.

“It’s trying to restart itself again,” says Shane Guidry, Harvey Offshore CEO. The problem is one of oversupply, says Todd Hornbeck, CEO of Hornbeck Offshore.

During the most recent boom, the OSV and PSV owners kicked into high gear, ordering vessels to meet projected demand.

When oil prices tanked, so did demand.

“We’re still oversupplied a little bit in the Gulf of Mexico, probably by about 10 ships,” Hornbeck says. “We’ve been oversupplied for four to five years, but we’re getting close to equilibrium.”

Part of that is because vessel owners are stacking older assets.

“There are way too many vessels idled, laid up,” says John Rynd, Tidewater CEO. “It’s depressing to see these expensive high-tech pieces of equipment just tied up at the dock.”

But Rynd expects to see more of just that as the latest raft of vessels undergoes five-year surveys, which could result in a large repair bill depending on how the vessel had been maintained.

“Are these owners going to put more capital into these vessels? Are they going to get a return on that investment? We may see some of the supply stacked as they elect not to do the survey,” Rynd says.

He also believes migration of vessels into other hot spots around the globe will help the OSV/PSV supply levels in the Gulf of Mexico.

Tidewater is not the only vessel operator that has reflagged a vessel from the U.S. to Mexico in order to benefit from the momentum of the Mexican Gulf of Mexico market.

Demand is also growing in the greater Caribbean, where it is possible to use U.S.flagged vessels.

“Guyana is the honey hole,” Guidry says.

Demand there is for larger vessels that can pump 12,000 to 14,000 barrels of mud, he says. “I also think Brazil is going to heat up a lot quicker than the Gulf of Mexico.”

In fact, Guidry doesn’t expect to see the Gulf of Mexico as a hotspot until 2021, “if

we’re lucky. Maybe 2022.”

Rynd, who calls his view cautiously optimistic after a rough five-and-a-half years, believes the real key to a turnaround is “the rig count ticking up.”

There are signs that rig counts may improve for several reasons. One, he says, is that when one company purchases another— such as Kosmos Energy buying Deep Gulf Energy or Murphy Oil acquiring some assets of LLOG—they tend to spend money to get the ball rolling on their new properties.

Potential of Renewables “We’re going to see a lot more vessel traffic headed toward the wind side of the offshore industry,” NOIA’s Luthi says. “The wind companies are almost in a position where they can start putting iron in the water.”

While the offshore windmill industry is thriving in Europe, there is virtually no supply chain ready to serve the nascent U.S. offshore windfarm industry, says Robb Erickson, senior vice president of marine services at Boskalis.

Yet interest in offshore wind along the East Coast is growing exponentially, he says. Part of that is because power plants are aging.

There is no desire to replace old plants with more coal-fired facilities and little support for nuclear sources, leaving oil, gas, wind and hydro as the options.

State governments up and down the northeast coast have committed to reaching varying levels of offshore wind energy in the near term. In her “Supply Chain Contracting Forecast for U.S. Offshore Wind Power” released in March, Stephanie A. McClellan, Ph.D., estimates almost $70 billion in capex by 2030 to build out the offshore wind sector along the northeast coast.

“That’s a big, big number,” Erickson says.

“Consequently, a lot of companies are wanting to jump into the business.”

And while the opportunity is huge, the learning curve is steep, he says. Along the East Coast, companies must deal with unions, regulations from different states, permitting issues, strict local content, and Jones Act obligations. Further complicating matters is the fact that it takes special vessels to install windmill towers, turbines and blades onto fixed offshore platforms on the Outer Continental Shelf. Other specialized vessels will lay and bury subsea electrical cable between windmills and from the windfarm to shore after a trench has been dug.

“None of those vessels exist in the U.S. yet,” Erickson says. A newbuild vessel capable of installing offshore windmills built in the U.S. would cost double what it would cost to fabricate in Korea, he says.

But, Hornbeck says, some of the U.S.flagged stacked vessels could be modified to perform some services for the offshore wind industry. He believes the economics of converting an existing vessel will win out over a costly newbuild with “the moon and stars and sun, and all the bells and whistles.”

But as some OSVs and PSVs are migrating out of the Gulf of Mexico, so may some vessels tailored to offshore windmill farm installation operations mobilize to the East Coast as projects there ramp up. Erickson says Boskalis can provide vessels for the installation operations by working with U.S. partners.

“Two years ago, everybody was asking, ‘Is this going to happen?’” Erickson says. “They began to doubt whether this whole offshore wind thing in the U.S. was going to happen.

It’s going to happen.”

Luthi agrees. “Offshore wind is not a solution for tomorrow, but it’s a solution for the near future.”

Tidewater’s Highland Prestige

June 2019 // Marine Log 33

Newsmakers

Crowley Names Nichols Manager of Business Development BRYAN NICHOLS is moving over to Crowley Shipping’s marine services team as manager of business development after four years with Crowley’s Jensen Maritime. Prior to joining Crowley and Jensen in 2015, Nichols worked on the vessel construction side of the industry at family-founded Nichols Brothers Boat Builders.

CHRIS REMONT has been promoted to executive vice president of new construction programs at Bollinger Shipyards with responsibility for commercial and government new construction programs. He joined Bollinger Shipyards in 2014 and has worked at Bollinger’s Lockport facility.

SADAN KAPTANOGLU, managing director of Turkey’s HI Kaptanoglu Shipping, has been elected president of BIMCO, the world’s largest shipping association.

She will steer BIMCO through the industry’s transition to lowsulfur fuel and set the direction for BIMCO’s approach to short- and long-term measures to decrease global emissions.

GEORGE TOMA has been named commercial business development manager at Furuno USA. He was previously president and general manager of Transas USA and comes to Furuno with 40 years of experience in maritime that includes serveice on the board of directors for Radio Technical Commission for Maritime Services.

ANDERS LINDMARK, formerly head of Alfa Laval PureBallast, is now Alfa Laval’s president of gas systems business unit, overseeing the Alfa Laval PureSOx exhaust gas cleaning offering. He will be based in the Netherlands, where he will oversee development of Alfa Laval’s SOx scrubber offering.

DON BLACK joined Sea Machines Robotics as vice president-sales and marketing. He assumes responsibility for global sales of autonomous-command and remotecontrol products for commercial workboats. He also has oversight for supporting the development of advanced perception and navigation assistance technology for commercial ships and vessels.

One Magazine, The Entire Market

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34 Marine Log // June 2019

2/27/19 3:33 PM

TECH NEWS MAN in VTA Turbocharging First

Viega Cuts Time on Bilge Piping Replacement Job The Viega SeaPress system for marine pipe-joining applications can be used in a variety of pipe applications.

When Engineered Yacht Solutions (EYS) of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., recently had to replace the aluminum bilge suction lines on a yacht, it did so using the Viega SeaPress 90/10 copper nickel marine pipe-joining system, because although a 150-foot yacht may be big, the spaces inside to do repair or replacement work are still very small.

The ability to press fittings, and to do it quickly, meant the small crew doing the work was done with the Viega portion in just a few days.

“There were some sections of bilge suction piping that were compromised with holes and degraded material,” said Aksel King, vice president of EYS. “The vessel was probably 10 years old, and the material we cut out was a 60-series grade aluminum, which is not the best for seawater or for the way they’d constructed the boat. SeaPress is a big upgrade for the vessel, a better material, and it made the job easier to do, too.”

Because there was a tight time frame to get the repairs done, coupled with the fact that cold press technology is safer—particularly

in tight quarters—EYS turned to Viega.

“If I’m working on piping on a boat, I’m concerned about putting a bunch of welding equipment inside a million-dollar motor yacht,” King said. “When you start striking an arc, it’s fire. You’re going to have to have a fire watch and have a marine chemist come and make sure the area is safe to work in. I don’t have to worry about that with Viega.”

On the recent vessel, 54 millimeter SeaPress fittings were used for about 40 feet of pipe run. King said they used a variety of fittings, including tees and 45-degree elbows, and connected to the bilge suction manifold.

With Viega’s recent launch of MegaPress CuNi, EYS now has more options to choose from, depending on the vessel being working on. Both CuNi and SeaPress are 90/10 copper nickel fittings; but SeaPress is for CTS tube, while CuNi is for IPS pipe.

“Being able to remove and reinstall pipe without having to do hot work, and 99 percent of the time in very tight quarters, is great,” King said. “We use a lot of Viega stainless steel and copper nickel fittings.

I like Viega products. They’re easy to use.”

MAN Energy Solutions has made Variable Turbine Area (VTA) technology standard on TCA turbochargers for its MAN 51/60 engine type.

This makes MAN the first turbocharger manufacturer to offer axial turbochargers with VTA as standard for any large-bore, four-stroke engines.

“High-tech solutions are necessary to meet the market’s demanding requirements, and —with this announcement—we have really delivered,” says Stefan Terbeck, project manager for the MAN 51/60 engine series at MAN Energy Solutions. “VTA turbochargers are becoming more and more important, especially when it comes to gas engines. VTA has already been applied by our licensee, Kawasaki Heavy Industries, which has reported excellent performance and high reliability on its engines.”

MAN Energy Solutions already has more than 380 references for turbochargers sold with VTA technology, where VTA is approved for its TCA turbocharger sizes TCA55 to TCA88.

VTA BENEFITS The VTA technology means that the volume of charge air can be precisely matched to the quantity of injected fuel at all points in an engine’s load and speed range. This has several benefits, including: • significant fuel savings; • improved dynamic performance; • fuel flexibility; • range extension; and • peaking balance.

MAN Energy Solutions says that the typical payback period for VTA on MAN engines will be one-and-ahalf to two years, and that its next step will be to make VTA standard for its MAN 51/60G engine type.

June 2019 // Marine Log 35

TECH NEWS MACS3 Loading Computer Gets IMDG Update

The catcher has a wingspan of 6 to 7 meters when deployed.

Svitzer Trials Remote-Operated Tow Line Catcher Connecting heaving lines at sea is one of the most critical parts of day-today towage operations; however it presents significant risk to crews, particularly from a center lead forward position where tugs must operate very close to the connecting vessel. Now Maersk Group towing specialist Svitzer has started sea trials of a remotely operated line catcher that could significantly improve safety standards and reduce risks to crews.

T h e n e w s y s te m , b e i n g t r i a l e d o n the vessel Svitzer Trym, consists of a hydraulically controlled set of catching arms, with a “wingspan” when activated of 6-7 meters,

fitted on the foredeck of the tug. An automated tying mechanism connects the line being heaved with the tug’s rope line in a safe and efficient manner. Both catching arms and the tying mechanism are remotely operated from the bridge.

With its wide wingspan, the crew on the connecting vessel has a larger target area to hit with the heaving line weight, and no member of the tug’s crew is exposed during the process.

As well as enhancing safety standards, the automated catching arm prototype is also designed to increase the success rate of connecting the vessel to the tug, leading to safer and more efficient operations.

USCG Approves Largest Alfa Laval Reactor Alfa Laval has gained U.S. Coast Guard ballast water management system type approval for its largest PureBallast 3 reactor, with a size of 1,500 cubic meters per hour (m3/h). Customers can now select any PureBallast 3 system configuration for use in United States waters.

The 1,500 m3/h reactor was launched last year and is optimized for 50% more flow than the former largest reactor, enabling more streamlined and cost-efficient system configurations for vessels with large ballast water flows.

For vessels with ballast water flows of 36 Marine Log // June 2019

1,000 cmh or more, the configurations covered by the new Coast Guard-type approval offer significant benefits. A 3,000m3/h system can be achieved with just two reactors, for example, while a 1,500-m3/h system goes from two reactors to one.

“Today’s UV ballast water treatment systems are already smaller and more costeffective to install than electrochlorination systems for large flows,” says Peter Sahlén, head of Alfa Laval PureBallast. “Being able to configure a PureBallast 3 system with even fewer reactors further reduces complexity and cost.”

N av is, oa k l a n d, c a l i f., h a s announced an upgrade to the dangerous goods ( DG ) module of its MACS3 loading computer sof tware to comply with the latest update of amendment 39-18 to the International Maritime Dangerous Goods (IMDG) Code.

Cur rently, compliance with the code is optional, but it will become mandator y on all vessels star ting January 1, 2020.

The MACS3 DG module controls the vessel’s compliance with IMDG stowage and segregation rules and ensures the s tow and segre gation are in line with the vessel design according to the document of compliance.

Through MAC S3, user s c an check the DG stow together with s tabilit y and s tres s conditions in order to ensure a safe vessel stow.

Additionally, MACS3 is integrated with both StowMan and XVELA planning platforms to share visibility with the crew onboard.

“Due to increasing incidents on board of container vessels during recent months, the new dangerous goo d s s egregation and s towage rules are at the top of customers’ minds” said Selke Eichler, director of global customer ser vices for Navis Carrier & Vessel Solutions. “As safety and efficiency are a top priority for Navis, we wanted to ensure that we could deliver a software in line with the new standards in a timely manner to satisfy our customers’ business needs.”

Navis, a par t of cargo-handling solution firm Cargotec Corporation, is a provider of operational technologies and ser vices that unlock greater per formance and ef ficiency for the world’s leading terminal operators and ocean carriers.

The IMDG code is reviewed b ie n niall y a n d p u b lis he d i t s lates t update in 2018. Through this s of t w are up gr ad e, Navis MAC S 3 L o a ding C o m p u te r S of t w are D G m o d ule w ill b e i n c o m p lia n c e w it h t he s e new re g ulatio ns s t ar t i ng i m m e diatel y fo r current customers.

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June 2019 // Marine Log 39

SAFETY FIRST

High River Conditions Impact Mariner Safety

I

n May 2019, the Mississippi River exceeded a 92-year-old record for days at flood stage. It is not so unusual that the river is high, but it is unusual that it has been for so long. According to the National Weather Service, flooding in at least eight states along portions of the Mississippi River—due to relentless, record-breaking spring rainfall—is the longest-lasting since the “Great Flood” of 1927.

High river conditions create a diverse set of hazards, increase myriad risks and present new safety challenges to all river operators— from terminals and facilities to deep-draft vessels. High river season is the broadest reaching natural phenomena facing American maritime commerce, yet no other group of operators are more vulnerable to the hazards and increased risk than the towing and barge industry. Onboard a towing vessel, circumstances can change from challenging to tragic in a matter of moments.

Commercially, high river events are a boon to the towing industry. Vessel utilization is never higher, with rates to match.

High commercial demands coupled with navigational challenges results in a very busy market.

Everyone loves to beat the safety drum, that is until it becomes an inconvenience.

Yet the stakes are never higher than when the river comes up. It is precisely during these times that our risk tolerance should decrease rather than increase.

The Coast Guard, American Waterways Operators and the National Transportation Safety Board have well documented the risks inherent to downstreaming in high river conditions, with one being to keep main

40 Marine Log // June 2019

deck doors closed and latched at all times while underway or standing by.

SMS and Training Good leadership and a solid safety management system (SMS) are foundational to safety risk management, but the best safeguard against accidents and injuries are experienced and well-trained mariners behind the sticks and on deck. An SMS is truly only as effective as the mariners who implement it.

The force of the river takes its toll not only on the people, but also on the equipment.

Behavioral research shows us that in emergency situations and critical moments, muscle memory and instinct take over. In a crisis situation, there isn’t time to look up a procedure. Training, rigorous drills as if in an actual emergency, and vessel specific orientation are critical to ensuring onboard safety.

Not all working hours are created equally.

In these conditions, waking hours are especially stressful, and rest can be fitful. The water is moving faster, and so are the bodies on it. In addition to the increased physical demands on deck, mental and physical

exhaustion go hand in hand. Being at a near constant state of alertness takes a progressive toll.

We speak of chronic unease, a beneficial discomfort that enhances awareness in hazardous situations and overall mindset operating in a naturally risky business. But there is a very fine line between enhanced safety through optimal situational awareness and anxiety, which makes one more susceptible to hazards. This threshold is different for everyone. Open and frequent lines of communication between shore and vessel are imperative.

During these times, it is of utmost importance to ensure crews are adhering to work and rest hours. Industry leading companies may decide to increase manpower during high river events, and this serves not only to benefit the mariners onboard, but also to ensure commercial continuity in the event of crewing shortages.

The force of the river takes its toll not only on the people, but also on the equipment. In high and fast water, people are working harder and so is the equipment. And while Subchapter M requires operators to take prompt corrective action in the event of failure of critical equipment, planned maintenance strategy should help to eliminate or minimize failures and corresponding down time.

Industry leading companies have also adopted standing policies and procedures during high river episodes based on their own operational risk assessments.

The river is a rapidly changing environment no matter how optimal the conditions.

When all else is tried, during this time when an unanticipated contingency arises, we must also remember our “Stop Work Responsibility” and follow the little voice in our heads that says, “Wait, something doesn’t feel quite right.”

Effective safety risk management begins with planning and is sustained through teamwork and communication. The Coast Guard routinely announces safety alerts to the barge and towing industry, which should be taken seriously. A safer high river season in 2020 begins now.

Sarah Michelle Hattier Safety & Regulatory Compliance, Dupre Marine Transportation

A CRUISE SHIP THAT MOVES THOUSANDS OF PASSENGERS And a large-scale project where we were on board from the beginning Why does the world-renowned Meyer Werft shipyard team up with Viega time and again for numerous projects of this scale? In addition to the extremely reliable piping systems made from copper, copper alloys or plastic materials, Viega also supplies the know-how to go with them.

Viega. Connected in quality.

Meyer Werft shipyard, Papenburg, Germany

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