Generations 1 - 2009

Generations A !"" magazine published

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Generations Our mission is to establish community, to provoke thought, to generate passion, and to give meaning‌ to everyone ABB Marine is in contact with.

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This Generation Here are some of the contributors, opinion givers, experts, scientists, engineers, shipowners, managers, technicians and very smart people you’ll find in the pages of this magazine...

Market Survey

Arctic

André Luiz da Silva

Mikko Ninni

Yuriy Ivanov

Arto Uuskallio

Samuli Hänninen

Markku Lumme

Family Rules

Brains Trust

Jaakko Aho

professional endeavour

Jukka Varis Rolv Petter Amdam

Klaus Vanska

Mirva Ojanen

Egil Ove Johansen

Julia Wei-Cai

William Mobley

problem solved

Jostein Bogen

Gery Yao

Annette Torp

perspectives

Y.C. Shin

Victor Rokhlin

Kari Laukia

Recurrent Theme

Stig Leira

Ki Dong Park

Torsten Heideman

Jerry Marczak

q&a

Michael Pfeifer

Gunvor Ulstein

Michael Scheepers

tech porn

Tore Ulstein Eric W. Schreiber

Kevin Zhu

Dr. Waqas M. Arshad

slang

Peter Nixon

Tonje Gjertsen

3600 profile

C.H. Park

quality in the life-cycle

Keun Kim

Geir Holstad

Materialism

P책l Idar Strand

Dr. Ernst-Peter von Bergen

Thomas Norrby

ABB Marine editorial board: Heikki Soljama,Gery Yao, Alf-Kåre Ådnanes, Jyri Jusslin, Juha Koskela, Rune Lysebo, Anders Røed & Julia Cai ||| ABB Marine coordination: Milla Johansson, Peter Nixon, Ji-Seung Yoo, Fiona Jia-Ding, Joanne Jing Gu, Kjell Nilsson, Audrey Brehm, Alex Yip, Daniele Patuelli, Magnar Østrem, Nina Paivoke, Tenho Eerola, Chang Soo Hong ||| Managing editors: Say – PR & Communications (Daniel Barradas, Johs Ensby & Ryan Skinner) ||| Design & Art Direction: Daniel Barradas ||| Journalism, Photography & Illustration: see article by-lines ||| Uncredited photos: ABB image bank or Shutterstock.com ||| Printing: ColorMaster Norge |||

News from the world of ABB Marine – production, R&D, projects, support

Technology development has opened up ice-covered polar areas to commercial shipping. Go with us to the far north!

Metals, plastics, oils, glass, synthetics – they’re at the core of our work. We look at a compelling material. This issue: Biodegradable lubricating oils.

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The rules that frame our work are in constant change. This page looks at one change. This time: Hardware-in-the-loop.

How is quality maintained at every step of a component’s development, production and installation? We look at ABB’s Stadt Drive as an example…

You probably like to read, but don’t have much time. We pick out a few good titles for you. This time: Shipping titles.

Learn from experience. We go one-on-one with a leader with an exclusive, in-depth interview. This issue: Gunvor Ulstein on cyclical downturns.

Some questions are common to all of us in the marine business. This article looks at the latest thinking to bring you new insight on… motivating multicultural teams.

A dream team of engineers imagine futuristic answers to real problems. This time we banish fossil fuels…

Interviews with many people involved in Stena’s Drillmax series at Samsung Heavy Industries.

Just as it sounds, we look at a major customer from many different angles. Join us at Samsung Heavy Industries.

Look closer and it gets more and more complex.

Delve into the details of the next generation of the Azipod®.

Table of contents Generations magazine ||| Issue 1-2009 ||| All rights reserved ||| Generations is published twice annually by ABB Marine, a fully-owned daughter company of ABB ||| The opinions expressed in this magazine are those of the authors or persons interviewed and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or ABB Marine ||| This magazine is not a retail product. ||| For subscription information, go to www.abb.com/generations |||

This section shares some of the unique vocabulary of the marine business.

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10 market survey 13 Generati

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Poll

We look at life in one country for marine professionals.

Let’s go to Brazil.

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Brains

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Q&A

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life

360

in the

Frontier

ality

Materialism

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04 here & now 05 h ouse 06 rules slang

News of innovations in ABB that may soon change your business too

We surveyed 60 students at maritime schools worldwide.

Here is what the next generation of marine professionals likes...

The common denominator for all of us is that we are problem solvers. Here, we see how Chinese shipyards started building offshore supply vessels with electric propulsion.

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Here & Now Far Samson

here & now

norway An AHTS/CSV offshore ship, built for Farstad Shipping by STX Europe Langsten in Norway and designed by Rolls-Royce (UT 761 CD), has set an unofficial world record for pulling power. In March, Far Samson created bollard pull of 423 tons during a trial off Norway.

The record was made possible by a propulsion system that combines input from two diesel engines, shaft generators and electrical motors in the gearbox. ABB Marine supplied the ship’s shaft generators, auxiliary generators, propulsion transformers, frequency drives and electric motors. Four main motors give 6000kW each, with four auxiliaries of 2755kW each (total: 35020kW). The ship’s installed power is 48,000 horsepower.

ABB has developed a winch control program for use with ABB industrial drives ranging from 0.55 to 5600 kW. The program improves operational safety and performance.

The winch control program can be used in different control system configurations in the marine environment. All functions commonly required for winch applications are in the winch control program.

The ABB industrial drive is certified for marine use and when combined with the winch control program it can replace traditional and costly hydraulic winch controllers typically used in anchoring and mooring. finland

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ABB has formed a joint-venture company with Fincantieri to sell and supply integrated automation systems. The company will be headquartered in Genoa.

The joint-venture company will market ABB’s marine integrated automation systems for cruise and naval newbuildings. The company will be responsible for marketing and sales, project execution and commissioning, and supply of equipment to the defined markets. italy

ABB and ZPMC (Shanghai’s Zhenhua Port Machinery Co. Ltd.) will together develop energy-efficient propulsion solutions for deepsea offshore ships.

The solutions that ABB and ZPMC aim to develop will apply specifically to offshore vessels with relatively deep operating draft, such as heavylift ships and drilling platforms. The new solutions will use ABB’s Compact Azipod® technology, which aims to improve operating efficiency and availability. china

ABB has sold its mechanical marine propulsion business based in Gdansk and Elblag, Poland to Norway’s Scana Industries.

The move aligns with ABB Marine’s strategy of focusing on electric power plant and propulsion systems and ABB’s Azipod® technologies.

ABB and Scana have agreed not to disclose the terms of the transaction. poland

global ABB is developing a new low-voltage series of generators for marine applications.

The first prototype (AMG 0500MK08 LAE) was successfully tested with a diesel engine in February this year. The new AMG generators are being developed with the most modern design tools available. Electrical and mechanical FEM (finite element method) assures high performance and reliability of the generators. And the mechanical engineering was completed entirely in a 3D environment. Typically these generators are used as an auxiliary generator in a ship, or as a main generator for propulsion power in a diesel electric vessel. |||

house rules

How to get in the loop?

Today it’s required of aircraft manufacturers and some charterers of dynamic positioning systems.

Some people want to apply it to much more of the software on a ship. What is it? Hardware-in-the-loop testing. It may just be the better mousetrap of critical software testing.

Ryan Skinner ||| illustration: Otto

it sounds mystical: Hardware-in-the-loop.

In fact, it’s rather mundane. It means that you test software by plugging it up to hardware.

You literally put the hardware in the (test) loop.

Sounds like a simulator? It is a kind of simulator. The subtle difference is that the software is connected to someone else’s hardware (an independent third-party test company), and then run through its paces. Mathematical models simulate sea conditions, hydrodynamics, wind and weather, and the software’s performance is closely monitored and then re-examined.

“It’s similar to a factory acceptance test.

But this test usually runs on the manufacturer’s own simulator. Obviously, software is less likely to show trouble when it runs on a simulator made by the same firm,” says Egil Ove Johansen of ABB Marine. “HIL provides a special kind of third-party verification.”

Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) testing kicked off decades ago in the aircraft industry, and all commercial airliners are today put through mandatory HIL tests. Only three or four years ago, some oil companies began to demand HIL testing of the dynamic positioning systems of ships or rigs that they chartered, for safety reasons.

The company that began offering HIL tests of marine components, Marine Cybernetics, is today the only one of its kind. It is based in Trondheim, Norway, and now offers HIL testing of power management systems, drilling control systems, crane control systems and steering , propulsion and thruster systems. a requirement

Classification company DNV has worked closely with Marine Cybernetics and has developed a certification based on HIL testing. Both companies see a place for HIL testing in classification rules, and some customers seem to agree. still a ways off Johansen confirms that ABB Marine took part in a pilot project with Marine Cybernetics, using the latter’s Steering, Propulsion and Thrusting HIL test method. “It was useful, and we are now prepared to run such tests on request,” he said.

The testing has clear advantages. It lets users test numerous operating or fault modes, at many stages of product development or delivery. It is particularly attractive when used to test complex control systems, as a supplement to traditional FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis). Despite the benefits, Johansen doesn’t feel like HIL tests will soon be widespread or mandatory.

“It can be costly and time-consuming. So far, there is only one company doing HIL tests.

There are concerns about giving another company intricate knowledge of your technology.

Lastly, if you have a very good simulator inhouse for verification, who do you trust? Your own simulator, or theirs?” says Johansen. |||

house rules – hardware-in-the-loop

writer:

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SLANG

The unique patois of drillers The oil drilling industry’s first roughnecks came almost exclusively from farms near the oilfields.

The farmyard words they used to describe their surroundings still dominate the industry. Other terms have more arcane sources; some have gained broader usage in the language. If you learn our handy drilling terminology, you’ll know what someone means when he says: “The worm had sx, when he knocked a fish down the rathole.” writer:

Ryan Skinner

Water table slang

[waw-ter tey-buhl] n. : A small reservoir that used to rest at the top of wooden derricks, in order to extinguish a fire from a blow-out. To this day, general arrangement drawings for drilling rigs include a water table.

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Doodlebugger [dood-l-buhg-er] n. : A seismic company employee conducting seismic surveys in the field.

“Farmers in the US think that doodlebuggers are travelling bands of gypsy-like felons who tell them lies, promise to drill free water wells, leave gates open, tear up pasture and then blow town in the dark of night.”

– Jim Hubbell

Possum belly [pos-uhm-bel-ee] n. : Mud tank or pit closest to the return line where drilling fluid is returned from down hole.

Sx [saks] n. pl. : An abbreviation for sacks, in drilling or mud reports. Contrary to what you might expect, drilling crews are not very excited to get lots of sx.

Monkeyboard [muhng-kee-bohrd] n. : The derrickman’s working platform. This is located at a height in the derrick or mast equal to two, three or four lengths of pipe.

A 1960 film called “Route 66” had the sub-title “The Man on the Monkey Board”; it told the story of a Nazihunter who worked on a drilling rig.

Clabbered [klab-erd] adj. : Describes when mud accumulates with various contaminants to create a clumpy mass. Clabber is a colloquial name for sour, curdled milk in the US South.

Rathole [rat-hohl] n. : A hole in the rig floor 30 to 35 feet deep, lined with casing (the pipe that lines the drilled hole) that projects above the floor. Also used as a verb in poker when a player removes chips from the table during a game.

Worm [wurm] n. : A first-year oilfield worker. To show how drilling terminology infiltrates our life, here is a quote attributed to a Texas-born American football coach: “And you, you’re nothing but a low-life scum-of-theearth worm rookie.” [From Tales from the Packers Sideline, by Chuck Carlson]

Rabbiting [rab-it-ing] n. : Cleaning out casing and greasing thread connections. So-called because rabbits liked to bask in the warmth inside casings on land.

Fish [fisj] n. : Any object lost in the drilled hole that must be removed, a process known naturally as fishing. As operators regularly must pay for the rig during fishing operations, some drilling contractors sell “fishing insurance”.

Power provider ABB is a global leader in power and automation technologies. New ways to create and deliver power in other industries may soon impact the marine market. Here’s some of those innovations…

Photo: GVEA

As reserve power, Alaska’s heartland city Fairbanks commissioned construction of the world’s largest-ever battery energy storage system. A consortium led by ABB supplied and installed the system.

This system has two components: the converter and nickel-cadmium batteries. The converter changes the battery’s DC power to AC power, and the battery stores the energy. It can produce up to 27 MW of power for 15 minutes (long enough for other sources to get back online). This can be quickly increased to 40 MW with additional battery strings.

The complete battery weighs 1300 tons, and its housing measures 120 meters by 26 meters (as big as a football field). The battery can have from four to eight strings, each with 3440 cells connected in a series. These cells can deliver 80 per cent of their rated capacity for 20 minutes. new uses for permanent magnet motors

Traditionally used in small-scale applications, high power density and high efficiency permanent magnet motors are being chosen by paper producers, wind-mill rotors and marine propulsors.

ABB’s permanent magnet motors are synchronous, meaning speed can be optimized and more power can be delivered from a smaller unit. The magnets are neodynium iron boron – the most powerful magnetic material at room temperature.

The paper industry, which requires many highly accurate low-speed drives, has seized upon the technology. ABB has also developed three permanent magnet motors for wind turbine generators. As these motors increase in popularity, ABB expects the relatively expensive magnet inputs to decrease in cost.

most efficient subsea transformer ABB Transformers in Vaasa, Finland has manufactured the world’s most efficient underwater transformer, for use at a Norwegian gas field 400 meters under the North Sea. Rated at 15 MVA (megavolt amperes)/50 kV/6.6 kV, this subsea transformer is capable of operating at depths up to three kilometers and has the highest power and voltage ratings, and highest operating frequency, in the market.

The 30-tonne transformer will step-down high-voltage electricity produced at a platform 50 kilometers away.

ABB is already building an even higher rated subsea transformer (20 MVA/132/22.5 kV) for Norway’s largest gas field, Ormen Lange. power superhighways in china The State Power Grid of China asked ABB to help with the distribution of the 18.2 gigawatts possible from its Three Gorges hydroelectric power plant. ABB has been working on a total of four different high-voltage DC transmission superhighways that will carry over 10,000 MW collectively.

The Three Gorges Transmission System will measure over 10,000 kilometers of highvoltage AC and DC lines extending to grids in central China, east China, Sichuan and Guangdong. Seven regional power networks and five independent provincial networks will combine in two new regional networks, and eventually a national integrated grid in 2015. |||

power provider

world’s largest battery

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TECH PORN

Superconductors: here tomorrow?

While the phenomenon has been utilised in MRI machines and mass spectrometers for many years now, superconductors haven’t made their way to marine propulsion as of yet. When they do, they’ll not only reduce motor size and weight significantly, but also fuel costs. The technology has been considered “just around the corner” for the last 15 years now, but is that day finally upon us? writer:

TECH PORN — SUPERCONDUCTORS

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Scott LaHart ||| photographer: Mai-Linh Doan

meet the centerfold Superconductivity occurs in certain materials at very low temperatures, and is characterised by zero electrical resistance and the Meissner effect – that is, the exclusion of the interior magnetic field. When a material drops below its “critical temperature”, its resistance drops to zero, meaning that an electric current flowing in a loop of superconducting wire can persist indefinitely with no power source. why is she on everyone’s lips ? A high-temperature superconductor would reduce the volume, weight, and raise the efficiency and operation control response performance of marine generators and motors to a large degree. The main reason to look into superconductor technology is to reduce electrical losses – which of course goes into the cost question.

Take an LNG carrier, for example, which would have propulsion power of 30 MW. You could very easily reduce transmission losses at

the generator and motor stages by about 5% through the utilisation of superconductors. At current prices for fuel, this equals out to savings of at least USD 300,000 over the course of a single year for that single vessel. what can we expect from her in the future ?

ABB is prepared to utilise the technology in its propulsion products in the future, and is actively carrying out R&D in the area. The time just has to be right to commercialise – and at present it’s not, due to costs, manufacturing and availability.

According to technology manager Alf-Kåre Ådnanes, people have been saying for the last fifteen years that the technology is six years away. What about now, then? “It’s going to take someone willing to pay to commercialise it, because the materials are there,” Ådnanes says. “From that point it will take…”

Yes, you guessed it. Six years. |||

Zero electrical resistance Magnetic flux density distribution on a high-temperature superconductor (lower part of picture) and a permanent magnet (structure on top).

In this illustration, the lighter the colour is, the stronger the magnetic field. On normal conducting material, we would see a greater magnetic influence on the lower structure

Too cold to hold Superconductors are separated into two groups – low temperature and high temperature. Low-temperature superconductors have been around longest, and have a “critical temperature” of -270° C. High-temperature superconductors were discovered in 1986 and are more viable for commercial activities, though the phrase “high temperature” here may be as apt as placing the phrase “fat-free” before the word “butter”. Their temperature is still in the -100° C range.

Generations data sheet NAME: Superconductor MEASUREMENTS: It all depends on the product I’m utilised in, but significantly smaller than normal conductors. In this case, however, small is sexy ☺ FAVOURITE ACTIVITIES: Conducting electricity with exactly zero electrical resistance FAVOURITE PLACE: Anywhere that it’s cold. I mean realllllyy cold GUILTY PLEASURES: Levitating magnets for interested onlookers TURN-ONS: Cold, postmodern engine design

A magnet levitating above a high-temperature superconductor cooled with liquid nitrogen.

The persistent electric current flowing on the surface excludes the magnetic field of the magnet – the Meissner effect.

TURN-OFFS: Outdated technology, heat MOST EMBARRASSING MOMENT: Being called “six years away” for the first time a full fifteen years ago

TECH PORN — SUPERCONDUCTORS

Centerfold fun fact

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Market survey

ABB Marine now in Brazil This January, ABB Marine opened a dedicated service and support office in Brazil.

Meet André Luiz da Silva, who leads the office. writer:

market survey – brazil

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Richie MacTaggart ||| photo: Petrobras Imagebank

ABB Marine opened its first service office in downtown Rio de Janeiro in January 2009.

The office will have responsibility for all marine business in Brazil including newbuilds, modernization, commissioning and spare parts management and supply. It will pursue opportunities both locally in Brazil and across South America.

ABB has set strong revenue forecasts from the outset and is expecting to double revenues each year over the first few years. André Luiz da Silva explains where this growth will come from: “New drilling units are on the way to this market, and we estimate that these units will need support worth around EUR 200 million. At the same time, we expect over 100 supply vessels to be built in Brazil over the next five years, while there are also plans to build 28 drilling vessels here.”

Silva has taken charge of ABB’s initial diesel electric propulsion system contracts in the Brazilian market. The first delivery was an Aker-designed ROV06 offshore vessel to owner DOF in December 2008 from what is now STX Brazil Offshore SA. ABB will also supply the hybrid electric/mechanical propulsion systems

Brazil’s response to the global economic crisis: “GDP is expected to shrink by a small margin in 2009.

Activity lost considerable momentum in the last quarter of 2008, dragged down by a fall in industrial production, but may be showing signs of bottoming out. Ongoing policy easing, coupled with improvement in credit conditions, will buttress the recovery towards year-end and in 2010.”

– OECD report, 31 March 2009

Brazil’s trading partners (2008)

Others 18.7%

E.U. 26%

United States 14.3%

Asia 16%

Mercosur and Latin America 25%

André Luiz da Silva will lead ABB Marine’s operations from Rio de Janeiro

Some major Brazilian shipyards Estaleiro Wilson Sons, Guarujá, São Paulo Newbuilding of: OSV and AHTS.

Estaleiro Ilha S.A (EISA), Ilha do Governador, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of: OSV, AHTS, Tankers and Containers. Ship and rig repair

Shipbuilding in Brazil New players, both local and foreign, are investing to restructure old operations and set up new shipyards. The expanding oil and gas activities have increased the need for platforms, tankers, and other ships such as offshore support vessels. STX has a shipyard in Brazil and the likes of Jurong, Hyundai, Daewoo and Samsung all see growing opportunities in the country.

Annually, Brazil produces 26 million tonnes of cement 3.5 million TV sets 3 million refrigerators 70 million cubic meters of petroleum

Aker Promar Brazil, Niterói, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of: OSV and AHTS, floating dock.

Estaleiro Aliança, Niterói, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of: OSV and AHTS

Estaleiro Sermetal S.A, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of Tankers. Ship and rig repair Estaleiro Mauá, Niterói, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of Production Platforms. Ship and rig repair

Estaleiro Brasfels, Angra dos Reis, Rio de Janeiro Newbuilding of OSV, AHTS and Production Platforms. Ship and rig repair

New Mac Laren, Rio de Janeiro Investment of USD 75M, operating in Q3-2009. The shipyard is a joint venture between Jurong Shipyard and Mac Laren .

Newbuilding of: OSV and AHTS. Ship and rig repair Estaleiro Detroit, Itajaí, South of Brazil Newbuilding of: Tugs and OSV

New - Estaleiro Rio Grande, Rio Grande do Sul Investment of USD 625M, operating in Q3-2009. It will be the biggest dry dock in Latin America for building of: Semi- Sub. rigs/drillships, FPSOs, oil tankers, OSV and AHTS. Ship and rig repair.

New – Estaleiro Atlântico Sul, Pernambuco Investment of USD 930M, operating in Q1-2009. The shipyard is a joint venture between Camargo Correa, Queiroz Galvão and Samsung. It will be the biggest shipyard in Southern Hemisphere for building of: Semi- Sub. rigs/Drill Ships, FPSOs, oil tankers, OSV and AHTS. Ship and rig repair

Estaleiro Inace, Fortaleza Newbuilding of: Tugs and OSV

market survey – brazil

for two Aker-designed AH12 AHTS vessels for DOF, also being built at the STX yard.

“There are great opportunities in the longterm,” says Silva. “We now see the reemergence of Brazil’s maritime industry. New oil finds in deep water generate huge investments in the sector. The country has good financing conditions; the Maritime Fund for newbuilds and the Brazilian Development Bank offer special financing aids to shipyards and shipbrokers.” |||

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Market survey

Brazilian Superpower After the global economy collapsed in Autumn 2008, Brazilian oil company Petrobras cheered the market by announcing a massive new round of investments. This company is driving economic growth in Brazil. writer:

market survey – brazil

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Richie MacTaggart ||| photo: Petrobras Imagebank

petrobras is a powerhouse in the world of oil and gas. In 2008, Petrobras became the third largest company in the Western Hemisphere, behind only Exxon Mobil and General Electric, and over the likes of Microsoft, AT&T, and Wal-Mart.

Petróleo Brasileiro S.A., the company’s full name, is semi-public and headquartered in Rio de Janeiro. It produces more than two million barrels of oil equivalent per day, distributes oil products and owns and operates oil refineries and oil tankers. Due to its significant reserves located off the coast of the country, Petrobras has become a world leader in the development of advanced technologies for deep-water and ultra-deep water oil production.

Despite the present global financial turmoil and the subsequent drop in the international oil price, Petrobras’ 2009-2013 business plan does not include any significant cost reductions. Indeed, the plan retains aggressive

growth targets and incorporates the investment required for the exploration and development of the oil discoveries in the pre-salt area offshore of Brazil.

The Business Plan 2009-2013 has established the following oil production targets in Brazil: 2.68 million barrels of oil equivalent a day (boed) in 2013, 3.34 million boed in 2015 and 3.92 million boed in 2020.

Maintaining its commitment to sustainable development, the company intends to continue expanding its activities in target markets for oil, oil products, petrochemicals, gas and energy, biofuels and distribution, being a benchmark to the integrated oil industry. The company’s vision is to become one of the five largest integrated energy companies in the world – a vision that it wishes to maintain through the pillars of profitability, social and environmental responsibility, and integrated growth. |||

Generations Poll

What is the next generation of shipping people interested in?

We surveyed 60 students at maritime schools from Norway, Korea, Finland, Italy, Singapore and China.

Here are their responses.

With what vessel type would you most want to work?

What kind of shore-based shipping job or employer would you most like to have?

Offshore ships

20

Yachts

8

Shipping finance

6

Car carriers

23 10

Shipowner, operator

9

Merchant cargo

Shipyard Classification society

12

7

Ship equipment supplier

5

4

Gas carriers

2

Port/terminal

Naval

2

Government

Tankers

2

Media, newspapers

1

2 2

Rescue

1

Charterer

1

Heavy-lift

1

Marine insurance

1

3rd party ship management

1

Dredger/cable-layer

0

What marine environmental issue interests you the most?

Engine efficiency Clean design Ballast water management

8

NOX emissions

7

Spill prevention

6

13

If you had to work in a country other than your own, which would you choose?

19

15

generations poll

Cruise/ferry

UK

18

USA

11

Norway

11

Singapore

6

UAE (Dubai)

Ship scrapping

2

Japan

Sulphur emissions

2

Brazil

Bilge water separation

1

4 3 2

China Korea

2 1

Russia

1

Finland

1

India

0

problem solved

New technological frontiers The growth of China’s shipyards have turned the shipbuilding industry on its head. But, as the yards consider their prospects in a recession, each strives to demonstrate the kind of technological prowess that will win it scarce, high-margin builds. ABB Marine has worked with two major Chinese shipyards to develop offshore supply vessels with electric propulsion – now this is a problem solved. writer:

problem solved

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Richie MacTaggart

no company that positions itself as a global concern can really claim to be that unless it has a strong presence in China. Both due to its opportunities as a growing domestic market and for its ability to provide low-cost raw materials and workforce, China is a must-win market.

ABB Marine was quick to recognise this market and set up a marine-specific operation back in 2002, as general manager, ABB Marine MEC in China, Gery Yao explains. “Our major emphasis has been on developing our marketing presence. This was to promote ourselves and our systems and services to potential customers, but also to explain to potential partners our strategy for the Chinese market. Back in the early 2000s, market trends clearly show that shipowners were looking to build electrical propulsion vessels in Asia, so it was natural that we should create a presence here.”

Since then, ABB’s development in this market has been encouraging. “We began with sales and marketing activities and followed up with project management coordination functions and local service capabilities,” Yao continues. “From there we began to build up our engineering team. It took a long time to do so, as we found it a challenge to develop the necessary quality procedures and cultures among the workforce. However, we are now at a standard that meets our international quality criteria which will take our business to the next level.”

The company’s product offerings encompass a total solution for electrical propulsions systems, from consultancy and purchasing to installation and commissioning. These electrical propulsion systems a full service offering

A quick-fire six We interviewed a spokesperson from Mawei Shipyard in Fujian province, south-east China.

1. When and why did Mawei begin working with ABB? We started the cooperation with ABB in the autumn of 2008. For this project, both ABB’s technological leadership and Mawei’s productivity upgrade bind us together. We can say it’s a win-win cooperation.

2. Are OSVs a new departure for the yard?

We began to study and build offshore vessels from 2000.

We gained much experience in OSV building during this decade, such as platform supply vessels (PSVs), anchor handling tugs (AHTs), accommodation barges and some Rolls-Royce designed vessels. But now we are building a series of vessels with electrical propulsion, which for us is an exciting new departure.

3. How significant will OSVs be to the yard’s business plans for the future?

Our key products today are container vessels, bulk vessels and engineering vessels. But we expect to further extend the range of our products – such as with OSVs – as we increase our technical capabilities. Partnering with ABB will allow us to do this.

4. Are there cultural differences in working with a multi-national, non-Chinese company?

We have built export vessels for more than 20 years, even though it is the first time we have worked with ABB. Certainly there were some problems in the beginning, but, as we began to understand our different ways of working , things went more and more smoothly. Considering what we are trying to achieve in fusing two different companies’ methods , we have not met big problems cause by ‘crossculture’.

5. What has helped the partnership to succeed?

In Chinese, we believe that “a good beginning is half done”. From this solid base we hope we will achieve great success, and expect a long-term cooperation.

6. What benefits have come out of the relationship – improved working practices, quality, etc?

Our greatest achievement is in being able to listen to somebody that we recognised could add something to our own capabilities. Being able to understand each other is bringing a win-win cooperation to both of us.

In 2008, China’s shipbuilding output was 28.81 million deadweight tonnes, a rise of 52.2% over the 2007 figure.

Newly-placed ship orders in 2008 were 58.18 million deadweight tonnes, a reduction of 40.9% over the previous year. However, ship orders in hand were 204.6 million deadweight tonnes, an increase of 28.7% compared with 2007.

The market share of Chinese completed shipbuilding orders, newly booked orders and ship orders in-hand accounted for 29.5%, 37.7% and 35.5% respectively of total global demand. This brings to six years in a row that these figures for Chinese shipbuilding have risen consecutively and why China is presently recognised as the number two shipbuilder in the world.

In response to the global financial crisis, in February 2009 the Chinese government issued its Adjustment Revitalization Plans specifically for the Chinese shipping industry, showing the Chinese government’s determination to support its shipbuilding industry in the face of slowing industry demand.

Gery Yao, general manager, ABB Marine MEC in China

quality issues The level of quality of products produced in China varies a great deal. A lack of more advanced operational management tools, as well as different cultural perceptions and values is still creating a challenge to improving quality levels. However, Chinese production facilities are learning quickly and appreciate the knowledge brought into the country by Western firms such as ABB. ABB Marine partner, Mawei Shipyard is, in fact a very old shipyard with a long history. It was a 19th century pioneer in new ship designs and has been making steel ships for 100 years.

Today’s employees have a lot of experience in cargo and container vessels, but these ships do not use electrical propulsion, so Mawei needed to develop new skills to achieve success.

“We saw that Mawei had the essential elements of a solid shipbuilding company,” continues Yao. “They had some basic electrical knowledge to prove that they could with time put our systems together and, above all, they were professional in their attitude. They really >>> were eager to learn and impress us.”

problem solved

Market data

help ship operators to increase cargo space and maximize the fuel efficiency of offshore supply vessels, providing major value-added and cost savings for vessel owners.

But for ABB to enter and make inroads into this market, it realized that it needed to undertake this task in conjunction with yards as partners. Since 2004, ABB Marine has worked with Sinopacific Group Zhejiang Shipyard and since 2008 with Mawei Shipyard, gaining orders between them of more than 40 electrical propulsion offshore supply vessels.

Yao says: “For us, the OSV market is one in which we excel due to the technical competence required to manufacture and install electrical propulsion systems. But it has been difficult to bring this level of competence to our partners. This is nothing to do with their capability, but when you don’t have the heritage and experience of these complex systems, the learning curve is steep and arduous.”

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The work that ABB undertook with Mawei eventually resulted in an order of 16 supply vessels – a number of which are in the build phase already, with options on others. It is a project that will last many years. The shipyard has put a lot of effort into this project and, in conjunction with ABB, is now using production design software for 3D development of the pipe and cable ducting arrangements. With many kilometers of cable onboard, it is a great challenge to work out the spacing and dimensions necessary for these electrical installations.

The electrical equipment itself, including generators, switchgear, transformers, drives and motors, will be delivered to the shipyard in 2010 and 2011. problem solved

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a long-term project

“Entering the OSV market in China was a bit of a chicken and egg situation,” says Yao. “Chinese yards have not built many of these in the past because shipowners don’t have confidence in the build quality. But without the experience, their ability to build quality vessels was going to be a challenge.”

But ABB Marine came in with the resources, know-how and the patience to accept that it would be a long task in training up the shipyard workers. For these vessels, ABB is using products that are manufactured worldwide, including some from China. However, much of the equipment is very specialized, so a lot of it comes from outside, which the ABB and Mawei teams will then integrate into the OSVs. Building electrical propulsion OSVs is a particularly challenging undertaking. The most difficult part of building these vessels is due to the very limited space for installation of all the equipment. Additionally, the cabling

must be of a particularly high standard in order to fulfil EMC requirement, and there is great complexity in commissioning. Therefore very close collaboration was needed between the shipyard and ABB. “I see it that there will be massive growth over the next few years in the OSV market.

And drilling rigs could also be a significant part of ABB Marine’s business,” says Yao. “The only potential cloud on the horizon is that costs are increasing very swiftly and already they are having an impact on the business.

Prices in China are still reasonable, though if things change considerably I can see an eventual shift of shipbuilding business to countries such as Vietnam and India.” international vs domestic ABB Marine Systems presently employs 90 staff, of which 39 are service personnel. Most of these are now local, with just two or three non-Chinese employees in the group. The present market for ABB is overseas, though with such fast growth in every shipping sector, it won’t be that long before China itself is a major market for the company. But that means building greater local sales competence – and getting closer to customers, meaning having the right staff.

The operational principles and techniques of ABB marine in China are very much European.

The shipping business is a global business so it is vitally important to have a standard solution for vessels that means they are more reliable.

Yao concludes: “ABB Marine is a pioneer in electrical propulsion. In addition we are a strong global organization that has a number of systems and products that have been developed over a number of years – meaning a quick response to issues. It is these unique capabilities – allied to strong shipyard partnerships - that will allow us to compete and succeed in China.” |||

For a deeper investigation of electric propulsion in supply ships, see the technical article in Chapter B on page 77.

the danwei system Danwei (”iron rice bowl”) refers to work communities in state-owned companies. Previously, in urban areas, the Chinese government guided the labour force living in the cities to state-owned companies and in doing so provided the labourers belonging to the danwei with life-long employment and social security benefits. The danwei divided social benefits to the workers according to their loyalty and guanxi relationships. Such policies led to the formation of working relationships in small communities and a member of that community belonged to it from birth to death.

A Western company operating in China may do well to consider applying some aspects of danwai systems and old Western factory owner system in their HR policies in order to increase their ability to attract and keep qualified employees. This could mean arranging such benefits as housing, a day care centre for children, health services for workers and their family members.

Another challenge for Western companies is how they work their way around guanxi – relationship building and maintenance. guanxi Guanxi can best be translated as a personal connection or relationship and is actually a very old phenomenon in China. It came about due to the lack of infrastructure and social protection, and because Confucian tradition does not like formal institutions as a way to settle disputes – so relationships gives a basis for trust and security. As a result of this inherent preference for doing business with known contacts, the Chinese are much more dependent on personal relationships when compared to the west.

Guanxi is derived from the Chinese family system and can be understood as a reciprocal obligation.

In the Confucian tradition, people are morally expected to improve the welfare of relatives and friends through influences and contracts. One can classify different types of guanxi depending on the type of relations. There is a difference between having an extensive guanxi base and actually enjoying guanxi, so not every connection is guanxi.

It is interesting to consider whether the importance of guanxi will diminish as Western companies gain a stronger foothold in the Chinese market. Already today in more ‘westernised’ business areas such as Shanghai, an increasing number of Western business values have started to root leaving Chinese ones behind. It is not unthinkable that guanxi will take the same road. the importance of face Although a universal human nature and a ubiquitous concept that occurs in all cultures, face is particularly important for Chinese culture.

Face is described as the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself by the line others assume he has taken during a particular contact; is one’s dignity, self-respect or prestige.

Face is evident in all aspects of Chinese life. The Chinese often avoid the word ‘no’ to save face for both parties. Words such as inconvenient, too difficult and maybe are often used instead of no in Chinese culture. The Chinese ‘yes’ can also be elusive – a word that has little meaning as it is used to respond to almost everything, such as ‘yes, but it is inconvenient’.

Building a successful business requires strong relationships with partners and suppliers, along with dedicated employees that are prepared to work hard for the company in return for both financial and social rewards.

For Western companies operating in China, it also means bringing a new level of professionalism, trust and global market acumen to this land of opportunity.

problem solved

Culture counts.

Western businesses need to be aware of culture differences when entering the Chinese market, so that they maintain their own standards without adversely impacting local sensibilities.

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PERSPECTIVES

Anatomy of a build writer:

Scott LaHart ||| photos: Stena Drilling, Ole Musken

Perspectives 1. HONESTY In order to be a true partner, you need to be honest when there are issues and take care of problems when they arise.

2. LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

PERSPECTIVES – STENA DRILlships

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Local offices are important for shipowners, suppliers and shipbuilders alike.You need to be in place where the project is being carried out in order to provide support.

You also need to be where the action is in order to build relationships, make contacts, and gain contracts in the first place.

in the summer of 2005 – just before the last shipbuilding boom kicked in – Samsung Heavy Industry and Stena Drilling got together and agreed upon a contract, with options for additional ships, for the Stena DrillMAX drillship. Not only was it to be the first drillship of the 21st century, but the $600 million ship designed to operate in harsh environments such as the Norwegian and Barents Seas was the largest, most powerful, and most advanced drillship every produced.

Now, over three years later, two vessels in the series (DrillMAX and Carron) have been delivered, with a third vessel (Forth) due this summer, and a fourth – the DrillMAX ICE, a USD1 billion ship capable of operating in icy waters – scheduled for 2011. Obviously something is going right.

Therefore, we decided to go deeper into the deal to get the viewpoints of some of the main players involved, including one of the dealmakers between Samsung and Stena, the project manager of ABB’s power package deliveries to the vessels, and Samsung’s man seeing through each stage of the project – from design through interfacing of the ship sides. We’ve also highlighted areas of note where views concur with one another, shedding light on some of the keys to the project’s success.

3. CONTINUITY & COMMUNICATION Utilizing the same contact people and holding regular project meetings helps build continuity and relationships.

For a long-term project, these are crucial elements of success. Also, the better the working relationships and professional respect amongst the involved parties, the more likely the parties are able to work around potential roadblocks that arise.

4. TURNING THE LEARNING CURVE FROM A LIABILITY TO AN ASSET When dealing with a ship series project, the first vessel is never going to turn out exactly how it was imagined, no matter how fastidious the planning was beforehand.

Taking lessons from this experience and integrating them into the master plans of the other ships in the series means moving closer, step by step, to the perfect vessel.

5. TIMING IS EVERYTHING You’ve got a megablock building style which means that everything , to the day, can be planned months in advance. And you’ve got drilling rigs that can fetch 500,000–600,000 dollars per day on the field. It’s vital that delivery of parts, installation of parts, and ship delivery take place on time. But timing here doesn’t just refer to the project delivery – in the case of Samsung and Stena, it was also seeing what the market need would be at the very beginning of the latest shipbuilding boom. The result: the first drillship delivered in the 21st century.

relationship between shi & norwegian

Y.C. Shin

Samsung Heavy Industry Vice President relationship between samsung heavy industry (shi), stena drilling & abb marine The DrillMAX contract was the first time that we worked with Stena Drilling, with the two sides brought together for the first time by Knut Frøystad at Fearnley Offshore.

Both of us were interested in getting into the offshore market at an early stage – this was right before the last real boom kicked in.

Stena made it clear that it needed a confident and competent shipyard that could deliver a turnkey drillship solution. In the end, they decided we were the ones for the job.

As Stena is a very demanding client, with sky-high expectations, we knew that we needed to make careful considerations. Our CEO decided that we should go forward in order to make the leap as a truly major shipbuilder. And we have. From the mid 1990s until now, Samsung has become the secondlargest shipbuilder in the world. This is due to our focus on sophisticated vessels with value-added services.

Our relationship with ABB Marine goes much farther back – to the mid-1990s. When you’re working on such sophisticated, hightech ships, the project management aspects that ABB brings to the table are essential.

The most important thing with ABB is that they never say no – no request is too difficult for them. We think of them as a true partner.

importance of shi’s oslo office When we opened our Oslo office in 1996, Hyundai had already been in place here for almost 20 years. From 1996 until 2004, contracts from the office totalled about USD 2 billion. We changed our focus here to more sophisticated offshore vessels. Over the last few years, the Oslo office has represented about USD 3 billion/year, 25% of SHI’s total earnings. In addition to the drillships, the Oslo office has sold icebreaking Arctic tankers, SRVs and FPSOs. So, even when the vessels are seemingly a bit more traditional, they’ve gotten much more complex in nature. most critical construction phase As the DrillMAX was the first turnkey drillship that Samsung delivered, the main challenge was how to manage this process and secure that everything is taken care of on time. There was some trial and error on the first vessel, but then there was steady improvement on each vessel afterwards. ensuring good communication & cooperation

We are Stena’s client. ABB is our client. ABB has its own clients as well. And so on. So the relationships are complex and take time, and are akin to friendships. Listening and building the long-term relationship is important.

If one side faces a difficult situation, then the other sides try to show understanding. But >>> these relationships aren’t just built on

PERSPECTIVES – STENA DRILlships

sub-suppliers We import more from Norwegian sub-suppliers than sub-suppliers from any other country. As we build more sophisticated and value-added projects than other shipbuilders, Norwegian competence and know-how fits in perfectly here. From ABB Marine to Rolls-Royce to Kongsberg, Norwegians develop the technology of the future.

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>>> good feelings. To be a good friend means being something special. The goodwill itself stems from the work – the competence, time and energy put in and devoted to each client. When this is done, then all sides give the others a little more leeway.

It was in place from the beginning, or we wouldn’t have gotten the contract. That said, it wasn’t until we delivered the first vessel that Stena gave us their full trust. You can think, and you can hope and have confidence, but until the DrillMAX was finished, they were never going to know for sure. project trust

PERSPECTIVES – STENA DRILlships

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drillship performance The fact that Stena not only ordered four drillship vessels in the series, but also gave us contracts for two RoPax vessels – vessels that they’ve never built at our yard before – says it all.

So these vessels serve as showcase projects for us to gain future contracts as well. relationship between owners, shipyards

& subsuppliers in future as market cools

Shipowners are suffering very much and would like to cancel, or at the very least delay deliveries and payment. Without the cooperation of the shipyard and the suppliers, this isn’t possible. Some builders would go bankrupt on the spot. Shipowners say the same thing – without their orders, the yards would go under. But when shipbuilders had problems previously, the owners weren’t so interested. Now it’s time to work together and build a new history. Everything is linked. It’s time.

Stig Leira

ABB Marine Senior Project Manager relationship between abb marine, samsung heavy industry (shi) and stena drilling In this instance, Samsung contacted us and asked for a tender, and we competed with other vendors. In the end, the yard put us on their preferred vendor list based on the quality of our package and price.

Our relationship with Samsung goes back to the early 1990s, and they have a lot of trust in us. When we had some quality problems with transformers in the late 1990s, ABB took the responsibility to correct this. It was a big job, but we did it, and I think that created a lot of goodwill for us at Samsung. I’ve met some of the Samsung middle and upper management over the last few years, and they still mention this specific incident, so it’s obviously left a very positive impression. It created trust. And it’s a situation where something bad turned into something good.

I think that’s one of our trademarks – if we have any problems, we do something about it. All vendors have some form or another of quality problems, but we dedicate resources to solving these problems. abb marine deliveries to stena drillships

We have a contract for the power package – which includes generators, switchboards and transformers, along with thruster motors, drives, and transformers. This covers >>> the electrical part of propulsion.

We opened an office in the vicinity of SHI’s yard in South Korea in 2006, though it wasn’t specifically due to this project. This sent a message to Samsung that ABB will be there when they need us. If there’s a problem they can call someone locally – even though we have a large organisation in Norway, the time difference is always an issue. We have two site managers and two secretaries based at the local office, and it is otherwise populated by a number of commissioning engineers who come and go. On average, there will be 20–25 people based at the ABB office there at any given time. project

keys to delivery success Our openness factor plays a large role here. If there’s a problem or potential issue, we’re upfront about it and talk about it with the shipyard. That’s the company policy. If the yard has a problem with installation, then we see it as our problem as well and our first priority is to solve it.

Two other keys for success include continuity – the engineering and commissioning team from ABB is the same on all four vessels – and the fact that we always have a single point of contact for SHI. For the first two vessels, this was me. The single project manager contact is something that our clients tend to appreciate a great deal. critical phase of construction Most critical for us is the logistics – to be able to deliver the equipment on time and install on time. project challenges & getting past them We had some delivery problems for the thruster motors, but together with Samsung we were able to find a solution. Normally the equipment would have to be delivered and installed when the slot appears for each block.

But after the block was closed, Samsung said that they could open a hatch and put the

equipment in place with a crane. Our close relationship with the yard meant that we could put the problem on the table and say: What do we do?

Many of the issues take place with the first vessel, and then it’s smoother sailing afterwards . ensuring good communication & cooperation

There are certain meetings we regularly attend – such as a kickoff meeting, interface meetings, etc. During the intensive phases like commissioning, we set up meetings locally every week between the site manager of the yard and the commissioning engineers to go through what we did last week and what we’ll do in the week to come. While these meetings aren’t necessarily standard, we find them helpful – also for us – in order to utilise the commissioning engineers in the most effective way possible. project trust I think we had the trust from SHI and Stena beforehand, or they wouldn’t have picked us. It’s more a matter of keeping the trust afterwards.

I had a meeting with a Stena technical manager in Aberdeen before Christmas. We went through the some of the measurement factors they have for the drillship, including hours unable to drill. This figure was extremely low, which was nice to hear. It sounds as if they’re very satisfied with the equipment. feedback from stena

relationship between owners, shipyards & subsuppliers in future as market cools

There’s even more emphasis now on finding more efficient ways to execute projects, and we have to look to deliver solutions with lower costs. But there needs to be a balance here as well, or it could negatively affect quality and service.

PERSPECTIVES – STENA DRILlships

local presence of abb marine during the

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It is far more convenient for us hire a supplier that has a site office near our shipyard, so that we have a better access to their service and expertise. When changes are made, then we need blueprints for every new piece of equipment that is to be installed, and the faster we can have those blueprints, the better. Also, if unforeseen problems with equipment occur, then we need the suppliers to come in first thing in the morning to examine the situation. We can’t wait until the engineer flies in from Norway. To my knowledge, ABB has an office here in Geoje and in Busan as well.

Their accessibility is one of the reasons why major South Korean shipbuilders hire ABB as one of their main suppliers . importance of a local presence

Ki Dong Park

Samsung Heavy Industries Project Manager – Stena Drillships

people involved in the stena drilling project PERSPECTIVES – STENA DRILlships

There have been so many involved at numerous stages of this very complex and sophisticated project that I’m not sure the exact number, but I know that it took about 2 million man-hours to build and complete a single Stena drillship, from design to construction.

22 most critical construction phase Each and every phase of this project is critical. You cannot afford to slip or make an error when it comes to specialised vessels like drillships.

But for me personally, the most critical phase is the seamless interfacing of each stage of the project – from the designing stage to the commissioning stage, and ultimately, the interfacing of the top and hull sides of the ship.

I make sure that each designer, supplier, and subsupplier carries out its share of the responsibility accurately and in a timely fashion. relationship between shi and abb marine If we cannot trust the supplier, we do not hire them, and ABB is an example of a reliable and responsible supplier. Their equipment has been critical to building the hull sides of specialised vessels in our shipyard. I can’t think of a better supplier of highly sophisticated and specialty electronic equipment for specialised vessels.

ensuring good communication & cooperation

I communicate as often as possible with the groups involved in the project – this is particularly important with regards to the shipowner to guarantee we know what our client wants. We hold daily and weekly meetings with the various engineers involved in the project, including those from Stena, SHI and the suppliers, and regularly hold technical follow-up discussions to ensure that the project is being handled well and is progressing on time. Occasionally, we also meet up for simple meals and drinks. After all, the work relationship is also a human relationship. In order to communicate better, we need to be comfortable with each other . stena’s presence at the yard throughout the project They hired us to build the ship, so their presence at the shipyard was undeniably large. Stena engineers were involved in every stage of the project, and it’s very important that we’re on the same page due to frequent changes in plans. The changes made and

project challenges & getting past them

Getting the right subsea and drilling equipment on time is difficult. If problems occur when installing or testing the equipment then we require help from our suppliers. We try communicating with our key suppliers as well as we can in order to prevent unfortunate delays. keys to delivery success Technology and project management is really what sets us apart from our competitors. Every project manager has to take charge to ensure that all aspects of the projects are in order, and that everything is done on time, flawlessly. feedback from stena Stena has been very positive about our performance. Shipowners want vessels that are built flawlessly, delivered at the promised time, and at a reasonable cost. That’s exactly what we’ve done. |||

Humankind can control the power of dynamite, harvest power from a waterfall, and ingeniously exploit the power of plutonium. Humans have elaborated many sources of power, but it is ultimately the power of the human mind that can accomplish marvels by aligning elements for incremental returns. The power of the human mind can create something out of nothing and likewise destroy something with nothing. The human mind holds the power that can power a rocket out in to space or translate wind into electrical power. Undoubtedly the human mind is very powerful and as such must be handled with great responsibility. I encourage anyone to cherish his or her powerful mind by endlessly learning.

project trust Stena certainly had enough trust in us to award us the contract to begin with, but we had to earn total trust through the result.

What is powerful? Eric W. Schreiber , Manager, Electrical Services, Marine Operations / Royal Caribbean International

added to the original design on Stena’s first drillship were worth tens of millions of dollars. With the second ship, this figure increased by an additional 50 percent. The higher margins for building drillships are due to their sophisticated and complex nature. Some of the changes were made in order to enhance the quality of life of the crew, while others were to minimise the physical efforts of the drilling itself.

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Microscope

A glimpse inside the next generation Azipod® The closer you look at it, the more intriguing it gets. Since its conception over a decade ago, the Azipod® unit’s design has been the object of steady evolution. Now that the technology has surmounted 4 million operating hours, it was time to reinvent it, with the benefit of perfect hindsight.

Railcar design New ladders and hinged doors inside the Azipod® unit allow technicians to go directly from one end to the other without climbing out of the unit.

microscope – the next generation azipod

Two years ago, ABB engineers in Finland went to the drawing board. Their task: Rethink the Azipod® design. Combined they spent over 100,000 hours on it. 23 new shaft line concepts were born, and five new frame concepts. Here we look at the winners of that process. writer:

Ryan Skinner

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Hybrid bearings The bearing at the non-drive end of the Azipod®, which bear the system’s thrust loads, is based on a conventional rolling bearing design. Now a combination of a rolling bearing and slide bearing share the load. The slide bearing’s thrust pads can be changed by hand from inside the Azipod®.

A leaner profile Using computerized fluid dynamics, the entire pod has been slimmed down. Both the lateral “torpedo” and the propellor hub have decreased around five per cent in diameter.

Redesigned control systems On the bridge, an updated steering interface controls the Azipod® units’ speed and angles via levers and a steering wheel.

The control systems will offer recommended angles for the units, and give real-time status of the system’s fuel economy.

Electrical steering

Shorter swiveling radius The new Azipod® unit’s strut has been moved about 20 centimeters towards the propellor, decreasing the swiveling radius to around two meters. That means you need less steering torque to turn the Azipod®.

microscope – the next generation azipod

The Azipod® is now steered by electrical motors only, instead of electrohydraulics.

Cables replace the hydraulics hoses inside the vessel’s Azipod® machinery room.

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New shaft seal arrangement

Void space

Thanks to three small openings into the Azipod® unit’s void space, a technician can now replace seals on the stern shaft from inside the azipod.

He simply reaches in, cuts the old seal, pulls it away, inserts the new one and bonds the two ends with an adhesive and heat.

By rearranging the seals, the designers have created a void space around the stern shaft.

This space provides redundancy, as it can fill with oil or water if any of the various seals leak

360o profile – samsung heavy

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360° PROFILE

Samsung Heavy is second to none in specialised In a little over three decades, Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) has established itself as the thirdlargest shipbuilder in the world. The company’s recipe for success? It’s not the volume of ships that’s most important – rather, it’s the production of value-added, specialised vessels.

Alexa Park ||| photographer: Donghoon Kim, Samsung Heavy

360o profile – samsung heavy

writer:

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360o profile – samsung heavy

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“historically, the shipbuilding business was chiefly about providing the means to simply transport people and bulks. But this has changed now,” according to C.H. Park, SHI executive vice president and chief technical officer, in an interview with Generations at its Geoje island shipyard near the port city of Busan.

Now ships don’t merely transport, but also serve as offshore exploration, processing and development facilities. Drillships, one of Samsung Heavy’s key specialty products, have made deep-sea drilling possible in areas where employing a conventional drilling platform is difficult. LNG FPSOs (floating, production, storage and offloading facility) are used for the development of deepwater fields, and offshore development ships, as the name itself implies, facilitate various offshore developments.

Even when building transport vessels, SHI constructs value-added ships that are far more difficult to build than the conventional bulk carriers, such as LNG carriers that transport liquefied natural gas cooled to -163°C. Park says specialised vessels account for the majority of Samsung Heavy’s business, and attributes the company’s success to the fact that it gets more orders of this type than its competitors. While specialised vessels are

very difficult to build, they also come with a great reward: higher margins and order prices.

Other South Korean shipbuilders’ ship order contracts come in at around $150 million per ship. Samsung Heavy’s corresponding figure is about $260 million.

“Right now, we have few competitors in the specialised vessel sector, but we expect competition to intensify in the near future, so we are putting a lot of energy into finding ways to differentiate ourselves”.

C.H. Park , SHI Executive Vice President & Chief Technical Officer

With a staggering 66 percent market share, SHI is currently the world’s leading drillship builder, and in 2008 won a drillship order worth around $1 billion from Aberdeen-based Stena Drilling. “Right now, we have few competitors in the specialised vessel sector, but we expect competition to intensify in the near future, so we are putting a lot of energy into finding ways to differentiate ourselves,” C.H. Park says. “For instance, our drillships are superb at exploration, but we think there is even more room for improvement in the area of crude development capacity.”

The Lowdown: Samsung Heavy Industries • Established on August 5, 1974 • Received its first shipbuilding order for two offshore supply ships from Bulkship (Australia) on April 19, 1979 • Samsung Shipbuilding and Daesung Heavy Industries were merged under Samsung Heavy Industries in 1983.

• The largest of Geoje’s three docks, Dock No. 3, is 640 m long, 97.5 m wide, and 13 m deep. Ultra-large ships are built here, and the dock has the world’s highest production efficiency, with a year turnover rate of 10 and the launch of 30 ships per year • Samsung Heavy Industries mainly concentrates on specialised vessels such as LNG tankers and drillships, for which it is the market leader • 2008 earnings: – Net profit – $467 million (35% increase over 2007) – Operating income – $567 million (89% increase over 2007) – Sales – $8 billion (25% increase over 2007)

ever innovating A key to Samsung Heavy’s increasing success is its strong attention to detail and continual improvement. One of the larger areas of focus at the yard at present is the modification and improvement of ship designs in order to make the lives of crews more comfortable and safer.

“Lately, we have noticed that our clients are paying increasingly more attention to improving the quality of life of crew onboard, and maximising overall operational efficiency,” says SHI project manager Ki-dong Park.

Some of the ongoing design efforts include relocating equipment to minimise noise in the sleeping bunks, and to minimise the physical efforts of drilling itself. Ki-dong Park says that shipowners are also looking to automate various equipment functions in order to maximise drillship efficiency, and enhance monitoring systems so that crew can oversee various ship activities all in one place.

By rethinking conventional placements, Samsung Heavy is making breakthroughs.

This includes working on designs that relocate equipment to the hull in order to make >>>

360o profile – samsung heavy

At present Samsung Heavy chiefly competes with domestic peers such as Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering and Hyundai Heavy Industries, but says it is also bracing for emerging competition from China as well.

“Our competitive advantage lies in our expertise and complex vessel engineering capabilities. In this regard, our engineers – our people – are our best assets,” says C.H. Park.

He points to the company’s R&D centre as a prime example. While SHI’s yard itself is smaller in dimension than its domestic competitors, Samsung Heavy’s R&D centre is the biggest of the bunch. C.H. Park is also confident that the company staffs more PhDs than any of its peers. SHI puts its money firmly behind the focus – about three percent of the company’s total annual revenues are poured back in the form of R&D.

Above: C.H. Park is responsible for issues related to ship design and R&D at Samsung Heavy Industries. Part of his mandate is maintaining the yard’s edge in specialized builds. Below: Technicians at Samsung Heavy test engine room control systems.

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360o profile – samsung heavy

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360o profile – samsung heavy

>>> more space available for oil development activities, and looking at ways to move the passageway from the upper deck to the inner hull to increase crew safety.

New designs aren’t only to the benefit of daily vessel operation. They may also help Samsung Heavy and its shipowner clients cut shipbuilding costs. “We conduct thorough risk analyses.

For instance, we used to follow a lot of preset guidelines in building ships, but now we do our own analyses. For example, we found out that a particular ship area has no flammable parts, so a metal sheet that would have been superfluous was removed,” says C.H. Park.

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– cruise ships, ice-going “The cruise ship industry is something we are definitely interested in.

We have been working with Royal Caribbean Cruise Line as long-time partners and share long-term visions,” says C.H. Park. Although the cruise industry faces challenges due to the current global economic slowdown, he says the downturn provides Samsung Heavy more time to prepare to make its goals a reality.

“As opposed to drilling vessels, cruise ships are not only the product of fine engineering, but also of fine architecture,” C.H. Park says.

“If we took a purely mechanical approach to a cruise ship project, it would likely falter.”

In this vein, Samsung Heavy is not satisfied with simply hiring European interior design firms. The company is looking to work with a reliable design and architecture firm with a South Korean local office in order to share longer-term views and develop more in-depth cooperation. new opportunities

vessels & more…

Ice-going design is another area in which Samsung Heavy sees ample opportunities. “God has nestled the richest resources around the North Pole and Antarctica – far away from the masses – and there is a great deal that remains untapped in these regions. Ice-going vessels have great potential in this regard,” says C.H. Park.

Capacity to break ice alone will not be enough, he says – understanding the regions in order to help explore the environment will be key. “We are conducting joint studies with major oil companies and researchers in Russia, who also has interest in the project due to their own climatic environment,” C.H. Park says. And, amid rising interest and awareness in clean energy, he adds that Samsung Heavy is also looking into potential opportunities in the utilities industry – such as wind power plants. the importance of coordination Outside designers, suppliers and subsuppliers play a critical role in ensuring that vessels built by Samsung Heavy meet the utmost quality standards.

According to Ki-dong Park, a total of 2 million man-hours were invested from design to construction in the building of a single Stena Drilling drillship.

While Samsung Heavy did most of the basic and detail engineering and designing on the topside, Norway-based design consultants were also hired and National Oilwell Varco was a major drilling equipment supplier. Wärtsilä and ABB Marine were two of the key suppliers of complex and sophisticated electronic and engine parts for the ship’s hull.

Samsung & ABB – A Perfect Match ABB Marine and Samsung cooperate often. On the four-ship deal with Stena Drilling, ABB Marine is supplying generators, switchboards and transformers, along with thruster motors, drives, and transformers for the drillships. Amongst other things, ABB Marine systems help keep the vessels in their desired positions during drilling operations.

“We demand a track record of excellence and reputation in our suppliers, as we can’t compromise our reputation with our clients,” says Ki-dong Park. “ABB has proven over time to be highly credible and trustworthy, and I can’t think of a better supplier of highly sophisticated and specialty electronic equipment for specialised vessels.”

“When a problem occurs, our priority is solving the issue even if it means working late into the night.”

Keun Kim, SHI Quality Planning Senior Manager

It can cost shipbuilders hundreds of thousands of dollars if the ship is not delivered on time.

“And in our eyes, European suppliers sometimes do not seem as committed to solving problems as our domestic or Japanese suppliers are. I suppose it has to do with the cul>>> tural differences,” Kim says.

360o profile – samsung heavy

Coordination between the outside parties and Samsung Heavy, which ensures smooth interfacing of the different shipbuilding stages, is crucial to project success. “Each and every phase of this project was critical. You cannot afford to slip or make an error when it comes to constructing specialised vessels like drillships,” says Ki-dong Park.

Uninterrupted and seamless interfacing of each stage of the project – from design to commissioning to the interfacing of the top and hull sides of the ship – prevents delays and errors. Ki-dong Park says that it’s not something that comes in and of itself – it’s hard work, and not just due to the technologies involved: “Enabling coordination among different equipment and raw material suppliers, who in turn are of different nationalities and cultural backgrounds, is highly challenging.”

One of the challenges is narrowing differences in supplier and shipbuilder quality standards and manners in which they manage important projects, says Keun Kim, a Samsung Heavy quality planning senior manager. “I’ve noticed differences in the ways that European and Asian suppliers conduct their businesses.

European suppliers tend to prioritise their family life before work, whereas, here, when a problem occurs, our priority is solving the issue even if it means working late into the night,” adds Kim.

Above: Keun Kim is a quality planning senior manager at Samsung Heavy Industries. He believes that the yard’s dedication and focus have helped it avoid the kinds of cancellations seen in the industry today. Below: The yard’s massive facilities on Geoje Island.

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>>> Coordination between suppliers and shipbuilders is also critical in providing after-service care to shipowners, which Samsung Heavy takes seriously. Every ship built by SHI is normally covered under a one- to two-year warranty. But even after the warranty term expires, Samsung Heavy assumes the fundamental responsibility in ensuring that shipowners can carry on their business with as few vessel-related issues as possible.

“Due to impeccable building, customer service, and our complex vessels specialty, we’ve hardly seen any order cancellations – this despite large economic difficulties across a wide range of industry segments at present,” Kim says.

360o profile – samsung heavy

“We notice that our clients are paying more attention to improving the quality of life of crew onboard, and maximising general operational efficiency.”

Ki-dong Park, Project Manager, Samsung Heavy Industries

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Ki-dong Park is a project manager at Samsung Heavy Industries. He led the yard’s project group for the Stena Drillmax drilling rigs, and thus managed numerous yard and supplier teams working simultaneously to a tight schedule.

No. 1 is South Korea.

No. 2 is South Korea.

No. 3 is… ...well, you get the picture.

According to figures from London-based Clarksons, the world’s top-five shipbuilders have something small in common – their passports. Based on order backlog at the end of December 2008, the shipbuilders are: 1. Hyundai Heavy Industries (South Korea) – 18.84 million compensated gross tons (CGT) 2. Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (South Korea) – 11.01 million CGT 3. Samsung Heavy Industries (South Korea) – 10.42 million CGT 4. STX Shipbuilding (South Korea) – 7.21 million CGT 5. Hyundai Mipo Dockyard (South Korea) – 6.02 million CGT

going even more global? As one of the leading builders of sophisticated specialised vessels, Samsung Heavy is already very much a global company. But how does it feel about its peers making more aggressive moves – such as STX Group’s purchase of Norway’s Aker Yards, now renamed STX Europe – for faster international expansion?

“I wish STX Group all the best. Shipbuilding is a global industry and there is nothing out of the ordinary with STX wanting to acquire a renowned European shipyard,” says C.H. Park, adding that he would not completely rule out an overseas acquisition by SHI in the future, either.

“One of those days, Samsung Heavy will have to be able to build vessels elsewhere on the globe, not just here in Geoje. We will eventually have to be capable of building ships in Brazil, Russia, or even in Nigeria,” C.H. Park says. “If we insist on building ships only here on this island, it may become difficult to win ship orders.” |||

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360o profile – samsung heavy

Brains Trust

How could you power the commercial fleet without fossil fuels?

In each issue of Generations, we launch a thought experiment. A small group of ABB Marine’s creative engineers, a writer and an illustrator combine their diverse skills to present ideas about how the future might be. What new technologies might emerge to solve intractable problems facing us today?

The first ever meeting of the “Brains Trust” addressed one of the most perilous questions facing our industry: How could you power commercial shipping without fossil fuels? workshop facilitators: writer:

Julia Cai, Ryan Skinner and Johs Ensby Ryan Skinner ||| illustrations & photo: Johs Ensby

brains trust

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Jaakko Aho – One of the leading designers behind the new re-tooled Azipod®, Aho is a R&D manager in ABB Marine.

Jukka Varis – Known in ABB as “Mr. Azipod®”, Varis has worked at many levels within ABB Marine and on engineering projects in the marine business.

Klaus Vänskä – Back in Finland after residing in China, Vänskä has some experience translating complex technical issues to readily understandable concepts.

brains trust kick-off

Jukka Varis [JV]: “I think that there’s a lot of potential in fusion. It’s a great source of energy. The technology is still far from a real operating situation, though.”

Klaus Vänskä [KV]: “The sun. That’s the power of the sun, in many different, simple forms…”

Jaakko Aho [JA]: “If you had a battery, an extremely heavy-duty battery, that you could charge very efficiently…”

JV: “It would work well enough for ferries operating close to land. You could power up at land terminals, and maybe augment it with some flywheels onboard.”

KV: “I think we need to take a wide scope, with every possible source of power, then manage the energy in a new way. We could shift seamlessly from different power sources using a kind of fuzzy logic.”

JA: “Nuclear energy has great electrical potential, but the waste is still a problem.”

Initially, different power sources were bounced around like beach balls. Efforts to turn the industry on its head, in order to dream up novel approaches, led to some wild thoughts, which were eventually given up in most cases (see “Abandoned Technologies”). >>>

Abandoned Technologies Baleen propulsion – A ship could take onboard massive quantities of small marine organisms (like a whale) and ferment it into a form of biofuel. Reason for abandonment: Disastrous consequences for the ocean’s food chains.

Ship tube – You create a hollow channel through the ship. Through a variety of technologies, you speed the water through, creating a water rocket effect. Reason for abandonment: impractical for commercial and structural reasons.

Drift supply – Watertight containers are simply set adrift.

Prevailing currents take them to market, where small ships grab them and tow them to shore. Reason for abandonment: inability to control currents (among other things, you’d create an eddy of cargo-garbage off the California coast).

Catalysis – You coat half the hull surface with copper.

Give the ship a slight current and catalysis would move the copper particles over to the steel side (thereby creating more electricity). Reason for abandonment: Serious ship stability problems as ship mass migrates from one side to the other.

“Cheeseburger Bunkers” – A “diet camp” concept, whereby willing passengers use their own physical force to drive the ship. Reason for abandonment: Obvious.

Water rocket hovercraft – For shorter ferry trips.

You power up on shore, and then a single power blast gives sufficient impetus to reach the destination. Reason for abandonment: Danger of serious injury during acceleration.

Fish-styled structures – A flexible keel or whaleshaped tail fin gives the ship efficient fish-like movements.

Reason for abandonment: Structural weakness and friction.

brains trust

now and then during our hectic work-days, we pause. For perhaps only a brief moment, we dream away about the kinds of problems we face. These dreams are as wild as dreams can be, but also informed by our knowledge of technology, our skills and our imagination. We ask ourselves “…if only we could just…”, or “what if we just…?” We feel like we get a glimpse of something new, maybe even profound. Then, without fail, our daily concerns crowd back in. The ideas fade amid more pressing concerns.

We thought: What if we encouraged a small group of talented engineers and technicians to dream away, and then try to record and preserve some of their ideas? That’s the idea of “Brains Trust”. To get the ball rolling, we asked them to think freely about the kind of problem that will only be solved by a thoroughly original approach: How do you wean shipping off of climate-changing fossil fuels?

It’s an appropriate challenge for these thinkers. They engineer propulsion systems powered by electricity. Today, that electricity comes from diesel engines, or gas-powered steam turbines. It could, however, just as well come from any other source of power. But, ever since the great sailing armadas of the 19th Century gave way to coalpowered steam ships, fossil fuels have powered shipping. So, if you needed to power the fleet with other sources, how could that work?

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>>> A fuzzy set of design principles emerged:

brains trust

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– The biggest challenge is to find a power supply that could manage the electrical propulsion system’s peaks – The power system should employ an existing means of generating electricity – nothing entirely new (such as cold fusion) – The power system should be able to scale up to the world’s entire merchant fleet – The solution shouldn’t introduce a new major environmental problem – A proportional reduction in service speeds would significantly ease the challenge of finding sufficient power – We should have a power system that could provide as much as 20 MW to the electrical propulsion system There are about as many different ways of making power as there are ways to use it.

Making electricity onboard a ship, however, gives you far fewer options, than if you could make it elsewhere. That means batteries, so the brains trust talked batteries.

Impractical ideas with some potential Solar feet – By using heat differences in the surface of the ship and small channels leading from under the keel to stern, you could effectively provide some forward thrust (look up Stirling motors) Ship-sized flywheel – An enormous flywheel connected to a gyroscope within the ship converts the movements of the ocean into electricity.

Sea e-fields – You could create a bed under the surface of the sea that created a powerful magnetic field. As the ship sails over it, it is recharged.

Current fishing – Using a number of guided underwater anchors, the ship gets pulled along by strong currents deep in the ocean.

Fuzzy logic energy management – Ships today are engineered to consume as little fuel as possible over the voyage distance. A new, flexible system maximising speed based on energy input could give a ship much greater efficiency.

modular power Some back-of-the-napkin calculations help us to understand the possibilities and limitations of using batteries to power a ship.

Take the Lithium-polymer 1050 milliampere-hour battery we found in Jaakko’s Nokia cell-phone. To drive a 20 MW electrical propulsion system for 10 hours, we’re talking about 5 million ampere-hours of the same voltage, or 5 billion milliampere-hours. So, with equal performance, the battery would need to be some 5 million times bigger than that Nokia battery (bigger, actually, since small batteries are more efficient). A normal 20-foot container, however, could hold over 3 million such batteries.

Developments in supercapacitors have the chance of radically reducing these battery sizes, and increasing the speed at which a battery can be recharged. “Imagine a cell phone that never needed a recharge,” said Aho. “That may be soon at hand.”

Hybrid electric cars have given a boost to technology development in the field of batteries. If the size and recharge time of a battery could decrease by a magnitude or two overnight, it would dramatically change the market. The brains trust felt that this was a field due for a breakthrough soon, given the time and money now being spent on it. the marine atp system After all of the bluesky ideas, thoughts began to swirl around a single, practical model to change the shipping business’s power supply away from fossil fuels.

We dub it: The Marine ATP System (for the small power packets that drive each and every animal cell).

Strangely, we discovered that the arrangement is both possible, and possibly feasible, with today’s technology. It is modular, scaleable and maintainable. And we have no patent for it. Here are the basic elements : >>>

The GREEN Cell (Global Renewable Electrical Energy Network) In essence, this is a containerized battery, with a small wind turbine and solar panels that fold out, covering the top and the two adjacent containers. A container-sized sodium-sulphur battery that provides 1.2 MW over 7 hours is already available today. Multiply that times 100 and you’re going places!

brains trust

[Calculation: 500W per m2 x ~20,000 m2 surface of Emma Maersk = 10 MW of solar energy]

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brains trust

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The GREEN Cell ship Like a ship that takes refrigerated containers, a GREEN Cell-equipped ship would have an electrical connection to a number of containers. In this case, instead of feeding electricity to the reefer units, the ship would pull power from the containers. A fuzzy logic energy management system would ensure that the battery power was utilized as carefully as possible.

[Calculation: GREEN Cell Ship = Conventional ship – diesel engine (75 tons) – frequency converter (25 tons) – bunkers (3000 tons?) + hundreds of GREEN Cells (???? Tons)]

The bluewater power-hub system

brains trust

A network of floating power stations placed along major trade routes would either recharge a ship’s GREEN Cells, or simply switch them out (like a container port). These could create electricity from green sources like wave power generators, wind turbines, a flywheel-driving water density column, solar panels and current-driven turbines. Alternately, it could be powered by a single, subsea nuclear power station.

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Shoreside GREEN Cell centres Container terminals would carry a large supply of ready-to-go GREEN Cells. These would switch out GREEN Cells on ships just like a container port unloads and reloads a container ship.

Professional Endeavour

Motivating Multi-Cultural Teams In our business, almost every team is multicultural. And, if you need to manage a multicultural team, you need to be able to motivate them. We spoke with two experts, in Oslo and Shanghai, one practitioner at ABB in Singapore and two Master’s students writing a thesis on the subject, to bring you some of the latest thinking. writer:

professional endeavour – multi-cultural teams

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Ryan Skinner ||| illustration: Otto

first, a disclaimer: I am an American. As such, I am probably motivated by a higher salary and greater responsibility. And I probably share my thoughts, enthusiasm and criticism of people and things with little regard to the feelings of my audience.

This brings me to the first, highly practical and equally important, step in motivating a multicultural team: 1. Know yourself. Know how people from different cultures may think about you (even the worst prejudices). Be explicit about your own background, culture and prejudices. Take a healthy dose of cultural self-criticism, and share it.

Why is this important? “Experts talk of an asymmetric relation. That is when one party perceives a significant difference and the other does not. These misunderstood differences can be very damaging,” says Rolv Petter Amdam, a professor of intercultural management at the Norwegian School of Management BI.

From the trenches:

Motivating multicultural teams at ABB in Singapore Jostein Bogen leads a staff of 90 professionals from over a dozen different nations (primarily Northern Europeans and South and Far East Asians) at ABB Marine in Singapore. Further, it’s a unit that has experienced explosive growth, starting with only three people in 2001.

“One challenge we see is that people from the same culture stick together, both in formal and informal contexts,”

To illustrate this, consider an American manager and a Chilean team-member. To the American, the Chilean’s culture is one of many colorful South American societies. To the Chilean, the American’s culture has played a strong counter-revolutionary role in his nation’s politics. These two may perceive the distance between them very differently.

Now, a waiver: I am breaking one of the most important rules to motivating a multicultural team, by talking too much. As no two multicultural teams will be alike, there is no single, guaranteed way to motivate such a team. The second step in motivating a multicultural team is thus: 2. Try to spend more time listening to your team than you are accustomed. Practice encouraging people to tell you how they are thinking, how they arrive at their conclusions.

“We call it reflective listening. You need to lead, yes, but this is a way to lead without

says Bogen. “That’s why we put a focus on team-building exercises, where people interact across cultural lines.”

The office in Singapore has five main teams, each subdivided into additional groups. He says that the composition of these teams is another focus area. “You don’t want one nationality to dominate too much,” says Bogen.

Asked how he addresses the key issue of fairness in teams, he affirms that it requires care. “Our advice to people heading up teams is to employ an open management style. Focus on information flow. Keep people informed. Be a visible, handson manager, and spend time to listen to the employees.”

1. Power distance: A society’s willingness to accept inequality.

2. Individualism: Does your society encourage you to look after yourself, or are you encouraged to relate via a group (collectivism)?

3. Masculinity: Women’s values differ little country to country; men’s values may differ much more dramatically.

4. Uncertainty avoidance: To what degree does the society tolerate uncertainty and ambiguity?

5. Long-term versus short-term: Are the society’s values skewed towards a longterm view of things, or a short-term one?

Professor Amdam’s tips to prepare to motivate a multicultural team 1. Take a course with a multi-cultural class, specializing in hands-on case study.

2. Practice interacting with colleagues from other cultures.

3. Respect that local issues or considerations may take priority.

4. Establish an atmosphere of openness; address conflict quickly and openly.

professional endeavour – multi-cultural teams

attacking things head on, and thus worsening a situation that results only from a misunderstanding. If there’s a dispute, say ‘hey, help me understand you. What do you mean? How can we structure this better?’,” says William Mobley, a professor of management at the China Europe International Business School.

Cultural differences in your team may stem from different nationalities, different company cultures or different functions (the eternal struggle between engineers and marketers, for example). You are definitely familiar with the latter two groups of differences.

A famous Dutch sociologist named Geert Hofstede listed five key differences between national cultures. They are:

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Professor Mobley’s tips for handling a multicultural conflict 1. Step back to try to learn what is really at the heart of the conflict.

2. Work the relationship: Do something with the aggrieved team members.

3. Use 3rd parties to help ease communication.

4. Consider using mentors who can give the dialogue a better structure.

professional endeavour – multi-cultural teams

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Scores for over 50 countries were obtained. For example, masculinity was found to be high in Japan and German countries, moderately high in Anglo countries, moderately low in Latin and Asian countries like France, Spain and Thailand and low in the Nordics and Netherlands. It may be worthwhile to consider your team members based on these five points.

After all this, the third step to motivating a multicultural team is an exception to the above, namely: 3. Never underestimate the differences between countries that are physically (and to a great extent, culturally) very close.

Between neighbors like Spain and Portugal, the USA and Canada and Germany and Austria, for example, some peculiar, but oftentimes intractable, tensions arise.

Says Amdam: “We were advising a Norwegian bank on multicultural issues across the globe. In the end, the bank asked us to concentrate on Sweden because it was this relationship that was causing the greatest troubles. Countries that are close may have a troubled history.”

As a manager, you want to motivate everyone in your team. Despite efforts to locate a kind of universal motivation trigger, most experts will admit that there are persistent differences in the values of different sources of motivation, depending on the culture.

Thus, the next step to motivating a multicultural team is a seemingly obvious one, even if it is near impossible: 4. Motivate your team members based on the things that motivate each of them.

Try to understand each person’s values and aspirations, and manage those factors.

In most large companies, things like pay scale, advancement and job responsibilities are governed by corporate rules, with little flexibility for different cultures. Thus, much of a manager’s job will be to manage expectations, discuss issues related to fairness and form feedback in a way that is beneficial.

“In China, for example, it can be very demotivating for a team member to receive either tough criticism or boisterous praise in front of others,” says Prof. Mobley. “It is then better to give negative feedback privately (or even via a

A misunderstanding with cultural roots may not appear until there is a crisis. Extra time spent early will save you countless headaches later.

“Different cultures communicate differently. Oftentimes, an Asian likes to think, then speak, while a westerner will speak out with whatever they’re thinking right away,” says Prof. Mobley. “If you provide some structure, you’re less at risk of causing offense, or losing valuable input.” |||

Study: What is CQ? Two Master’s students are using ABB Marine in Singapore as guinea pigs in an attempt to better understand cultural intelligence, or CQ. Anette Torp and Tone Gjertsen of the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and the Norwegian School of Management BI gave all 90 employees of ABB Marine in Singapore a survey on social networks and cultural orientations. Respondents are asked, for example, to list colleagues they would nominate to an in-house team to resolve inter-cultural conflicts, or those they simply seek for advice.

“According to theory, a few people play a strong role as go-betweens. We suspect that these people have high CQ. This study aims to explore these relationships,” said the two.

What is powerful? Michael Pfeifer , ABB Marine US office

5. Spend more time than usual to describe the situation to begin with. Stick to good, old-fashioned tools like a good agenda and meeting minutes. Ask regularly for reconfirmation that you are understood.

The more powerful a machine is, the more work it can produce, right? Imagine that you are in the middle of the ocean on a ship in a very “powerful” storm. The ship’s propeller is driven by a very “powerful” 20MW synchronous motor that is in turn driven by a cycloconverter. You have a water cooling system for the cycloconverter that requires a 5kW motor (for all you technoids, let’s just agree to pretend that there is only one propulsion motor, and only one cyclo with only one cooling system).

So, now your 5kW pump motor fails, your cyclo shuts down, and you’re “dead in the water”. The only way to get going again is to replace the pump motor with a spare.

In your store room, you have an identical replacement motor (you’re smarter than you look), and you have an even more “powerful” 50kW motor. Of course, the 50kW motor will never fit inside the cyclo, and even if it did the power supply for the pump motor would trip as soon as you tried to start the pump. So, then, you have a 5kW motor with the ability to get you out of a dangerous situation, and you have a “more powerful” 50kW motor that might be good for ballast but nothing else at the moment. Now which one seems more powerful? It seems to me that “powerful” is a relative term. More powerful is not always better. Power matched to demand is more powerful than just plain old “more powerful”.

third-party), and positive feedback modestly.”

Prof. Amdam studied one Norwegian multinational’s efforts to establish a common system for performance management worldwide.

“There were vital differences from country to country, but the major variable wasn’t culture but the attitude of local managers. So, in fact, culture doesn’t have to be the deciding factor.”

The next step in motivating multi-cultural teams is perhaps boring, but still critical, as it relates to communication:

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Q&A

Gunvor Ulstein q & a – gunvor ulstein

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As a CEO of the Ulstein Group, Gunvor Ulstein’s days are full. She is leading one of the world’s most innovative maritime groups specializing in offshore, heavy offshore and short-sea shipping. She is working closely with her brother Tore Ulstein, who is deputy CEO and COO of one of the company’s most important business areas; Ulstein Design & Solutions. Recently, the company announced plans to offer ship management and other services through a network of international offices. At the same time, she must steer the company through an industry-wide cyclical downturn. Gunvor Ulstein was kind enough to meet with Generations to speak about the rewards, and challenges, of her busy life. writer:

Alexander Wardwell ||| illustration: Kathryn Rathke ||| photos: Tony Hall

gunvor ulstein enters the office, greets her staff warmly, and walks down the hall to her modest offices, which have commanding views of the (busy) Ulstein shipyard. After taking a moment to confer with an associate and check her emails (there are a lot) she pours herself a glass of water and takes her seat.

You have a lot of work to do. How do you manage the work life balance?

It is a challenge, but when I took the job, I recognized that it would require a lot of long hours at the office and frequent travel. Certainly, there are moments when I wish I had more free time but I sincerely love my job, so it is very much woven into my daily life.

I should note that I basically grew up at the yard and spend a lot of time as a child at the office with my father [Idar Ulstein, Chairman of the Board, Ulstein Group]. It may seem unusual, but the company has always felt like home to me.

With a history stretching back more than 90 years, Ulstein has a lot of experience operating

successfully in tough markets. How is this crisis different?

In the past, cyclical downturns have been driven by more localized events, such as the Asian financial crisis in 1997, for example. Depending on the kind of event, this might impact some shipping segments more than others.

However, today, we are seeing a much broader and deeper crisis which is affecting the entire industry. Tight credit markets, a collapse in global consumer spending and falling energy prices have created a perfect storm for the industry, and it will take time to go through it.

How has the crisis affected Ulstein?

So far, we have had no cancellations, but we are taking steps to prepare ourselves for the worst. We should also note that while Ulstein can’t compete on price with some yards based in low cost countries, our offering is unique, and there is always a market for quality. So while we anticipate a slower market over the next few years, we are confident that we can minimize the negative impact of this crisis and emerge from this time in a strong position.

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q & a – gunvor ulstein

A Family Affair: Idar Ulstein, (Chairman of the Board), Gunvor Ulstein (CEO Ulstein Group) and Tore Ulstein (Deputy CEO of the Ulstein Group, Managing Director of Ulstein International and Head Design & Solutions) don’t always see eye to eye, but they are all committed to strengthening the company’s sustainable growth model. q & a – gunvor ulstein

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What in your past has prepared you for this crisis?

When I was named CEO in 1999, the company was faced significant challenges.

The yard had been without a contract for almost 18 months. Also, since I was 29 and my brother 31 when we took control of the company, many considered us to be too young to manage the yard, especially during such a difficult time. However, I should point out that my grandfather took control of the yard at age 23, my uncle 25 and my father at 27, so by our family’s standard, we were old enough.

How did you get the yard back on its feet?

We were under a great deal of pressure. We had to let some people go and announced temporary lay-offs. At the same time, we had to win the support from the board of directors for our long-term strategic plans and seek out new contracts. Fortunately, some shipowners chose to take advantage of government subsidiary scheduled to expire in 2001, so we won a number of newbuilding orders which carried us through 2003. A year later, we had no newbuildings in our portfolio – just a refit. But in time, the industry rebounded, our order book gradually filled up, and we were on our way.

What was the most difficult decision?

Cutting staff. Ulstein is a very active part of the local community, so we are very much aware that our actions have a very real impact on local businesses and the lives of the people who live here. We do as much as we can to support the community, both directly and indirectly. But we are also realistic. Internally, we make an effort to communicate both the rewards and risks of working in this industry -- it’s a cyclical business, so it’s not a career that necessarily guarantees life-long job security. Looking back, it was a very difficult time, but in some ways I am grateful for the experience. After all, when we took over, the only way to go was up.

Can you describe the circumstances of your being named CEO? There’s not much to tell. My father asked me if I wanted to be on the management team, and gave me 15 minutes to decide. I said yes.

Fifteen minutes doesn’t sound like a lot of time…

My father believes if you really want something, you don’t need a lot of time to make up your mind. I agree with him. As I said before, I grew up around the yard, so for me it was a very easy decision.

Tectonic plates shifting entire continents, mountainous ocean waves crashing into land, the tenacity of life itself: demonstrations of powerful forces are easily recognisable, and possess the ability to fascinate. Nature can be defined as neutral; what humankind applies to agents of power is intent and purpose. The power of the human mind is unlimited; the sheer energy of people’s ideas, aspirations, imagination, and creativity is unrestricted by physical limitations.

While human nature can become a force for horrific cruelty and destruction, the overall course of human development has been relentlessly positive. When human innovation, creativity and knowledge form synergies with, rather than against, the natural world, we see unstoppable momentum; manifesting itself in forces for universal good such as democracy, sustainability, human rights and health care. Despite temporary setbacks these synergies’ arc in history cannot be reversed.

Humanity learning to harness these forces to work together for the common good – this is powerful.

In 2006, you won the Veuve Cliquot Business Woman award and in 2008, an International Personality Award from the Women’s International & Trading Association (WISTA). What is it like being a top female executive in an industry dominated by men?

I really don’t think of it that much. It may be true that women are underrepresented in leadership positions in the industry and I do support the efforts of these organizations to raise awareness, but in my view, the industry is a great place for women. As for the awards, I am honored to be recognized, but I don’t work alone. I’d like to share these trophies with my brother and the rest of the management team. |||

What is powerful? Michael Scheepers,

Ulstein recently announced ambitious plans to establish a network of international offices and enter the ship management segment. What is the business case for these developments?

In brief, sustainable growth. We have established a strong market presence in design, construction and the development of electrical, communications and automation systems.

However, we recognize that by expanding horizontally in the value chain, we can provide a more integrated life-of-vessel service package to our customers, ranging from helping them develop business plans to providing design solutions, shipbuilding to ship management and long term maintenance. If we are successful in developing these related services, our revenue stream will be diversified, making us less vulnerable to market fluctuations.

Cavotec MSL

Ulstein is a family owned business, can you describe your decision making process?

I work very closely with my brother and my father and the rest of the management team. We don’t always agree, but we welcome healthy, constructive debate. If the idea survives first stage of this process it might be developed further and submitted to the board of directors for review. So far, it’s worked well.

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On the move with Tore Ulstein As Deputy CEO of the Ulstein Group, Managing Director of Ulstein International and Head Design & Solutions, Tore Ulstein spends a lot of time travelling around the world, meeting colleagues and new and existing customers. Generations caught up with him on the train serving Oslo’s International Airport for a brief 20 minute interview to get more details about the Ulstein Group’s expansion plans.

How often do you travel?

Too much. I’m in China about five times a year, and visit Brazil, the United States a few times each, along with other countries.

It can be exhausting, but an important part of my work.

q & a – tore ulstein

50

Ulstein is coming off a very strong year and these days, there are a number of yards which would welcome a takeover bid from Ulstein. Has the company ever considered buying a yard in a low cost country?

Our expansion plans are horizontal, not vertical, so no, we are not looking to invest in a new yard. However, for shipowners who seek to build Ulstein designed vessels, we have close working relationships with a number of shipyards around the world, so we already have a strong international presence.

Recently, Ulstein announced plans to get into ship management. Is this the right time to start a new business?

We strongly believe in the Ulstein Marine Services concept. We have a long term perspective, so in our view there is never a bad time for a good idea. Obviously, we are best known for the design, construction of OSVs and related electrical, communications and automation systems. But we also recognize that in addition to offering our customers quality vessels, we can provide them with broader range of services to ensure they get the best performance out of these vessels throughout their life cycle or better value in the second hand market.

Ship management is outside Ulstein’s traditional area of expertise. How can you compete with companies which have been providing these services for decades?

First, we put together a team of individuals with extensive experience in ship management. Second, we have developed a fresh approach to ship management which we believe will add significant value. Ulstein’s ship management services will help our customers reduce costs and help us understand their needs more clearly, which will support our ability to develop improved ship designs.

Ulstein Marine Services appears to be part of a larger strategy which includes establishing a network of international offices, selling spare parts, and offering business consulting services. What is the business case for diversifying into other maritime segments?

We are broadening the scope of our services to provide more comprehensive services to our customers and a stronger foundation for our sustainable growth. Ulstein’s Accelerated Business Development (ABD) will enable our customers to make better decisions faster before they order a vessel. Ulstein Sales and Representative Offices (USROs) will allow us to market our services and spare parts in different regions and will help us stay closer to our customers overseas. And Ulstein Marine Services will allow customers to get more out of their vessels over time. We see that these related services are vital to our future development. |||

Fieldbook

New Shipping Reading Find new professional inspiration from the pages, or the screens, of shipping writers. Here’s some titles that you may never have seen… shipping strategy

Elements of Shipping – Alan Branch The newest edition of this classic has updates on electronic data interchanges. Essential reading.

Global Logistics Management: A Competitive Advantage for the 21st Century – Kent Gourdin “…alternatives and opportunities arising from developments in such areas as transportation, communication, electronic data interchange and so on, and with real-life examples…”

– Times Higher Education Supplement The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger – Marc Levinson “…treats containerization not as shipping news, but as a development that has sweeping consequences for workers and consumers…” maritime security

marine construction

The Maritime Engineering Reference Book: A Guide to Ship Design, Construction and Operation – Anthony F. Molland One-stop-shop for engineers…

The Elements of Boat Strength: For Builders, Designers and Owners – Dave Gerr For those of us who always dreamt of building our own boat…

Terrorism and the Maritime Transport System – Anthony M. Davis As featured on syndicated radio show “Homeland Security Inside and Out”

Web-sites and Blogs

The Outlaw Sea: A World of Freedom, Chaos and Crime – Wiliam Langewiesche If you ever thought the sea was “a lawless domain where brute economics always trumps moral considerations” (Amazon.com), then this is the book for you.

Maritime Blog gcaptain.com/maritime/blog

popular interest

Ocean Titans: Journeys in Search of the Soul of a Ship – Daniel Sekulich From Korea’s shipyards to the North Atlantic to a shipowner boardroom in Monaco: Merchant shipping’s soul.

The Canal Builders: Making America’s Empire at the Panama Canal – Julie Greene A description of how this key channel was constructed, in political and physical terms

Container Shipping Information Service www.shipsandboxes.com

Coracle Online shipping news www.shippingpodcasts.com Bryant’s Maritime Blog (regulatory developments) bryantsmaritimeblog.blogspot.com Shipping Around the World theworldofshipping.wordpress.com The Monitor (Marine Engineering) dieselduck.blogspot.com International Shipping News internationalshippingnews.blogspot.com

fieldbook

Shipping Strategy: Innovating for Success – Peter Lorange A former director at IMD and currently its professor for international shipping, Lorange shares some of his tremendous insight on the industry.

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quality in the life-cycle

Quality is a habit, not an act (Aristotle) ABB develops and manufactures a broad range of quality marine propulsion and control systems. But how does the company ensure quality throughout the life-cycle of an individual product? Recently, Generations travelled to Ulsteinvik in Norway to find out how the company manages quality issues related to its industry leading frequency converter – from concept to after sales service. writer:

quality – the stadt drive

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Alexander Wardwell ||| photographer: Per Eide

located near ålesund on Norway’s scenic west coast, ABB’s waterfront facility in Ulsteinvik manufactures, tests, distributes and provides support for one of the industry’s leading frequency converters – the ABB Stadt Drive.

We met with Geir Holstad, ABB’s Vice President Projects OSV, and Pål Idar Strand, Technical Product Manager, to track the development of ABB’s frequency converter from concept to after sale services.

Like all successful products, the ABB Stadt Drive was inspired by customer demand. Then working for a small local company called Stadt Automation, Strand says marine customers, particularly those in the OSV segment, regularly communicated their concerns about decreasing space in the engine room. ”Over the last decade, offshore support vessels have become increasingly packed with sophisticated machinery,” he says. ”We saw an opportunity to develop a frequency converter which would have a smaller footprint.” Strand also noted that shipowners are increasingly sensitive to the high price of fuel. He explains that conventional propulsion systems require engines to run continuously; since many OSVs run dynamic positioning systems, these costs can be significant. “Frequency controlled propulsion allows operators to shut down some diesel engines during some operations, which can result in significant fuel savings,” he says.

1. concept

2. development In order to develop the product in line with customer demand, the concept team took another look at the cooling system. Strand notes that at the time, all existing models were air-cooled, which required more space. “We chose a water cooled system, which in addition to having a more efficient heat exchange rate, also allowed us to reduce the size of the unit significantly,” he says. Technical challenges included the development of computer controlled pump systems and precision machined parts for the cooling flange, but eventually, the company had a working prototype.

3. beta testing Because the Stadt Drive was new, the company had to demonstrate the reliability of the frequency converter to both shipowners and shipyards. Strand explains that the close-knit shipping cluster in Ulsteinvik provides a healthy environment for innovation and exchange of new technologies, but it’s a double-edged sword. “Our close relationship with local yards won us the chance to test the frequency converter onboard, and, while we were confident that the unit would perform well, our lack of in-house dynamic testing facilities created some uncertainty.”

In any case, the beta testing phase was completed successfully, and the company began >>> marketing its first units.

“Our ability to subject our frequency converters to rigorous testing is critical to quality assurance.”

quality – the stadt drive

Pål Idar Strand, Technical Product Manager

53

What is this?

ABB’s Stadt Drive is a frequency converter, an electronic drive that converts alternating current (AC) of one frequency to alternating current of another frequency, allowing more efficient management of onboard propulsion and control systems. In addition to converting bulk amounts of power from one distribution standard to another, the ABB Stadt Drives are also used to control the speed and the torque of various onboard AC motors and thrusters.

What has made it so successful?

It’s relatively small. In today’s crowded engine rooms, size matters, especially onboard OSVs, which are often packed with specialised equipment. Also, ABB’s Stadt Drive enables improved energy management, helping companies reduce fuel costs. quality – the stadt drive

What is its secret?

It’s water-cooled. Previously, frequency converters were air-cooled, which meant they were much larger and had a less efficient heat-exchange. Developing this technology represented a genuine challenge, but since its launch in 1995, ABB Stadt Drives have been a market leader.

Who buys it?

54

While ABB’s Stadt Drive is appropriate for any vessel type, demand for ABB’s frequency converters among companies operating OSVs has risen dramatically over the past five years. Between 2005 and 2008, sales rose from 48 units to 170 and the company is on pace to deliver about 200 by the end of 2009.

4. fabrication The early success of the Stadt Drive caught ABB’s attention. The company understood that frequency converters are “gateway products” and if added to ABB’s existing portfolio, the company would be in better position to market integrated propulsion and control packages. In 2000, ABB acquired Stadt Automation, and the company ramped up production at the company’s new facilities, where about 25 people work in the assembly line.

Geir Holstad, ABB’s Vice President Offshore Support Vessels (Process Automation Division) says that while the facility functions well at present, he is working to improve qual-

ity control and the assembly process, which will enable ABB to cut production time significantly. “There is no system that cannot be improved,” he says. “Quality is not a destination, but a journey.”

Once assembly is complete, the frequency converters are thoroughly tested with new special purpose equipment, designed and constructed by ABB. The testing facilities mimic onboard conditions, with variable voltage loads, and each unit is tested extensively before being shipped. “Due to increasingly tight installation deadlines, shipyards have 5. quality control

“Quality is not a destination, but a journey.”

low tolerance for faulty equipment which may cause delays,” says Holstad. “Our frequency converters don’t leave our facilities until we’re sure they are in good working order.”

6. transportation Once testing is complete, each unit is carefully boxed to ensure it does not get damaged in transit, and wrapped in layers of plastic to eliminate exposure to potentially harmful dust particles. ABB also depends on a number of reliable land and sea transportation providers who are given precise information on how best to transport the units.

Holstad says that while rare, units are sometimes dropped during shipping or at the yard, which can damage internal parts. “We take every precaution to make sure these units are handled with care, but accidents happen.”

During installation and commissioning the units are exposed to many risks.

Placed in cramped engine rooms, where welding and sandblasting workers are often working nearby, the units may be damaged. In addition, the unit must be linked to the vessel’s internal piping and electrical systems, which can be tricky in tight quarters. ABB provides technicians during installation to ensure the unit is protected before and during installation and work is completed according to product specifications.

7. commissioning

8. after sale ABB provides extensive three day training courses to engine crews on performance and maintenance routines. Strand says that while the ABB Stadt Drive has been designed to operate in rough conditions, the unit requires some special care, including specific maintenance routines scheduled at precise intervals. For example, water purity is an issue.

“We publish guidelines to minimum requirements for water quality,” he says. “If waterborne foreign objects enter the cooling system, blockages can develop, which can impact the unit’s performance.”

9. design improvements Now in its third generation, the ABB Stadt Drive continues to be refined. New models with different voltage capacities are available, and customers can order external or internal pump systems, depending on their needs. Indeed, the product has been so successful that many competing companies have produced their own versions of water-cooled frequency converters. While both Holstad and Strand declined to offer details, they noted that work to develop additional improvements is underway. “If we fail to capitalise on our technological lead, our market share will drop,” says Holstad. “Our task is to build on our success and continue to develop systems which match, or exceed, customer expectations.” |||

quality – the stadt drive

Geir Holstad, ABB’s Vice President Offshore Support Vessels

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Materialism

Green oil?

Greener oils have been under development for years. Today their use in the marine industry is taking off. But how do the products differ? What do they come from? What about regulations? And are they safe to use? We set out to find answers.

Passive pollution An astonishing amount of stern tube lubricating oil is released into the sea due simply to leaks. “Even at a conservative rate, stern tube oil pollution is estimated to be over 80 million litres annually. The Exxon Valdez oil spill, by comparison, released 41.6 million litres.”

Source: Thordon Bearings

Marketing Fact & Fiction One supplier of biodegradable lubricating oils, Vickers Oil, warns consumers to control the claims made by suppliers.

Toxicity tests on fish alone, for example, leaves open the possibility that a product damages other creatures in the food chain, such as algae. materialism – green oil

Test method

Preferable

Acceptable

Biodegradability

OECD 301 (A-F)

Readily Biodegradable

Ultimately Biodegradable

Toxicity

OECD 203 (Fish) OECD 202 (Crustacea) OECD 201 (Algae)

Non-toxic/ Relatively harmless

Practically non-toxic

Source: Vickers Oil

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Four basic measures of environmental friendliness Biodegradability – How quickly are the organic components of the oil broken down?

Standards: OECD 301 (Ready biodegradability), OECD 302 (Inherent biodegradability), CEC-L33-A93 & ASTM D 5864-95 (lubricant degradation), OECD 306 (Biodegradation in seawater) Aquatic toxicity – How toxic are oils when they encounter marine life?

Standards: OECD 203 (fish), OECD 202 (crustacean), OECD 201 (algae) Bioaccumulation – To what extent do compounds in the oil accumulate in the food chain?

Standards: OECD 117 Renewability – How much of the oil’s feedstocks are from renewable sources?

No fixed standard, but increasing in importance Source: Castrol, Vickers Oil

Eco-labels in Europe EU Marguerite (28 hydraulic oils) SP-list (SS155434: 86 hydraulic oils) Nordic Swan Blue Angel IFAS Positive List Source: StatoilHydro

No requirements… yet Though there is no real requirement for ships to use biodegradable oils, this may come. And there are already related regulatory advantages, such as: • Preferential treatment in the event of an oil spill • Classification as a “clean ship” by local authorities (ref. Gothenburg harbour) • Reduced risk of detainment in port state or flag state control

Source: StatoilHydro

Crude oil

Refining

Plant & animal origin

Petrochemical industry

Hydrotreating

Mineral oil

White oil

Refining

Alcohols

VHVI

PAO

Fatty acids

Synthetic esters

Rapeseed oil

Biodegradability / Renewable raw material

• A real breakthrough has not yet been achieved in the sense of unrestricted application.

• Depending on conditions, an increase in volume, loss of strength and hardness variance may arise. In the presence of water, emulsification can arise, resulting in extreme deterioration of the sealing ring material.

• Some oils based on polyalkylene glycol (PAG) worsen the tribiological conditions between sealing ring and liner surface dramatically.

• Paint in tanks and in the stern tube can be dissolved. Rapeseed oil, in particular, can cause disruptions in hydraulic systems as a result of viscosity changes during cold running.

• The use of synthetic ester oils is limited for use as biodegradable stern tube oil.

Tryglycerides, have a weakness regarding resistance to water attack, but seem to be the best alternative currently to be chosen as base fluid for stern tube application.

ABB Marine’s stance ABB Marine’s director for Azipod® R&D Jukka Varis said of biodegradable lubricating oils: “ABB aims to develop an Azipod® product that is as environmentally friendly as possible.

Biodegradable lubrication development is part of that target. At the moment, there are few bio-lubricants approved by sealing manufacturers, but many tests are ongoing to extend that list and add to suitable solutions. We are monitoring the situation keenly, and in constant communication with our suppliers about this.”

What is powerful? Arto Uuskallio,

Blohm+Voss Industries, a producer of seals for stern tube applications, has the following to say about biodegradable lubricating oils:

ABB Marine Finland

Dangers – from a seal manufacturer

My children once asked me: “Daddy, can you tell us what is powerful?” I told them the following story: You know the saying: “The pen is mightier than the sword”. But what does it actually mean? I will give an example. On the bridge of a vessel, Jake (name changed) has broken the emergency steering push buttons with a sword so that the actual switches inside the push buttons can only be pressed by the tip of a pen. Thus the pen is mightier than the sword. And as mighty can be interpreted to equal powerful, then the pen is more powerful than the sword. With negative deduction, we can come into conclusion that the sword is powerful.

If I were to put them in a list from powerful to most powerful, I would list them thus: 1– Sword, 2– Azipod unit, 3– Pen, 4– US economy

Origin of Different Base Fluids

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the ARCTIC

The Harshest Frontier What won’t give way, given the persistence of knowledgeable men? Arctic shipping began as an anomaly. Now engineers are steadily driving down the costs, the complexity and the uncertainty of ice-going ships. These engineers’ work may open the Arctic frontier to a whole new generation of shipping business.

the arctic – the harshest frontier

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Generations presents a four-part story charting the development of Arctic shipping from an experimental pursuit to a broad industrial movement, and how a small community of engineers and technicians in Helsinki, Finland may have made it all happen writer: photos:

Ryan Skinner ||| illustrations: Daniel Barradas Ryan Skinner, Joonas Lehtipuu

1. the fact that began it all In 1968, ARCO and Exxon discovered the largest oil field in North America, at Prudhoe Bay on Alaska’s Arctic coastline. This discovery, for probably the first time, brought the world’s attention to the economic potential of its northern- and southernmost corners. And the effort to bring this oil to market showed for the first time that arctic shipping was feasible; this time, though, it was commercially inadvisable. The oil was piped to market.

This challenge – to make Arctic shipping not just possible, but profitable – is a defining one.

And, after the US Geological Survey concluded in 2008 that as much as one-fifth of the world’s recoverable oil and gas resources lie in the Arctic, the stakes are higher than ever. How this oil and gas are produced and exported, and how other Arctic resources are developed, are

questions that will in large part be answered by engineers and new technology.

2. the

“what-if” that made it possible From mid-1980s to the mid-90s, a small group of naval architects, engineers and technicians based in Helsinki, Finland made a series of vital discoveries that would significantly alter equations about the profitability of Arctic shipping.

The Finns (represented by its shipyards and electrical propulsion companies) and Russians (with their own yards, buyers and operators of icebreakers) had worked together on icebreaker designs for decades.

Said Torsten Heideman, a concept engineer from ABB Marine who has worked on icebreakers: “One day, an engineer from the Finnish Maritime Administration [FMA] was looking at an ice-breaker, called Otso, in dry-dock.

The Manhattan Project One of the oil companies associated with the Prudhoe Bay find wanted to try to export the oil with ships. An American oil tanker was converted into an icebreaker in order to prove the feasibility of shipping Alaska’s oil to the US East Coast. So in late 1969, the S.S. Manhattan set her course for the Northwest Passage. The ship succeeded in forcing the passage, taking on oil and returning to New York. Commercially, however, this “Manhattan Project” was a failure (at a cost of USD 54 million), and its oil company backers helped fund the construction of the Alaska Pipeline instead.

“The biggest barrier was a mental one: people worried about putting an electrical motor underwater. ‘Can you make it watertight?’ they would ask. But the components were all the same – the seals, bearings and swiveling – they were just put Mikko Niini, Director of Aker Arctic Technology

Standing behind the ship, he looked at the vessel’s wide bossings [to endure strong forces on the propellor hub]. He then contacted ABB and asked if it would be possible to build the propulsion motor in such a shape that it would fit in the bottom part of the vessel.”

This “what-if” kicked off the development work, shared between the FMA, ABB and the Finnish shipyard conglomerate then known as Wartsila Marine, that resulted in a new propulsion system, now known as Azipod®. The first patent for this technology was issued in 1987.

Kari Laukia now works with Kone Marine developing elevators for cruise ships, but in the 90s he led the team developing the first Azipod (then called the L-drive, for its shape). “We had done all kinds of studies and model tests, but we needed a prototype,” said Laukia. “Then the Finnish Maritime Administration commissioned one for a small ice breaking vessel, Seili.

We spent thousands of hours on that first 1.5 MW unit. Then the first full-scale ice-breaking test in winter 1991 was a success. This paved the way for later, bigger projects.”

From this initial success, it would take three years before azipod would take its next big step, when NEMARC (a joint-venture between Neste Shipping and Kvaerner Masa Yards) retrofitted first one, then a second tanker with large 11.4 MW Azipod® units. The discovery that allowed electricity to pass across a slip-ring instead of a cable (allowing the unit to swivel 360°) and better propellers led to contracts for cruise ships, offshore boats, arctic container ships and more tankers. The ball was rolling.

3. practice nibbling away at uncertainty

It is a white wintry morning in March 2009, at Aker Arctic’s offices in Helsinki. Technical managers of ice-going ships equipped with Azipod® units from Wagenborg, Finstaship, FESCO, Neste Oil, the Norwegian Coast Guard, Norilsk Nickel and Sovcomflot have gathered to meet the designers of Aker Arctic and engineers from ABB Marine’s Azipod® group (which is located just two hundred meters down the road). >>>

The unique economy of icebreaking operations Moving resources through Arctic waters introduces a new significant variable: ice. How you operate in ice will determine the economics of your project.

Ice thickness and distance: For very thick ice over a short distance, it may be economical to use a shuttle concept. For thinner ice over great distances, you might choose to go straight to market with a ship that can break ice.

Operating speeds: Ice will reduce your speed, impacting the profitability of export. The thicker the ice, the slower your speed. Norilsk Nickel’s experience, however, shows that vessel turn-around times in winter conditions are almost the same as in open water.

Ice breakers: These are scarce, and expensive. A large ship can require two (or more) at a time, to clear a channel.

Norilsk Nickel, for example, cut its Arctic operating costs by USD 80 million over a year because it reduced its dependence on ice breakers.

the arctic – the harshest frontier

together in a different way.”

59

“We believe that the best judge of how to operate in the ice conditions is the master on the bridge.

It could be a good idea to establish two different software, or control, packages – one for ice-breaking and another for open-water.”

the arctic – the harshest frontier

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Yuriy Ivanov, Norilsk Nickel

To these men, Azipod®-powered ships are hardly novel anymore. The representative from Neste Oil was technical manager for that first tanker retrofit in 1994. Norilsk Nickel has been operating ice-breaking container ships into the Kara Sea for three years. And Wagenborg operates two ice-breaking vessels in the shallow Caspian, where the ice sometimes reaches all the way to the bottom.

Aker Arctic has called the meeting, together with ABB Marine, in order to open a dialogue with users about operation of the Azipod®powered icebreaking ships. Even if the question of whether arctic operations are possible or not has been answered (emphatically, yes!), the question of how to make them more profitable still looms. And to answer that question, the builders need data.

Says Arto Uuskallio of ABB Marine: “Right now, each of these projects is a unique event, a one-off situation. The resource, the owner, the yard and the suppliers all need to go for it.

Many windows need to fit. As time goes by, the opportunity windows may grow, which leads to more projects.”

Today an ice-breaking ship costs at least 50 per cent more than a conventional ship of the same size. If Aker Arctic and ABB Marine can bring down that penaly, those opportunity “windows” will grow considerably.

There’s considerable room for improvement, argues Mikko Niini. “Feedback from our measurement systems shows that the maximum loads encountered by the azipods is some 40 per cent of the design load. The safety margin appears to be quite high and discussion is needed on what is a sufficient safety margin.”

If you could get the same performance from an engine with half the power, why not use a smaller and cheaper one? For the time being, it is the classification companies (and marine insurers, to some extent) that are demanding an extra magnitude or two of security. With enough information from live operations, however, they might ease installed power requirements – thus this meeting between a designer, a supplier and the operators.

All of the parties involved are trying to find a golden equation for ship operation practices in different ice conditions, in order

“The size of the bearings is one of several factors limiting the upper size and strength of an Azipod unit. We’re already almost at the point where each bearing is custom-built, at the top end.”

Arto Uuskallio, ABB Marine

the arctic – the harshest frontier

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Every night, a ceiling packed with refrigeration and misting units create a new layer of ice over Aker Arctic’s test basins.

By morning, they are ready. Note that everything in a test needs to be to scale, including the hardness of the ice. Thus the ice has the consistency of ice cream, not sheet ice. After running open ice tests, the testers run tests in the channel (as seen here) and, finally, they build an ice ridge.

“Some of the earliest Azipod® units had technical challenges with their sealing systems. We were able to improve this together with Wagenborg in the late 90s. Their ice-breaker was operating in shallow water, which was a challenge to the sealing design. The revised design added more seals and a new material. Since then, Azipod® units have become even more reliable.”

the arctic – the harshest frontier

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to minimize the building and maintenance costs of the ship. The stars of today’s show are Erkki Ranki, who presented ice loading scenarios, and Mirva Ojanen, who presented the results of a measurement campaign with Norilsk Nickel and FESCO Sakhalin. This data, with long-term measurement of operation data and forces on the propulsion units, are key inputs to the ideal operating equation.

“We checked the loads on the Azipod® units’ hull and the bearings, and recorded ship speed against propeller RPMs, power consumption and other ship operation data, such as latitude and longitude and time of day,” explains Ojanen. “This was very valuable, as it is difficult to study ice loads theoretically. Now, based on first-hand empirical data, we can optimize design of future Azipod® units. Among other things, we might be able to reduce the dimensioning.”

A few clear rules of the road have been established. With increasing speed in ice conditions, ice loads on the Azipod® units increase

Samuli Hänninen, ABB Marine

quickly. It could be possible to plot out different recommended speeds for different ice thicknesses, either steaming bow-first or stern-first.

There is no broad consensus over speed limits, though. The ships’ operators are eager to give their captains full discretion to operate according to the conditions. Says Uuskallio: “As long as your bridge officers have lots of experience, that is OK. But, if not, a captain may steadily increase the speed until – bang – you have a problem.”

Work on operating profiles continues, and – with each success – the opportunity “windows” grow.

4. opening up to the world The work that goes on in workshops like that in Helsinki this winter is a step in the direction of safe, economical ship operation in ice covered waters. It is necessary if the operation of ships in thick ice is to become an activity for more than just a few specialists.

“We need to rethink the equation here. Ice is

“We first retrofit two tankers (Uikku and Lunni) with Azipod® thrusters in the early 90s. We were very satisfied with these, and were convinced to build bigger Azipod®-powered tankers (Mastera and Tempera). These tankers were very profitable for a while, however there have been challenges with the bearings.

I hope they solve it.”

Markku Lumme, Neste Oil

the arctic – the harshest frontier

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From the floor of ABB Marine’s Azipod® production facility in Helsinki, Finland. A number of customers, including Sovcomflot, Norilsk Nickel, FESCO and Wagenborg, have come to see how ABB Marine constructs Azipod® units. In the background, we see one of the 8.5 MW Azipod® units destined for a Sovcomflot tanker under construction at Admiralty Shipyard in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Prudhoe Bay Oil and gas

Mackenzie Delta & Beaufort Sea

The SS Manhattan (see text box on page 58) took a symbolic oil cargo from here to New York in 1969.

Coal

Canadian jurisdiction

This region is known to have oil and gas hydrates.

Northwest Passage

Sverdrup Basin

An ongoing debate is trying to determine whether the sea routes through Canada’s Nunavut areas constitute Canadian waters or international trade routes.

This was first navigated by Roald Amundsen in 1903-06. In 2007, the European Space Agency stated that ice loss had opened up the passage “for the first time since records began in 1978.”

This once volcanic region possesses potential as a site for hydrocarbons

Minerals

C A N A D A Cruise ships

A

Oil tankers Container vessels

Coronation Gulf

R C T I C

Like Izok and High Lakes, this region is believed to have strong base metal deposits, such as lead and zinc.

O C E A N

G R E E N L A N D (KINGDOM OF DENMARK )

Fishing

BAFFIN SEA

Bering Strait traffic count

BEAUFORT SEA

The US Coast Guard in summer 2008 undertook its first head count of vessels passing through this strait, as it expects traffic only to increase.

Mary River Iron This is the highest grade, large undeveloped iron ore project in the world that remains independently owned (Arctic Economics)

CHUKCHI SEA

R U S S I A

ALASK A (U.S.A.)

Raglan Nickel & Copper Mine Samsung Heavy Industries (Korea) One of the handful of shipyards around the world that specialises in iceclass tonnage.

Sumitomo Heavy Industries (Japan) One of the handful of shipyards around the world that specialists in iceclass tonnage.

BERING SEA Ekati Diamond Mine

HUDSON B AY

GULF OF ALASKA

C A N A D A

Started operations in 1998.

Owned by BHP Billiton.

Accessible only by air and road (ten weeks of the year).

Izok and High Lakes This region is believed to be a good source of base metals like copper and zinc, and perhaps precious metals like gold and silver.

Production began in 1998, with 130,000 tonnes/year of nickel-copper concentrate, cobalt and precious metals. One of the world’s lowest-cost nickel producers.

Churchill, Manitoba One end of a planned trans-Arctic shipping route, called Arctic Bridge.

The other is Murmansk in Russia.

Bathurst Inlet Seven mining companies are sponsoring studies to construct a deep-water port in Bathurst Inlet.

The port would serve vessels up to 25,000, or even 50,000 tonnes.

Voisey Bay Nickel

Baker Lake This region is currently under exploration, and significant amounts of gold and uranium have been found.

This deposit is estimated to contain 141 million tonnes of nickel.

Svalbard coal Coal production from this Arctic island has risen to over 2 million tons per year.

A R C T I C

S VA L B A R D (NORWAY )

A N E O C

Arctic jurisdiction Russia and Norway (and, to a smaller degree, the EU and the USA) are engaged in a new cold war to draw jurisdictional lines in the Arctic.

G R E E N L A N D (KINGDOM OF DENMARK)

BARENTS SEA

Russian oil export 15 million tons of Russian oil will be shipped over the Barents Sea in 2009, increasing to as much as 100 million tons by 2015 (Norwegian Barents Secretariat)

Arctic tourism Cruise traffic and naturalists are increasingly finding their way into arctic regions, causing anxiety among rescue personnel.

NORTH SEA

ICELAND SWEDEN

FINLAND

N O R T H AT L A N T I C OCEAN

B A LT I C SEA

These two companies, located a stone’s throw from one another, have spearheaded commercial shipping technologies for arctic regions.

Admiralty Shipyard One of the handful of shipyards around the world that specialises in ice-class tonnage.

The Russians drew considerable PR when a mission in 2007 planted a Russian flag on the seafloor underneath the North Pole (with obvious allusions to their rights to minerals in the area).

Shtokman LNG

A shipyard near here called Zvezdochka is one of the world’s leading producers of propellor blades for Arctic applications

This subsea natural gas field could be developed in the next five to ten years with an export of as many as 200 LNG shipments per year.

Murmansk, Russia Arctic Bridge – This city is busy building a deep-water port, intending to form the eastern terminus of a trans-Arctic shipping route, called the Arctic Bridge.

The western terminus is at Churchill, Manitoba.

ABB Finland & Aker Arctic

North Pole

Norilsk Nickel uses this port for its large double-acting container ships

Archangelsk

N O R WAY

RUSSIA

Dudinka port

“We checked the loads on the Azipod® units’ hull and the bearings, and recorded ship speed against propeller RPMs , power consumption and other ship operation data. This was very valuable, as it is difficult to study ice loads theoretically.

Now, we can optimize design of future Azipod® units.”

Mirva Ojanen, ABB Marine

the arctic – the harshest frontier

64

not an obstacle; it’s an opportunity,” says Niini.

He cites the Neste Oil tankers, which earned back their cost in a few years. Or Norilsk Nickel, who has cut the operating expenses of its arctic operations by USD 80 million because of faster rotation and less need for assistance from ice-breakers. Finally, Russia’s Varandey terminal is exported by ice-breaking Sovcomflot tankers, instead of pipelines, because the oil companies can get a premium on the field’s low-sulphur content (compared to mixing it with the sulphurous oil in the pipeline).

Will ice-breaking capesize bulk carriers soon start exporting some of the world’s purest iron deposits from Canada’s Baffin Island? Will Russia’s enormous Yamal gas field be shipped out via ice-breaking LNG ships? Will bigger container ships and tankers soon cut their eastwest trade routes in half by taking the polar route?

Right now, designers and engineers in Helsinki are racing to help ease these trades into the shipping market. |||

For a closer look at ABB Marine’s solutions for the Arctic, see the technical article in Chapter B on page 89.

“Even in the Pechora Sea, it hasn’t been so bad. We’ve only been operating there for a limited time, but the lowest temperature the vessel experienced so far this winter was -30° C. There was only one meter of ice. That is not so bad.”

Victor Rokhlin, Sovcomflot Group

Table of contents

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Generations Chapter B brings technical insight from employees of ABB Marine, in the form of a collection of well-documented and researched articles on technologies and phenomena related to ABB Marine’s products and operations. Each article includes a full listing of the author and contact information, so that interested readers can follow up specific queries with the source. Parties interested in submitting a paper may contact the editor. ||| Editor: Alf-Küre Ådnanes (alf-kare.adnanes@no.abb.com) ||| Managing Editor: Julia Wei-Cai ||| Photos and illustrations: ABB Marine |||

harm

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103 redundant propulsion

ves

Azipod CZ offers more power for less author:

azipod cz

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Jari Ylitalo – jari.ylitalo@fi.abb.com

introduction Use of a Azipod CZ can mean that operators can specify equipment at least 10% less powerful for a mechanical thruster, while still maintaining equivalent levels of thrust.

Typically, modern semi-submersibles are fitted with azimuthing thrusters with nozzles, as these provide maximum thrust at low speeds and are capable of directing thrust in the required direction by simply rotating the entire unit.

When selecting thrusters, key considerations are: – Through life reliability and maintenance – Cost – Performance – Ease of installation/removal

Figure 1: Typical azimuthing thruster

One basic criterion when designing a dynamic positioning system is to prepare for thruster failure at the designated harshest environmental conditions. This is essential, due to the high costs of deep water rig down time, which is unacceptable. If a thruster fails, the time to repair can be costly. Therefore, reliability is the highest priority in thruster selection.

At the same time, overall thruster system performance is also a key issue, since an optimised size ensures that the system is fit for purpose, but not over powered. mechanical thrusters The most common type of thruster used on semi-submersibles is the azimuthing thruster shown in Figure 1. Here, the propeller is typically driven by an electric motor located directly above the thruster in the pontoons through a system of bevelled gears. This enables the electric motor rotation to be transmitted though 90 degrees.

To rotate the thruster about the vertical axis, a hydraulic steering gear is used, which can typically take up a large amount of room and also require a sizeable hydraulic power unit to drive it. Trying to accommodate such thrusters in a small thruster room often poses a challenge.

Figure 2: Azipod CZ unit

Steering Module (overall in light blue) Steering Motor(s)

Slipring Stewing Bearing

Steering Gearbox

Guide Base Strut end Single lift point

azipod cz

Nozzle End single lift point

Strut

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Guide wire lift points

Motor

Nozzle

Propeller

Figure 3: Compact Azipod thruster.

The Azipod CZ thruster unit shown in Fig. 2 is driven by an electric motor. The motor is located directly in line with the propeller, enabling it to drive the propeller without the use of any gearing system, subsequently reducing transmission losses considerably.

The electric motor is cooled to the surrounding water, eliminating the need for any cooling system to be installed, and further reducing mechanical complexity. The unit is steered by an electric motor in the pontoon that takes up less space than would hydraulic steering units.

Some of the key advantages of the podded propulsion over the typical azimuthing thruster are highlighted below.

– Reduced mechanical complexity.

– Reduced space requirements.

– Reduced ventilation requirements.

– Reduced noise levels – No cooling requirements.

– No hydraulic for steering.

– More mechanically efficient, no gearbox or crown gear.

– Improved thruster efficiency, whole unit can be tilted rather than just the cowling as is common practice on conventional thruster. azipod cz thruster

azipod cz

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The Azipod CZ unit consists of four main modules: – Propeller, with or without nozzle – Electric Motor Module – Strut Module – Power Transmission and Steering Module

All of these modules can be dismounted for transport or for maintenance, or for replacement work. This feature also allows for partial deliveries to the shipyard on demand.

The fixed pitch propeller is driven by an electric motor, directly mounted on the propeller shaft, whose power is controlled by an on-board frequency converter and transmitted to the electrical motor via the power slip rings at the power transmission and steering module.

Azipod CZ units incorporate features that simplify thruster room layout and requirements.

Such main features are:

Figure 4: Tilt angle of Compact Azipod®

Figure 5: Impact of the propeller jet to pontoon B, showing the axial velocity Vx

– The electric motor is cooled by the surrounding seawater through the motor housing. There is no need for any additional cooling media or cooling system for the motor.

– The azimuthing angle control is fully electrical, with a redundant variable speed controlled steering machinery, which together with the slip rings, ensures free rotation. There is no need for hydraulic power units or cooling systems.

– Since there are no hydraulic pumps nor cooling systems etc. in the thruster room, the noise generated by the Azipod CZ unit is very low – The absence of cooling units, hydraulic power units etc. means that there is no need for yardinstalled oil, lubrication or cooling lines.

distribution through the center of the

It has been established that, using a conventional approach, efficiency losses can be as high as 30% of the thrust. This compares to no losses at all at a 7 degrees tilt angle using the Azipod CZ unit. Naturally, such extreme losses can be avoided by prescribing certain operational zones within the dynamic positioning (DP) control software but, commonly, losses range between 10% to 20% of the unit thrust. In short, by using the Azipod CZ unit approach, equipment that is 10% less powerful is required by a mechanical thruster for the same thrust.

The electrical motor of Azipod CZ unit is a high efficiency permanent magnet type motor. Since the motor is directly driving the propeller, the thruster does not have any mechanical thrust gears, which significantly reduces the amount of other wearing components, such as shaft line bearings, seals etc. Naturally this kind of configuration also eliminates the need for any separate motor foundation, thrust couplings etc.

In sum, the Azipod CZ is a simple and efficient thruster that is directly cooled to the temperature of propeller disk

the surrounding sea water that has. No need for additional cooling systems, nor hydraulic power units.

Direct electric propeller drive also eliminates gears and thus reduces significantly the amount of wearing components.

By tilting the Azipod CZ unit it has been possible to get rid of thruster hull interaction effects without efficiency decrease due to tilted nozzle.

A direct comparison has been made between the Azipod CZ and a mechanical thruster with tilted nozzle, and has been shown to yield a 4% to 5% advantage in thrust for Azipod CZ, even without taking into account the differences in mechanical losses (about 5%) and electric motor efficiencies (3%).

When taking into account all factors, the Azipod CZ needs 12% less power than the traditional mechanical thruster to give the same effective thrust. |||

azipod cz

Typically, semi-submersibles are designed so that the wake from a thruster interacts with the hull and neighbouring thrusters. To reduce the effects of thruster hull interactions, it has become common to tilt the nozzles downwards and subsequently direct the wake away from the pontoons. For a conventional azimuthing thruster, the further the nozzle is tilted downwards the more efficiency is lost. Operators must thus accept a trade off between thrust gained and efficiency lost.

In the case of the Azipod CZ unit, tilting can be arranged simply by adjusting the angle of the propeller shaft line relative to the horizontal plane. This is possible because there is no mechanical power transmission connection to the motor module. With the Azipod CZ unit, the decrease in unit efficiency does not come into play because there is no change in the relative angle between the nozzle and propeller.

In order to visualize the benefits of tilting, a full scale depiction of the distribution of the axial velocity across the vertical section though the propeller centre is presented in Fig.5. It can be seen that the jet does not touch the pontoon and there is no influence on the thruster jet from the pontoon.

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Drilling vessel advances authors:

drilling vessel advances

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Jorulf Nergard – jorulf.nergard@no.abb.com ||| Alf-Kåre Adnanes – alf-kare.adnanes@no.abb.com

from 2005, a large increase in the number of drilling vessels ordered for deep sea drilling operations was witnesses, and the first of these are now delivered or in a delivery phase. These rigs are designed for operation with dynamic positioning and an electric power plant that supplies the drilling load, thruster systems, and other vessel systems.

It is essential that the electric power systems on board achieve the lowest possible down-time and, should such black-out conditions apply; systems must be restored as quickly as possible to avoid severe consequences for the drilling operations or damages to the well and equipment.

ABB has delivered the electrical systems for about half of the DP drilling vessels on order, based on solutions developed over years in the drilling market. The performance in operation has been good, although there is always potential to enhance operational efficiency while maintaining and improving safety performance. ABB’s focus has been and is, to maintain simplicity in the design of power plant, in order to make it possible to assess and test the system, as well to enable safe operation by the crew. The fundamentals of ABB’s design approach has been to use advanced and high performance products to achieve best possible performance while utilizing standard products as far as possible, in order to secure resources for commissioning and service, and spare parts over the products’ life time.

drilling vessels Recent years have seen energetic building activity in the drilling vessel sector, including jack-up rigs, semi-submersible rigs, and drill ships.

Although the financial crisis has led to a slow-down in ordering of new-builds, it is still expected that there will be a need for further deep sea drilling vessels as demand for harder to reach oil and gas reserves inevitably grows.

ABB’s scope of supply to the drilling market is: – Drilling drives and drilling drives control, low voltage

– Thruster drives with control systems, medium and low voltage – Electric power generation and distribution systems, medium and low voltage – Azimuthing electric podded thrusters, the Azipod CZ Being a total system integrator, the company’s scope of supply also includes services during and after the projects, such as: – Project management, being the overall responsible for the delivery – Project engineering, producing the documentation and studies needed for yard to construct, install, and commission the vessel, as well as providing the data for the classification society that is needed for the certification of the electrical plant and equipment – Site support, depending on buyer’s request, typically commissioning and sea trial support, but also site management, installation supervision, and engineering support – Warranty and after sales services Typical single line diagrams for semi-submersible rigs and drillships are shown in Figure 1-2, and an exemplary configuration for a drilling drive system is shown in Figure 3.

As can be seen, segregation and redundancy is key for the design of the system. Failures in one redundant, segregated part should have minimal or no consequences for the parallel paths of the power flow to redundantly installed equipment. In the industry, there has been a long term concern over how to ensure that such fault integrity can be designed into the system and, ensuring that protection and controls continue operate as was originally intended once a severe fault occurs. The traditional approach to avoid full black-out has been to operate the redundant systems without connections, i.e. in a split mode. However, this is not the most fuel efficient or environmentally sound

AC

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drilling vessel advances

Figure 1: A typical electric power configuration for a DP class 3 semisubmersible drilling rig.

AC

AC AC

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AC AC

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AC AC

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Drilling package AC Multidrive

Figure 2: A typical electric power configuration for a DP class 3 drillship

way to operate diesel engines and, increasingly, the demand for more energy-efficient solutions has driven owners to ask for redundant systems operating in parallel. It is also the case that splitting any system into smaller subsystems increases the probability for partial black-outs (or loss of parts of the system), because each system will be more vulnerable to disturbances. Although there will always be sufficient power to continue operations drawing on other sources of power, such partial failures bring disturbances to the operations, which can trigger secondary incidents.

Now, classification societies are more open to discuss and approve operation with closed bus ties and transfer feeders in DP class 3 installations, but they will also often require additional protective functionality in the system than has been explicitly specified in

the rules and regulations to accept the fault tolerance of the system. fundamental design principles The design basis for a drilling vessels is not in principle distinct from other vessel types, with exception of the fact that a drilling vessel normally has more propeller/thruster units, both in number and in terms of power. While in other ship types, a system that is split in two, with 50% redundancy, is often acceptable for safe manoeuvring of the vessel, DP requirements for rigs normally lead to a N+1 redundant configuration, where safe operation and DP capability must be maintained with N of the redundant paths in operation. This represents a trade-off between total installed power and cost of installation and components. Typically, four-split solu-

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Braking resistors

Drilling motor drives

Figure 3: The drilling drives are typically multidrives with a common DC bus

drilling vessel advances

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Figure 4: An electric power configuration with change-over for two of the thrusters

tions will be applied to semi-submersible rigs, while three-split solutions are used in drill ships, as shown in Figure 1 and 2.

In order to increase capability after single failure, further change-over connections for generators and thrusters may need to be installed. Change-over connections always complicate the system, and must be carefully studied in order to make sure that the change-over logic is reliable and sufficiently fast. All equipment auxiliaries will also need to be supplied on he basis of redundancy, using the same segregation rule as is the case for the main power system. When done properly, and throughout the complete installation – including ventilation, water cooling, fuel and lube oil supplies, etc.- this can be a way of reducing overall costs, while also maximizing the weather window for operations. Different class societies have different policies on the use of change-over in DP vessels and capability analysis.

ABB has made a primary goal of achieving the simplest possible segregation, minimizing cross con-

nections and inter-dependencies across redundancy segregation lines, in order to avoid hidden single points of failures. Its design philosophy rests on the contention that a simple configuration is a safe configuration to operate. When change-over circuits are needed, utmost care must be taken by the designer of the electric plant, but also by the yard, by the supplier of automation systems and power management system, as well as the DP. concerns in operation with closed bus ties and transfer feeders

From the available incident reports on faults in DP operations, there are some which are distinctly linked to operations with closed bus ties and transfer feeders. These areas should be approached one by one so that they can be better understood, and their possible solutions explored: 1. Fault in the generator’s automatic voltage regulator (avr) leading to over excitation.

Classification rules demand that generators are protected against under excitation in order to avoid the very large disturbances that follow a pole slippage, or loss of synchronism. If few generators are in parallel, or the reactive load in the plant is low, as is typical in new installations using variable speed AC thrusters and drilling drives, one generator entering over excitation may produce more reactive power than the load demands.

The remaining reactive power is then taken up by the parallel, healthy generators and, if coming under the set-point for under excitation, the healthy generators will trip and the system will black-out or experience a severe overvoltage, tripping trip the consumers.

Normal protection functions cannot always prevent such failures and special monitoring and protection functions are thus required. Accordingly, ABB has developed the DGMS (Diesel-Generator Monitoring System), which is a PLC based solution that supplements the required protection scheme by class to improve fault detection in more complex fault scenarios.

2. Fault in the diesel engine’s automatic speed regulator (governor) leading to over fuelling.

Similarly, the classification rules require a reverse power trip of the diesel engines in order to disconnect engines that are severely out of load sharing by a fault.

However, should one of a set of diesel engines operating in parallel experience a governor fault leading to

5. Other severe disturbances that bring voltage or frequency out of the tolerances of the system (+/10%), such as connecting a generator out of synchronism, loss of synchronism, trip of a large load, e.g. motor during start-up.

Here, the system has to be protected against outof-tolerance voltage quality, to avoid larger failures and damages of equipment and installation. If such conditions are found, and the reason for the fault goes undetected, it may be an acceptable solution to split the system into sub-sections, in order to avoid full black-out by ensuring that only the faulty part of the system loses power. Such conditions must be carefully discussed with all stake-holders and suppliers, in order to get an overall coordinated approach. diesel-generator monitoring system ABB’s DGMS was developed in 2003, on a request to reduce the black-out risk for DP vessels from malfunction of the governor and AVR. The DGMS functions are implemented in ABB’s AC800M programmable controller, with coordinated protection functions with the main switchboard. Typically, there will be one controller per switchboard, but it can also be distributed further to each diesel-generator set.

Principally, the DGMS consists of two functions: Voting – The voting algorithm can be used when three or more generators are connected in parallel. The principle is that if one of the diesel engines or generators starts to behave differently from the others, and unexpectedly in the context of the system’s overall behaviour, it will be tripped from the plant before leading to out-of-rated operation of the diesel-generator sets operating in parallel.

Correlation – By monitoring the production or consumption of active and reactive power by the diesel-generator set, and correlating this with the behaviour of the electric power plant, it is possible to detect whether the governor or AVR are behaving correctly.

If misbehaviour of a unit is detected, the faulty diesel generator will trip before bringing the remaining system out-of-rated condition.

The DGMS can easily be integrated in new-build deliveries as well as in retrofit applications, with a minimum impact and re-instrumentation of the switchboard.

In a DP vessel, the load reduction function is

drilling vessel advances

a full or too high flow of fuel to the engine, this can produce more power than the load demands, and the excess power will then be taken up by the remaining healthy engines as reverse power. Consequently, the healthy engines trip and the system will black out.

The DGMS is a combined protection system, which is also designed to detect and act on such faults.

3. Tripping of a generator, leading to overload and trip of paralleled diesel generator sets.

This may happen when the diesel engines are heavily loaded; or if they are not able to pick up the large power increase when a generator operating in a parallel mode is suddenly tripping from the switchboard. Such unexpected trips can be due to a failure in the diesel engine, or its control system, and can happen relatively frequent.

This can only be solved by a fast reduction in loads. Earlier, using constant speed electric motors for thrusters and other vessel loads, this could only be achieved by load shedding. Today, using variable speed drives, much better control of the actual load power is possible, where advanced and ultrafast response times are available in the DTC® controls of the motors to achieve load reduction times of less than 300ms, which is typically the limit needed to avoid black-out in the most severe conditions.

4. Short circuits in the system that the protection relays of the bus ties and transfer feeders do not react selectively to.

When deploying Protective Device Coordination (PDC), it is common engineering practice to use quasi-stationary methods. However, one must consider that the system is highly dynamic, and when a short circuit occurs, voltages, currents, and the generator’s pole angles are not in a stationary condition at the immediate instant after being cleared. Oscillations and power fluctuations may occur, as well as simultaneous disturbances to the power plant from other protection systems, such as the power ride through functions of the drives.

Since all these aspects are not possible to take into consideration by simulations or analysis; it is therefore essential that the PDC is made with sufficient margins in magnitude and time delays for protection devices, in order to as far as possible achieve the intended selectivity. These margins are based on established engineering methods, and experienced behaviour.

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10 sec

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0.1 sec

VSI Drives FPP load red

0.01 sec 100%

200%

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Load x MCR

Figure 5: the typical reaction times associated with the different load reduction functions in a typical DP vessel.

drilling vessel advances

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traditionally made by the Power Management System and the DP control system. However, experience shows that these systems traditionally, and to some extent even today, are not fast enough to avoid overload conditions of the diesel engines. In the early 1990s, when fixed speed and controllable pitch thrusters were applied, this was a severe concern for the fault tolerance of an electric power plant in DP vessels.

The appearance of total black-outs is, according to statistics, being reduced as DP vessels have started to utilize variable speed drive thrusters, and more advanced and digital protection systems have become commonly applied.

A key factor in avoiding black-out is to ensure that the load is being precisely controlled, within an ultra short response time. Response times may differ, based on the diesel engine’s capability to pick up power, the extent of the engine load, and on whether there is a large difference in engine ratings. A general guide is not to exceed 300 ms after a generator trips, until the load has been reduced to the necessary level to avoid overload of the remaining running engines. This includes complete loops, such as measurement delays, algorithm sampling times, communication speed, and finally the reaction time of the motor drive itself.

With the DTC® motor controllers used in ACS800 and ACS6000 thruster drives, and ACS800 multidrives for drilling, ABB says that the response time of the motor drive is limited by the dynamics of the motor, typically in the range of some 10 ms. This leaves more time for the power management system to react, and if still not sufficient, the drive controllers can monitor the power plant directly to get information more quickly about any imbalance between power supply and de-

mand, so the prompt action can be take, well within the limit of guidance. Figure 5 shows the typical reaction times associated with the different load reduction functions in a typical DP vessel. black-out restoration

Should a black-out occur, in spite of all protection functions, it is of ultimate importance that the power system is restored safely, and without more delays than necessary.

The acceptable restoration time will depend on the water depth of drilling, and what kind of drilling system is being installed. One should approach this in a realistic way, and avoid demands such as “as fast as possible”; since this may well lead to a system which appears to have a good performance, though ends up in a very complex solution, as well as new and possibly hidden fault modes.

Once the restoration time target is set, several subsystems must be coordinated and optimized in order to achieve the target. The most critical factor is the time sequencing of the automation system. A thorough review and optimization of the time sequence in the black-out restoration logic, with involvement from diesel engine makers, and supplier of electric power plant is highly recommended to achieve the best results.

For systems where the restoration time is more demanding, it is possible to avoid time intervals in the start-up sequence by keeping smaller or larger parts of the system alive during the black-out, using either a battery or emergency supply.

There are several ways to achieve the target, but most important of all, is defining the target as early as possible in the design phase, and involving all parties in the coordination. |||

Winch control program improves operational safety and performance of marine winches Mikael Holmberg - mikael.holmberg@fi.abb.com ||| Tuomo Tarula - tuomo.tarula@fi.abb.com

abb has launched a new winch control program designed to overcome the high maintenance costs and performance inefficiencies associated with the type of hydraulic winch controllers traditionally used in anchoring and mooring.

Specified for use with ABB industrial drives ranging from 0.55 to 5600 kW. The new program is also said to improve operator safety and overall system reliability.

ABB’s industrial drive incorporates direct torque control (DTC), which can achieve full torque at zero speed without the need for a feedback encoder. In the harsh marine environment, on-deck feedback encoders can often be damaged, or interfere with the motor feedback signal.

ABB’s latest winch control program incorporates built-in programmable logic controller (PLC) features, enabling the drive to be used without any external PLC. The winch application can be programmed within the PLC, communicating with the ABB industrial drive via fieldbus gateways.

winch interface Using the ABB industrial drive’s digital I/Os, along with the winch control program, the winch can be operated directly from three control stands, typically located on the port, starboard and upper deck of a vessel. This lets the operator control the speed of the winch while in a harbour, for example, from anywhere on the vessel, regardless of whether the vessel is coming alongside on port or starboard.

Thus, a control stand can be operated with the other two stands disabled or with all three stands active at the same time. From whichever stand, an operator can start and stop, or by way of a joystick, raise or lower the winch. The system also features a complete set of protection functions to safeguard the health and safety of personnel working close to the winch.

Figure 1: A winch control program is launched for use with ABB industrial drives and can be used in different control system configurations found within the marine environment, including winch, anchoring or mooring. anchor control Using the new program, an anchor mode can be selected from each control stand, so that the winch can raise or lower an anchor. This procedure requires careful speed control, so that it is vital that the operator manually controls the joystick at his chosen stand.

Built-in protection functions include a high load slip-detection feature on the chain, to identify any snagging when raising the anchor. High loads can also create a speed difference between the winch drum and the motor shaft and activate a load switch. In this case, the speed/torque of the winch motor is immediately reduced, to a level set by the winch manufacturer. This prevents damage to the motor shaft, winch drum or clutch between the drum and motor.

A further protection feature is anchor-in protection. As the anchor is being raised and reaches its limit, winch control detects the anchor winch speed and motor torque level, together with the relative length of the chain. It then slows down the winch automatically, allowing the operator to complete the task manually, controlling the joystick to the zero position.

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winch control program

mooring control When mooring a vessel to a harbour or pier, the tension within the mooring ropes can be controlled manually from any of the three control stands using winch control, while staying in full view of the rope movement. Without winch control, there is a risk that the force within the rope becomes too high, resulting in the rope breaking. As this is a speed control application, winch control detects the high force in the rope through changes in the torque and controls the speed accordingly.

Peak torque protection – the name given to the prevention of rope breakage – is a feature that detects severe tightening of the rope and immediately sends a signal to adjust the speed, thereby saving the rope and protecting the winch system from overload. Here, speed and torque is reduced to a level that the operator can control before the mechanical brake is applied and locked or change over to the ‘auto mooring’ mode.

mechanical brake control logic and torque

Additionally, the program features an integrated brake control logic, which in turn uses torque memory and pre-magnetizing to open and close the mechanical brake safely and reliably.

Safety is further enhanced by using brake feedback status from the brake hardware to the drive’s I/O board to monitor brake status compared to drive run/ stop status. memory

adaptive programming The drive also features adaptive programming. This block function programming technique is included as standard and allows winch features to be changed or modified on-site without having to wait for further software upgrades from the manufacturer. |||

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Figure 2: A key benefit of the ABB industrial drive is its motor control platform, direct torque control (DTC).

DTC enables the drive to achieve full torque at zero speed without the need for a feedback encoder.

Fuel saving concepts with electric propulsion for OSV and AHTS Tor Arne Myklebust – tor-arne.myklebust@no.abb.com

The use of electric propulsion in certain ship segments, such as platform supply vessels is well known. The technologies have developed continuously, and today there are several approaches to reach the “optimal design” that reduces fuel consumption and environmental footprint, simplifies design and construction with better utilization of the on-board space, and creates a better working environment for the crew. Reducing fuel consumption and operational costs have been the driving forces for this development; and the economic benefits have been shown to be significant. For no rational reason, until recently less attention has been paid to applying electric propulsion to anchor handlers, but now this segment too has shown a willingness for change.

Even though the suppliers of electric power and propulsion plants utilize building blocks that are principally based on the same fundamental concepts, there is a range of different configurations and preferences in the market. While technical arguments for the concept may be to some extent influenced by the need to secure sales, it is still necessary for ship owners, yards, and designers to evaluate and compare information given to make their systems selections.

Common for all configurations, electric propulsion is claimed to have demonstrated substantial fuel reduction compared to direct mechanical propulsion for offshore support vessels. The fuel savings are shown to be in the range of 15-25% in typical operation profiles, and even up to 40%-50% in pure DP operations.

Generally; the following criteria will be important when comparing products, systems, and services, although their weighting and importance may vary over time and between various applications: – Cost efficient building and installation – Flexibility in design that improves ship utilization – High safety for crew – High safety for operations – Continuous availability to propulsion and station keeping systems – Reduced fuel consumption introduction

– Reduced impact on the external environment, lower emissions – Improved working environment for the crew – Low maintenance costs – Availability to maintenance during the life cycle of the ship – Availability to maintenance in the region of operation, often world-wide – Spare parts availability – Remote and on-board support – Minimizing constraints of operations leading to non-optimal performance – Reducing negative consequences for other equipment – High ice breaking and ice management performance for ice breakers

fuel saving concepts

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77 fuel saving with electric propulsion system

By introducing electric propulsion, the shaft between the main engine and the propeller is replaced by a system comprising of generators, switchboards, transformers, drives and motors. This system has an efficiency of approximately 90%, meaning that there are additional losses that have to be accounted for in some way. The variation of losses between the different electric topologies is limited. However, electric losses are always small compared to the hydrodynamic losses of the propellers and the combustion efficiency in the main engines. Therefore, by introducing electric losses, and at the same time reducing hydrodynamic and combustion losses, the total losses can be reduced.

The key characteristics of electric propulsion that leads to reduced fuel consumption are: - Variable speed control of the propeller, reducing no-load losses of the propellers to a minimum compared with classical fixed speed, controllable pitch propellers - Automatic start and stop of diesel engines, ensuring that the load of the diesel engines are kept as close to their optimal operating point as possible within the limitation of operations.

230 V

Bow Thruster

Bow Thruster

fuel saving concepts

Port Side populsion and shaft gen.

Distribution

Stbd Side propulsion and shaft gen.

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Figure 1 – Top: Conventional direct mechanical propulsion, Bottom: Electric propulsion concept for OSV

The classical design of an offshore support vessel, including the AHTS, is to use fixed speed propellers with controllable pitch. As shown in Fig. 2, compared to variable speed control of the propeller, this is a very inefficient way of controlling the thrust, due to the high no-load losses of the fixed speed propellers. This alone contributes to most of the savings in electric propulsion when applied to offshore vessels. As also seen, the utilization of the thruster capacity in DP operations is very low for most of the operational days in the North Sea, even though this is regarded as a harsh environment.

The other major impact of electric propulsion flows from its potential to offer more optimal loading of the diesel engines, by using a number of smaller engines, compared to one or few larger units. Fig. 3 shows that, depending on the load, the automatic start and stop of the engines yields better loading, thus reducing fuel consumption.

For a 200+ tonne bollard pull anchor handling vessel (AHTS), fuel consumption has been calculated as being close to 1900 tonnes lower when electric propulsion is used. The operational profile is regarded as typical for operations (note: not in contractual terms, but in load condition), as shown in Fig. 4.

The required installed propulsive power for an AHTS is higher than in is the case for a normal offshore supply vessel. Therefore, the cost of the propulsion systems and installation is also higher. In traditional AHTS designs, the design is very much optimized

Figure 3: Fuel consumption per kWh produced energy. For four equally sized diesel engines in parallel, with automatic start and stop functionality of power management system, compared with one large diesel engine providing same total power (yellow dotted line). fuel saving concepts

Figure 2: Comparison of shaft power vs provided thrust from fixed speed controllable pitch propeller (CPP) and variable speed fixed pitch propeller (FPP), and an example of the utilization of the thruster capacity in DP operations in the North Sea.

Hourly Fuel Oil Comsuption kg/h

Anchor handling Bollard Pull Condition Transit Towing Transit Supply DP/Standby HI DP/Standby LO Harbor Total FOC kr//year Total FOC m.t./year Difference, m.t./year Total FOC m.t./year

Base Case D-Mech 2280 2451 1898 1276 1377 1015 26

11 293 005 11293 0

Electric Propulsion 2295 2795 2053 1036 1020 620 25

Operation Profile 438 88 1314 2190 1402 2803 526

9 396 661 9 397 1896 Difference, m.t./year

Figure 4: Calculated comparison between electric propulsion and direct mechanical propulsion in terms of fuel consumption for a 200+ tonne bollard pull AHTS

around the building costs, and around obtaining the guaranteed bollard pull. In the past, less emphasis has been placed on operational costs when designing and selecting propulsion concepts.

With today’s unpredictable fuel prices, and environmental concerns mounting, this is subject to change, and now there are several vessel designs that have been brought forward, where the operational

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Aux gen.

1665kW 2000kVA pf 0.8 900RPM 3200kVA pr 0.9 G 2x3500kW 900RPM 1300 kVA 800kVA

2x3500kW G 900RPM

690V, 60Hz

3200kVA pr 0.9

3250 kVA

3259kVA M

450V Distribution

M M Bow Thruster 883kW 1200 RPM

2700kW 1200 RPM

Az Thruster 1100kW 200RPM

6500 kW

450V

M 2700kW 1200 RPM

6500 kW

800kVA

M Aft Thruster 883kW 1200 RPM

Figure 5: Hybrid electric and mechanical propulsion for 200+ metric ton AHTS. fuel saving concepts

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costs, and especially the fuel consumption has become a primary area of focus.

An alternative to the full electric solution is the combination of mechanical and electric propulsion systems, the so-called hybrid propulsion, Fig. 5. Here, the vessel can be operated in either; - Full electric propulsion, for low speed manoeuvring, transit, and DP - Full mechanic propulsion, for tugging and high speed transit - Hybrid (combined) electric and mechanic propulsion, where electrical equipment can be used as a booster for the mechanical propulsion system to maximize bollard pull.

In terms of installation costs, such hybrid solutions are cheaper than pure electric solutions, and will in fuel cost terms be quite similar in their consumption.

Therefore, several new AHTS designs are based on such hybrid solutions, especially those with high bollard pull.

However, one should not disregard the increased mechanical complexity of such hybrid systems, where the crew needs to be more active and manually select operational modes optimal for prevailing conditions. In pure electric propulsion systems, it is much easier to optimize the configuration of the power and propulsion plant automatically, ensuring that the system will always operate as closely as is possible to optimal conditions, either without or with minimal manual interaction.

concluding remarks OSVs and now, gradually, AHTS vessels have come to feature electric propulsion in order to reduce fuel oil consumption, environmental emissions, and operational costs. Most vendors utilize similar basic components and solutions, even though the composition of such systems and preferences in design may differ to some extent – often depending on the maker’s available technologies.

For AHTS vessels, traditional designs have been strongly optimized to obtain guaranteed bollard pull abd minimum building costs, with the consequence being high fuel consumption, and substantial environmental emissions, especially CO2, when compared to electric propulsion.

Much of the same savings may be achieved by using hybrid electric and mechanic propulsion, at a lower building cost than is the case with pure electric propulsion. However, increased complexity means that the crew need to intervene more frequently to select the optimal configuration for varying operations.

To summarize; electric propulsion systems make fuel savings possible through the flexible operation of the vessel, even though the system itself introduces “new” losses in the energy chain. Efforts can, of course, be made to reduce these “new” losses, but in order to maximize the benefits of electric propulsion; a high focus should be on designing a simple, reliable and flexible system. |||

Harmonic mitigation, physics and solutions Tor Arne Myklebust – tor-arne.myklebust@no.abb.com ||| Jan Fredrik Hansen – jan-fredrik.hansen@no.abb.com

The basic topologies for the variable speed drive (VSD) are relatively similar among the various suppliers when applied to electric propulsion.

From a ship application perspective, the main technical differences relate to how these products are put together in a system configuration for electric power generation, distribution, and propulsion/station-keeping. Several system configurations are applied, of which the most common ones are shown in Fig. 1. For each main configuration, there may be several variants, chosen to optimize the system to each vessel’s actual requirements.

The main challenge in system design is to meet class requirements and ship specific requirements at a minimum total cost including equipment and installation costs, and still achieve the best possible life cycle economy. Each vessel may have its own specific requirements, e.g. space may be a scarce resource or not in a given design. Propulsion transformers are large and heavy equipment, and some prefer “transformer-less” solution, such as the 6-pulse, active rectifier, or the Q12-pulse with phase shifted main voltages, but it should be noted that there are penalties in selecting such options.

Fig. 1 shows the most common configurations for low voltage VSI frequency converters. Here, the rectifier may be of different types, depending on the requirements for each installations and the makers’ preference; introduction

– 6-pulse diode rectifier is the simplest design, with a full bridge passive rectifier – or several in parallel, if necessary, to achieve the desired power level. The AC supply voltage is rectified to form a DC voltage, of approximately 1.35 times the supply line voltage at full load; i.e. a 690V supply gives approximately a 930V DC link voltage at full load; depending on voltage drop and commutation impedance in the supply. The 6-pulse rectifier does not need any supply transformer unless it is necessary to adapt

the voltage. Hence, size and weight is minimized.

However, the harmonic distortion from the line currents is high – in the order of 25-30% THDi, resulting in a voltage distortion THDu of more than 10%. In order to achieve the 5% limit as specified in IEC, which most classification societies have now also adopted, either harmonic filtering or clean power supply are necessary. A harmonic filter at the distribution switchboard will reduce the distortion at this voltage level and below, but this will hardly have any impact on the distortion at the main switchboard. The main switchboard must thus be designed to tolerate a high level of voltage and current distortion, and must be documented accordingly, as specified in class rules.

harmonic mitigation

authors:

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– 12- and quasi 24-pulse configurations look similar, with two paralleled diode rectifiers; but the quasi-24 pulse (Q24) VSD transformers are made in pairs of two and two with a 15 deg phase shift between the two in each pair. Depending on load conditions in the prospective operational profile and system parameters, 12-pulse configuration may meet the requirements of voltage distortion set by class. For most cases, however, the worst case operational scenario will lead to a THDu in the range of 6-8%, which is above the limit set by most classification societies, unless harmonic filtering is used. The Q24-pulse rectifier utilizes the same rectifier topology as the 12-pulse rectifier, but since the supply voltages are phase-shifted through the supply transformers, the resulting distortion at the main switchboard is reduced. At ideal conditions, where the loads of the VSDs in each pair are equal, the harmonic distortion will be equivalent to a 24-pulse configuration. Under other conditions, a partial cancellation of the largest harmonic components will occur, and the harmonic distortion will, in most installations, be under the 5% THDu limit in any practical operational mode.

6-pulse – No drive transformers – Harmonic filters needed to get THD<5% – Weight: Low – Footprint: Low – Operational constraints: Medium – Total efficiency: Approx: 90-91% 12- and quasi 24-pulse – 3-winding transformers, phase shift for Q24 – Harmonic filters for 12-pulse, not Q24 – Weight: High – Footprint: High – Operational constraints: Low/medium – Total efficiency: Approx: 90%

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Quasi 12-pulse with phase shifted mains voltages /5/: – No drive transformers, oversized distribution transformers for power transfer – Weight: Medium – Footprint: Medium – Operational constraints: High – Total efficiency: Approx: 90% included harmonic losses in generators and distribution transformer

24-pulse: – 5-winding transformers (or 2 x 3-winding) – No harmonic filters – Weight: High – Footprint: High – Operational constraints: Low – Total efficiency: Approx: 90%

Active rectifiers: – No drive transformers – High frequency input filters for harmonics – Weight: Low – Footprint: Medium – Operational constraints: Low / Medium – Total efficiency: Approx: 90-91% Glossary: 690V: Main switchboard voltage, 440V: Main distribution voltage, G: Generator, M: Motor (Propulsors and thrusters), FC: Frequency Converter, AR: Active Rectifier, DC/AC: Inverter.

Figure 1: Alternative system configurations with main characteristics. 690V Main SWBD voltage is shown, high voltage, e.g.

6.6kV is used when generator capacity typically exceeds about 10MW.

– 24-pulse configurations consist of four parallel 6-pulse rectifiers, each supplied from phase-shifted voltages through one 5-winding transformer, or two parallel 3-winding transformers. This configuration normally generates distortion under the 5% limit, without constraints in operation. Normally, the transformer will be larger and more expensive than a 3-winding transformer of equivalent rating, and depending on the rating of the diode rectifiers, the size and price of the transformer may also increase. The 18-pulse configuration utilizes the same concept, but with only three parallel 6-pulse rectifiers and a 4-winding transformer. Here, the THDu will also normally be within the 5% limit but, compared to the 24-pulse topology, the total price and size will be of the same order due to the complex transformer design. 18-pulse rectifiers are therefore rarely in use today.

– For some time, active rectifiers with switching elements have been applied in demanding industrial applications, especially where load characteristics require regenerative braking to such an extent that it is beneficial to use this energy by feeding it back to the network. For propulsors and thrusters, regenerative energy is normally negligible when fuel and cost of energy are assessed. However, since the rectifier consists of switching devices, the current can be similarly shaped to the motor current and with much lower distortion than the currents of a diode rectifier. Even though the classical harmonic filters can then be avoided without using drive transformers, there are ample harmonic voltages caused by switching - with high frequencies and high levels of electromagnetic noise - that must be filtered with high frequency (HF) filters. There is limited experience in the use of active rectifiers in the type of weak electric power systems found on vessels, and in complex systems with many drives and a range of operating conditions, it is challenging to perform a complete system analysis of any mode and configuration in order to detect and

avoid possible resonance effects from the numerous combined parallel HF filters. As the switching elements are more costly than diode rectifiers, the cost of the frequency converter increases, and its losses will also be higher; reducing the benefit of avoiding losses in the drive transformer.

The 6-pulse and Q12-pulse solutions normally require some kind of harmonic filter installations, unless significant restrictions and constraints of operations are applied, which may cause deterioration in the fuel economy of prime movers and limitations of operational windows for the vessel. In particular, the Q12-pulse solution depends on a complex main switchboard with two feeders to each frequency converter, in order that loads can be balanced in a way crucial to maximum performance. Each feeder will carry a 6-pulse current that, to some extent, will enter the respective generators on the switchboard, or flow through the two primary sides of the distribution transformers. Again, to some extent, the resulting additional losses will counteract the benefits of avoiding the losses in the drives transformer.

Active rectifiers increase the number of active components in the installation and the complexity of the installation, as each of the rectifiers requires a HF harmonic filter that introduces resonance modes into the installations that should not be excited by the switching frequency of the rectifier. Also, the size and costs of the frequency converter itself will increase, as will power losses in the rectifier, partly counteracting the benefits of the transformer-less design.

Hence, there exists no one “ideal” design for all vessels. Different solutions have different characteristics, and only when considering the requirements and limitations for a particular vessel design can the best solution be applied. harmonic filterning and clean power supplies

Frequency converters are inherently non-linear components due to the switching characteristics of the rectifier components, meaning that they do not draw sinusoidal currents from the network, even though they are fed by sinusoidal voltages.

The non-sinusoidal currents passing into the rectifier consist of a fundamental component and a series of harmonic components, with a wide range of fre-

harmonic mitigation

Certain constraints in operations may be necessary in order to guarantee this. However, the Q24-pulse configuration is regarded as being a cost efficient way of meeting class requirements for most OSVs.

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quencies that depends on the rectifier type and system configuration. For the type of converters that have the highest level of current distortion, typically those with 6-pulse, 12-pulse, and Q12-pulse rectifiers, the level of harmonic distortion in the currents may lead to voltage distortions that are above class limits. Most class societies now have adapted the IEC 60092-101 requirement. In the case of ABS, the following guidance is given :

Even when generator and transformer design in the plant has been optimized, the limit of the applicable regulation can exceeded using the selected frequency converter and system configuration, but there are still several ways to manage the level of harmonic distortion.

For example, a harmonic filter can be applied.

There are two main types for harmonic filters; passive

LC filters (alternatively damped LCR), as shown in Fig. 2 and active filters, shown in Fig. 3. For ship applications, passive filters are more commonly applied, partly due to their lower cost, but especially because they can be used at lower voltage levels in the distribution system to filter the voltage distortion, not necessarily across the complete installation, but for the sensitive equipment only.

Active filters are similar to the active rectifier in frequency converters, in that they offer a topology with switching elements, like IGBT, for low voltage systems. However, while the active rectifier is designed to draw sinusoidal currents from the network, the active filters measure the distorted load currents, and cancel the harmonic components of the VSD, by injecting the harmonic current with a 180 deg phase-shift into the power plant.

Both methods are efficient filters; it is normally a matter of economy as to which solution is selected.

Introducing capacitive components in an inherently inductive network, as is the case when passive filters are used, must be done with care as it introduces not only the desired series resonance to achieve low

One stage passive LC filter; un-damped

Two stage passive LC filter; un-damped

The total harmonic distortion (THD) in the voltage waveform in the distribution system is not to exceed 5% and in any single order harmonics not to exceed 3%. Other values may be accepted provided the distribution equipment and consumers are designed to operate at the higher limits.

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Aggregated Generator/motor model

Aggregated Generator/motor model

First order 11th harm undamped LC filter

First order undamped LC filter

Frequency scan

Frequency scan

Figure 2: Passive LC filters, Left: One stage for filtering of one (5th) harmonic frequency; Right: A two stage filter, here for filtering 5th and 11th harmonic components.

First order 5th harm undamped LC filter

impedance current paths for the harmonic currents of concern, but also parallel resonances that may cause excessive distortion globally or locally in the installation, if they are excited by harmonic currents. Therefore, when including harmonic passive filters, an extensive system analysis must be undertaken to ensure that such parallel resonances that will always exist are not excited. Active filters are less vulnerable to such parallel resonances, but they also need HF harmonic filters in their feeders to avoid high frequency harmonics and common mode noise that distorts the network.

Until a few years ago, it was quite common to install a clean power supply, where the distorted network was decoupled from the supply to sensitive equipment by using either rotating or static converters, as shown in Fig. 4. With the exception of the UPS supply, which is a class requirement for a range of navigation and control equipment, the clean power supplies are less often used today, where today’s class rules normally require the general power distribution system to fulfil stringent requirements on harmonic distortion.

In designing electric plant for OSVs with electric propulsion, it may appear that there are large variations in the basic technologies being offered by different makers. However, this is not necessarily the case. Most vendors utilize similar concluding remarks

harmonic mitigation

Figure 3: An active rectifier can measure the non-linear current and compensate “instantaneous” its harmonic distortion. Some filters need one or more periods to calculate the harmonic components that shall be compensated.

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Figure 4: Clean power supplies; from top: Rotating motorgenerator set; Static frequency converter; Static frequency converter with battery back-up (UPS)

basic components and solutions, even though the composition of their systems and preferences in design may differ to some extent – often depending on the maker’s available technologies.

In order to understand and assess the technical arguments for different solutions, it is important to focus on the effects of the technology on safety, performance, and life cycle economy, rather than preferring one specific technology above another. |||

Offshore drives deliver the full package authors:

offshore drives

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Bo Hademalm – bo.hademalm@sg.abb.com ||| Sami Halabeya – sami.halabeya@sg.abb.com

introduction ABB is a worldwide supplier of drilling drive systems for the offshore industry. ABB offers a full range of environmentally friendly drive products for offshore and onshore drilling vessels and subsea production systems. ABB’s comprehensive product range enables it to deliver complete system packages or key components whilst managing the interfaces on behalf of the customer.

ABB’s drilling drive system delivery to a drilling vessel is a complete package consisting of drilling drive switchboards, high voltage transformers and dynamic braking resistors. As a total partner to our customers, the complete system from design and engineering to service and support can be provided. Each system will be designed to meet the particular process conditions on the vessel.

All ABB products form part of ABB’s Industrial IT philosophy, which allows all automation products to be easily integrated within a plant, thereby bringing significant production efficiencies and reduced costs to our customers. Extensive range of electrical products combined with true global support ensures global availability and service for the drilling vessel owners and operators ABB has been a driving force of development in oil and gas drilling drive technologies for over 30 years.

SCR drive systems together with DC motors constituted the bulk of ABB’s early deliveries to this market. But this changed in 1993 when ABB delivered the world’s first AC drilling drive system to the giant Troll A gas platform in the North Sea. This installation marked the beginning of a new industry standard for new build drilling rig drive systems. Since then, ABB has continued to develop its SCR products in parallel with AC variable speed drives, and remained at the forefront of this technology, serving the demands of both retrofit and new build drilling vessel markets.

The latest pioneering innovations in frequency converters offer comprehensive solutions and largescale savings in one package. The modular, yet simple

construction of the system allows optimized drilling operations and high availability. ABB drilling drives offer responsive, high-accuracy speed and torque control. They have excellent dynamic characteristics in the entire range from zero to maximum speed. technology Due to the nature of the drilling vessel operation, the reliability of the equipment has become more and more critical. In response to this ABB is continuously studying and working on improving the design, both electrical and mechanical to make it more robust and fault tolerant, e.g. to have a system where a single point of failure do not affect the overall operation but only the affected drive. drilling drive transformers The type of transformers used for the ABB drilling drive system have been manufactured by ABB for over 30 years, we have produced and supplied this type, epoxy resin transformers all over the world.

RESIBLOC® transformers answer to the need for a safe, reliable transformer designed to fulfill the most exacting specification requirements, whilst providing a non-flammable, environmentally safe product.

Pure epoxy resin reinforced with glass fibre rovings is a material of enormous strength. Modern winding processes, combined with electronically controlled winding machinery, ensure an even distribution of glass fibre rovings and epoxy resin and the highest precision in the manufacture of transformer windings.

Multispaced ribs, built-in during the winding process, integrate the HV and LV windings into a single compact winding block.

The RESIBLOC® transformers’ superior lightning impulse voltage withstand results from the linear impulse voltage distribution, obtained through use of the layer-winding concept.

Windings with high short circuit withstand levels and extreme thermal shock stability at highestand lowest temperature levels result. The risks of cracking,

The ABB drilling drive system normally uses 2 units of 3 winding transformer with phase shift to mitigate the harmonic level on the feeding network.

The drilling drive system uses an output voltage level of 690V as standard unless otherwise requested. the control system, ac800m AC 800M can be defined as a hardware platform to which individual hardware modules is connected that, depending on the specific module configuration and operating system selected, can be programmed to perform multiple functions within the system.

The hardware platform consists of processor modules, communication interfaces, power supplies and modules supplying additional functions, such as an external battery module for memory back-up.

The control system structure within the Drilling drive system where we have the AC800M controller

is configured with the “Hot Standby” feature as default which ensures continuity in the drilling operation even in the unlikely event of failure in the controller hardware.

The switch between the Active and the hot standby controller is automatic and “Bump less” which means the operation will continue without any interruption.

The Drilling drive control system software has been developed over the years and reflects the experience gained during previous delivered drilling vessels. It performs a number of important supervisory and protection functions of the drives, supply units, liquid cooling units and dynamic braking units. It also monitors the overall system status and generates alarm and status indications to the operator to indicate the status of the system. Another essential task for the control software is to keep the drilling drive system power consumption within the limits of available power allocated by the vessel’s PMS System to help avoiding a black-out, Other feature in the software is the mud pump de-synchronization function to ensure the pumps do not pump in synchronization which will have undesirable effects on pumps and connecting pipe works. Critical safety functions such as anticreep for the Drawworks prevent an uncontrollable motion of the top drive block which potentially could end up in a free fall and cause major damage to the drill floor and the top drive itself.

In addition, the ABB drilling drive system has a standard local process display mounted on the door of the drilling drive line-up. It provides the user with a comprehensive overview of the system health and display more detailed status and alarm data specific to the drilling drive system, which helps speeding up troubleshooting and problem solving thanks to the detailed diagnostics data shown on the display that would normally require special software tools to be connected to the system to extract the data. the drive system In 1996, ABB launched a revolutionary motor control platform, called Direct Torque Control (DTC) which is widely regarded as the most dynamic and accurate motor control technique available, bringing total control of an AC motor.

It plays a critical role in bringing the performance levels, inherent safety and protection functions needed for an off-shore application.

offshore drives

resulting from different thermal expansion coefficients between conducting and solid resin insulation materials, are effectively prevented for the transformers total lifetime. Furthermore, cracking caused under extreme operational conditions, i.e. arctic frozen climates or following surge overloads will never arise.

The windings are effectively protected against mechanical and chemical effects, through the encapsulation with glass fibre reinforced epoxy resin insulation materials, insensitive to humidity and practically maintenance free.

One other important characteristic for offshore use is that the RESIBLOC® transformers can safely be characterized as hard to ignite or self-extinguishing. Less than 5% of the materials used can burn if the transformer is drawn into a normal fire. Tests have proven that RESIBLOC® transformers fulfill the requirements of Fire Behavior Class F1, acc. to IEC 60076-11: – No toxic gases, and no gases appear other than those present in any normal fire.

– This very favorable fire behavior is a direct result from the use of approx. 80% glass fibre content in the insulation material.

– The excellent self-extinguishing effect is achieved without using any environmentally undesired halogens.

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DTC gives accurate speed and torque control and achieves full torque at zero speed without any feedback device. The torque is controlled with an accuracy of 1% from zero speed through base speed.

Behind all the wizardry is the fact that it can process data 1,000 times faster than anything previous.

With a fast control loop approaching 25 microseconds, there is little risk of overshoot by the controlled motion. It is the speed of the control loop that lies at the heart of DTC’s success. Traditional variable speed drives using either pulse width modulation or vector control offer control loop speeds substantially slower at between 1 to 3 milliseconds. The software within DTC updates the speed and torque signals extremely fast while at the same time rapidly checking the status of the load and carrying out immediate regulation. It is an ultra fast loop, continuously checking and controlling the information. The benefit to operational safety is immense. If you really want a slow speed that is what you get.

The frequency converters (i.e. AC drives) offer powerful and accurate performance with advanced diagnostic facilities. A flexible interface to major drilling control vendors secures reliable operation. Excellent dynamic characteristics are available for both induction and permanent magnet synchronous motors.

High efficiency and close to unity power factor across the whole load and speed range offers considerable energy savings. The common DC bus principle of the converter system results in major savings in space requirements and cabling costs. The frequency converter features excellent dynamic performance characteristic and speed control accuracy thanks to the Direct Torque Control (DTC) technology.

Both water-cooled and air-cooled single drive and multidrive solutions are available for system configuration. Depending on customer requirements, ABB drilling drives can be configured to 6-pulse, 12-pulse or quasi 24-pulse solution and also low harmonic solution with active rectifier unit is available to meet the most stringent harmonic distortion requirements. The frequency converters fulfill marine and offshore requirements and high priority has been given to system safety and availability. Direct water cooling technology together with the totally enclosed cubicle structure means increased reliability in harsh environmental

conditions. The low noise level also makes the drive very user-friendly. The basic design has been verified according to most marine classification society’s requirements. customer values & benefits

ABB’s drilling drive solution offer the owner a well proven solution and the vast experience ABB have accumulated over the years which will ensure a smooth project execution and trouble free operation in the years to come after delivery of the vessel.

In terms of after sale support and service, with direct ABB presence in over 100 countries and dedicated Marine Service Centers strategically located throughout the world with qualified engineers you can count on ABB to provide lifecycle service and support wherever the drilling vessel operates in the world.

In the overall performance focused design of the drilling drive system, ABB always keep the owner’s value in the center of attention. By designing the system in a simple manner yet highly advanced in functionality the owner will enjoy numerous benefits such as outmost equipment reliability, ease of use and a high grade of maintainability to mention just a few. |||

Electric drives tighten grip in the cold Samuli Hanninen – samuli.hanninen@fi.abb.com ||| Antti Sallinen – antti.sallinen@fi.abb.com

introduction For ice-going operations, the electric propulsion solution leaves diesel alternatives in its wake.

A significant part of world’s oil and gas reserves are located in Arctic areas. Year-around operations in these areas place stringent demands on the vessels supporting offshore fields, and the use of ice-going and ice-breaking vessels, oil tankers and LNG Carriers is rapidly increasing. High reliability has become a prerequisite.

In this context, the attractions of electric propulsion can be traced to the fact that an electric motor produce full torque from zero RPM up to full power.

If ice blocks hit the propeller blades, an electric motor simply keeps the propeller rotating more effectively than is the case for a diesel engine of equal power.

Continuous propeller rotation means a better ability to navigate in ice. If the propeller stops during an ice load, ice will hit the propeller blades from potentially damaging directions. An electric motor can also be dimensioned to endure momentary excess torque, which improves the ship’s performance and electric power plant operation in severe ice conditions, such as ice ridges.

G 3~

MG1 4520 kVA 750 rpm pf = 0,85

G 3~

Ice impacts on the propeller and the resulting rapid variations in propeller speed impose demanding requirements on the dynamic properties of the entire electric power plant. These propeller-ice interaction dynamic loads to the propulsion system must be considered in power plant and propulsion control engineering and in the mechanical design of the propulsion unit. High torque demand and wide power ranges, combined with limited machinery spaces, provide special design challenges.

The necessary characteristics for ice-going vessels in general, and for ice breakers in particular, can be summarized as follows: – High maneuverability – High bollard pull requirements – High mechanical ice loads – High power – High propeller shaft torque at low RPM – Over torque requirements – Rapid changes in propeller load These requirements mirror the capabilities of electric propulsion (See Figure 1).

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Figure 1: Example of single line diagram for an ice-going vessel with Azipod propulsion.

TR2 1500 kVA

electric drive in the arctic

authors:

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Propulsion power

Drive concept (thruster motors)

Motor voltage Check ISC

Ship Electric load

Main switchboard (Electric distribution)

Voltage level and frequency

electric drive in the arctic

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Medium voltage 3 300 V 6 600 V 11 000 V

Reactance X and power factor

Generator

Harmonics control

Low voltage 690 V

Filters 12/24 pulse system Low reactance generators MG-sets UPS

Selected DE propulsion concept Figure 2: Electric propulsion design selection steps.

Design input values, propulsion power and ship electric load depend on the operation and performance requirements of the vessel. Necessary propulsion power and selected propulsion type define the drive concept (electric motor, propulsion drive and possible propulsion transformer).

The voltage level is selected according the load current of electric consumers and short circuit power produced by rotating machinary (generators and electric motors). The requirements of end users define the selection of the frequency and voltage on the distribution side. Usually the same frequency is selected as has been chosen for the main switchboard. However, it is important to note that selecting 60 Hz, instead of 50 Hz, leads to electric motors and transformers that are approximately 10% smaller, due the higher electric speed.

The number of installed generators depends on the required installed power and redundancy. The power plant should be designed to have suitable number of available power steps. Thus, the diesel engines can be run close to the optimum point – not only from economical but also from environmental point of view. In this case, the generator power factor is selected according the reactive power consumption of propulsion and the ship’s electric load. It is essential that harmonic control is noted at the concept design stage to fulfill

classification rules and to avoid additional heat losses in power system, for example, and consequent malfunctions in protective devices or sensitive low voltage equipment.

High torque requirements at low RPM affect power plant design. With some drive types the power factor decreases when operating at low switching frequencies. Lower power factors lead to higher reactive power demands compared to effective power demands. Avoiding performance limitations and unnecessary generator starts may require: – Lower power factor of the generators –> increased size of machines – Power factor compensation –> compensating capacitors needed Electric motors and frequency converters are dimensioned to a specific full power point (nominal speed).

At this speed the motor voltage is nominal (100%).

This so-called field weakening point defines the maximum RPM that can be achieved with nominal motor torque. Maximum continuous power is achieved above this RPM. Below this speed excitation current is kept nominal. If speed is increased above this level, motor torque has to be reduced to prevent motor overvoltage and over-power (see Figure 3).

In most industrial and marine applications, it is

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Figure 4: Torque, power and speed (RPM) control characteristics.

P=T*ω

Field weakening point = design point of the motor, nN, UN, IN, P=PN Over speed point; n>nN, U=UN, I=IN P=PN Over torque point, n<nN, U<UN, I>IN P=PN “Drive thermal limit”;

Figure 3: Electric motor dimensioning– power and torque.

common to close a speed controlled loop around the torque regulator, with a PID (proportional-integral-derivative) type speed controller algorithm.

In ice breaking vessels, the load torque will vary substantially when the propeller hits ice or ice blocks in the water. With a speed controlled propeller, such load variations will generate large oscillations in the electrical power system, which can be reduced significantly by using a control strategy based on controlling the shaft power instead of the RPM. Looking at Figure 4, the bollard pull load torque characteristics are drawn in the torque diagram for the variable speed propulsion motor. This has a maximum continuous rating given by the rated torque of the motor, and normally an intermittent over torque, in the range of 130% of rated torque.

Here, the power load variation in the network is greatly influenced by the control strategy. Load variations in the engine create disturbances in the network, with fluctuating voltages and frequency. In addition to visible effects, such as influencing lighting etc., higher fuel consumption can be experienced, as well as more tear and wear of the engine and a higher risk for overcurrent tripping or even black-out from overloading of the engines.

Figure 5 compares the load variations in the power system with a simplified model of the load variation.

The load is assumed to be a step increase at t=2 seconds, which disappears at t=6 seconds, reverting to bollard pull load. It is obvious that power control gives much lower load variations in the generator plant. azipod secures ice passage The development of Azipod propulsion systems started with icebreakers and derives from icebreaker operating challenges. In the extreme case, a stationary propeller can start to rotate, even when surrounded by ice blocks, because an electric motor and the associated drive can be designed so that maximum torque can be directed to a stationary propeller. Correspondingly, the torque of a stationary diesel engine is zero. The lack of a mechanical connection between the power plant and the electric motor driving the propeller creates an ideal icebreaker system.

One of the greatest problems when using a conventional shaft line was manoeuverability in ice.

Indeed, the Azipod system was created for the particular purpose of achieving better manoeuvering for icebreaking vessels. A turning unit allowed the propeller thrust to be directed in any direction so that getting out of an ice channel became relatively easy.

The propulsion devices of ice-going vessels, particularly icebreakers, are under considerably higher stresses than those of normal open-water vessels.

Thus, the main design principles for the Azipod system were simplicity and reliability in the mechanical power transmission.

The hydrodynamic properties of the Azipod propulsion system were found to be good quite soon af-

electric drive in the arctic

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Figure 6: Azipod propulsion units ready to deliver for shipyard installation for arctic 70k oil tanker.

electric drives in the arctic

ter the first prototype vessels were constructed. The replacement of pushing propellers with pulling ones indicated that there were substantial hydrodynamic improvements available.

The improved hydrodynamic efficiency is mainly attributable to three factors: â&#x20AC;&#x201C; The flow faced by a pulling propeller is smooth compared with that faced by a pushing propeller (Figure 7), because parts such as shaft supports do not interfere with the flow. The risk of cavitation is reduced, allowing a optimal design of the propeller blades. â&#x20AC;&#x201C; A ship equipped with an Azipod propulsion system does not require lateral propulsion devices or shaft supports in the aft, while hull resistance is also reduced. â&#x20AC;&#x201C; A streamlined component behind the propeller contributes to increased propeller efficiency.

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Figure 5: Effects of load variations on generator load power for different control strategies

Thanks to its good hydrodynamic properties, the podded propulsion system was soon introduced to vessels other than ice-going ones, and the solution rapidly became more popular than conventional alternatives in large cruise vessels.

The Azipod concept has gone on to provide completely new possibilities for the design of the general arrangements and functions of a ship. Exemplary was the so-called Double Acting Tanker (DAT) developed at the arctic technology centre of Kvaerner Masa-Yards (today known as Aker Arctic Technology), with the subsequent development of the more general Double

Figure 8: MT Tempera operating stern first in ice in the Gulf of Finland.

Acting (DA) principle for all types of vessels.

It has been known for a long time that when going astern the ice resistance of a ship will decrease as a result of the propeller flow, which, among other factors, reduces friction. However, ships equipped with conventional rudders are difficult to steer when going astern. This problem does not affect ships equipped with azimuthing propulsion system, as the propeller thrust can be steered to any direction.

The bow of a Double Acting ship can be designed on the basis of normal open-water criteria, while the stern shape is optimized for ice operations. This principle has been applied to several ships and ship types. Good examples of these kind of ships are the oil tankers Tempera and Mastera owned by Neste Oil company, When evaluating and comparing alternative propulsion systems for a ship project, the total operation of the fleet should be taken into consideration. The performance of an individual ship in given ice conditions is naturally the basis for evaluation. The following topics, at least, should also form part of the evaluation:

and several ship duties in ice much more efficient.

Azipod propulsion thrust can also be used to clear ice between the pier and the ship. This will result in considerably faster berthing of an Azipod-equipped vessel. The benefit can be used for an increased transportation capacity per vessels or fuel savings due to slower vessel speed during voyage.

There are several possibilities for ice management that can be efficiently performed with the use of the wake of Azipod propulsion, for example:

– Icebreaker assistance requirements for the fleet – Operational aspects of low load operation of the machinery – Hull form performance both in open water and ice conditions Manoueuvrability of an Azipod vessel is superior compared to normal rudder and shaftline vessel. This makes tactical ice navigation, following of the leads

– Breaking of ice ridges – Breaking moving pack ice – Clearing ice channel behind vessel – Clearing ice from around hull of the icebreaker – Clearing ice from between the icebreaker and cargo vessel – Widening ice channel behind the vessel With optimum use of Azipod propulsion, ice management activities can be performed with high efficiency.

Furthermore, Azipod-equipped vessels have proven to be independently capable of navigating in difficult ice conditions, which leads to the need of fewer auxiliary icebreakers. This results in savings in both the investment in and the operational costs of the icebreaker fleet. It should be noted that two icebreakers per vessel are required when the ship beam is wider than the beam of the assisting icebreaker.

Due to power requirements being lower, the fuel consumption of an Azipod-equipped vessel is consid-

electric drives in the arctic

Figure 7: Water flow direction to Azipod pulling type propeller.

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Figure 9: Norilsk Nickel operating independently in the Kara Sea. electric drives in the arctic

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erably lower than in the case with conventional shaftline propulsion. Put simply, the electric power plant principle means that diesel engine loads can be kept close to optimum. This will lead to reduced specific fuel consumption by the diesel engines, which yields lower fuel consumption and lower emissions.

Over-dimensioning of diesel-mechanical propulsion systems for high torque and ice resistance requirement also leads to reduced open water fuel efficiency, as engines are running at low load. This results in increased fuel consumption and increased emissions. Running costs are increased if a diesel engine is operated for long periods at low loads.

Again, with Azipod-equipped vessels, more cargo capacity can also be designed into same size of ship, which increases transportation capacity or that speeds can be reduced during a voyage.

With Azipod propulsion the bow shape can also be optimized for open water operation, leading to smaller resistance and better sea-keeping characteristics. The benefit of reduced resistance can be used for a higher open water speed or for reduced fuel consumption.

A ship’s open water characteristics are also very important when considering design. An extreme icebreaking bow is highly questionable in open water conditions due to: – slamming in heavy weather – open water resistance characteristics – ice formation in open water at sub-zero temperatures – sea keeping characteristics

Figure 10: Ice breaking performance for different ship concepts as a function of non-dimensional propulsion power need (courtesy of Aker Arctic Technology Inc.)

Due to the more efficient ice and open water hull characteristics of a Double Acting vessel with Azipod propulsion the power requirement in some cases can be about 50% lower thanthe shaftline version. This will lead to considerable cost and space savings in machinery, as both total installed power and auxiliary power is significantly reduced. (See Figure 10).

In short, modern icebreaking cargo vessel designs enable vessels to be operated independently in ice without icebreaker assistance. This reduces the total investment and operation cost for the whole transportation system. Reduced open water and ice resistance of these kind of vessels also reduce CO2, NOx and SOx emissions.

The variable speed, electric drive is the key component in electric propulsion. A range of frequency converter concepts are available – but the special requirements for ice going vessels leads to the use of frequency converters that have high torque capability with high control precision in the whole speed range.

Hence, AC converters with good controllability at low RPM are used. |||

Tanking along with electric marine propulsion Increasing fuel efficiency and cargo capacity of LNG carriers using electric propulsion authors:

Jan Fredrik Hansen – jan-fredrik.hansen@no.abb.com ||| Alf-Kåre Adnanes – alf-kare.adnanes@no.abb.com

as the world’s demand for energy

45 40

Dual Fuel - Electric Propulsion

35 30 25 20

Steam Propulsion

electric marine propulsion

has increased, so too has the demand for large liquid natural gas (LNG) terminals and floating LNG production facilities. The transportation of LNG is, therefore, likely to increase rapidly in the coming years, requiring an increase in the number and size of LNG carriers.

Traditional marine propulsion systems deliver less than 30 percent fuel efficiency, however, today’s electric propulsion systems can deliver more than 40 percent fuel efficiency. For LNG carriers, this translates to more than a 30 percent reduction in fuel consumption.

In addition, because the electric propulsion system is more flexible, the cargo space can expand into the engine room, typically increasing capacity on a 145,000 m3 vessel by a further 10,000 m3.

ABB has been the world’s leading supplier of electric propulsion systems to LNG carrier fleets since the first vessels were contracted in 2003.

The steady growth in world energy demand continues to drive the search for new energy sources. Natural gas has satisfied some of this demand for more than 30 years. Most of the world’s gas is transported by pipelines from the producing fields to the consumer (over land and, for shorter distances, across the sea bed, from the North Sea to Europe, for example). From the late 1960s through the 1970s, the development of gas fields further offshore, in deeper water, and at more remote locations from consumers, has led to a growth in the production of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and its transportation by ship. The ships used were constructed with special insulated cargo tanks so that the LNG could be carried at a temperature of -162oC. With increasing energy demand in Asia, and particularly Japan, imports of LNG increased steadily, requiring more ships with greater capacities. In the 1970s and 1980s the ships were built mainly in Japan, but in the 1990s, South Korea emerged as a leading ship building nation and, by the end of the 1990s and

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Figure 1: Fuel efficiency curves as a function of propeller loading of dual-fuel electric propulsion and steam turbine propulsion

early 2000s, the majority of LNG carriers were built in South Korea. The size of vessels had also increased to a standardized cargo capacity of 138,000 to 145,000 m3 LNG. All of these LNG carriers were built for longterm lease, up to 30 years. They were chartered for LNG transport from gas fields to consumers, where pipeline use was not economically or technically feasible. The LNG producing and receiving terminals, including the surrounding infrastructure, were built for continuous gas supplies. This means that if one LNG carrier misses its loading slot at the terminal, a severe disruption in energy supply would result.

With this pressure to provide extremely reliable ships, with robust machinery and propulsion systems, less importance was placed on efficiency and fuel consumption. Steam-turbine propulsion systems were most commonly used because they offered excellent reliability and could use the gas onboard as a fuel.

LNG is transported at -162oC, however, depending on the efficiency of the insulation and the roughness of

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LNG carriers with LV switchboards: 440V & Steam Propulsion

1960 - 2001

LNG carriers with HV switchboards: 3,3kV & 6,6kV & Steam Propulsion

2000 – 200?

LNG carriers with HV switchboards & El. Propulsion: 6,6kV or 11kV Power & Propulsion

2003 – – >

LNG carriers with Azipod Propulsion 6,6kV or 11kV Power & Propulsion electric marine propulsion

2008 – – > Future requirements for ice going and maneuvering

Figure 2: The basic steps in the development of new generation LNG carriers

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Figure 3: The yearly calculated fuel consumption for the various alternatives based on the above efficiency considerations and an operation profile of 7,500 h per year

the voyage, a small amount of gas is lost in transit.

This “boil-off” gas, supplemented with heavy fuel oil, was used to heat the boilers, producing steam to drive the ship’s turbine. lng carriers—from steam turbines to gas electric.

Although the steam turbine is highly reliable and requires almost no maintenance, the boilers upon which they rely, require regular maintenance. Twin boilers are generally installed to ensure reliability; however, the thermal efficiency of this type of system

is lower than 30 percent. Alternatives, such as combustion engines are known to be 45 to 50 percent efficient; therefore, the potential for fuel saving by changing the propulsion system is huge. Despite this difference, the steam-turbine propulsion system, due to its reliability, remained the preferred solution, and LNG carriers are among the last major shipping types still using this form of propulsion.

As the vessels increased in size, so too did their need for installed electric power, the main purpose of which is to operate the larger cargo pumps. These are electric-driven pumps, submerged in the LNG tanks, and used to pump the gas out of the vessel at terminals. The installed electric power was increased to more than 10 MW for 140,000 m3 capacity carriers, requiring high-voltage (HV) onboard power equipment.

The first LNG carriers equipped with HV power plants of 3.3 kV and 6.6 kV were ordered in 2000. As a major supplier of electric power systems in the marine market, ABB took part in the design and supply of HV air-insulated switchgear for use in 40 LNG carriers between 2000 and 2006.

LNG carriers, however, were still built with steamturbine propulsion, but there was growing interest in alternatives. In 2000, the engine maker Wartsila intro-

usually required when engines are arranged on lower decks. There is no mechanical connection between equipment (ie, generators, converters, transformers and propulsion motors) only cabling, so the equipment can be arranged to optimize space savings. This has meant the capacity of standard LNG carriers of around 150,000 m3 capacity can be expanded by more than 6 percent, without altering the ships’ external dimensions.

DFEP has two main core technologies: dual-fuel, four-stroke engines, which are quite new to the general market especially to shipping, and electric propulsion, which is new to the LNG shipping market, but has been used, especially in cruise ships, since the mid-1980s. However, the general shipping and LNG markets are quite conservative. Changing from a well-established and reliable propulsion system to a novel system has taken time. Before the first ship owners took the initiative, a period of product maturity and proven capability was required. Once the benefits of space and fuel savings were shown to be quite significant, other ship owners and yards could follow with more confidence. The potential operational cost savings were simply too large to ignore. However, such technology could be adopted only if its reliability was equal to that of conventional steam-turbine propulsion systems.

In the early stages of development, a great many different configurations were discussed, with respect to the number of engines, number of propellers, redundancy, etc. Of these alternative scenarios two or three alternatives were particularly favored, one configuration has become more popular and has been widely adopted (Figure 4).

In the most common arrangement, the power plant consists of four medium-speed, dual-fuel engines, each with a generator. The ratings of the generators vary slightly from project to project, but are usually optimized for the most commonly used operations, such as LNG loading and unloading, and transit sailing, each of which has a different power requirement.

The HV power plant is split into four different sections, two main switchgears and two cargo switchgears. The reason for separating the two types of switchgear is purely to optimize the spatial arrangement of the installation. The propulsion system is also split into two configurations and abb scope

electric marine propulsion

duced dual-fuel combustion engines to the market, which could operate using either gas or diesel. These 4-stroke engines were basically designed to generate electric power, operating at constant speed, and requiring an electric distribution and propulsion system to drive the propeller. Even accounting for electrical transmission losses, the total propulsion efficiency for the dual-fuel system, known as DFEP (dual-fuel electric propulsion) was about 42 percent, much better than the 30 percent delivered by steam turbines (Figure 1). Today there are two suppliers of Dual-Fuel engines on the market, Wartsila and MAN. In 2003, Gaz de France (now GDF Suez) ordered the first three LNG carriers from Chantiers de l’Atlantique (now STX Europe) to be equipped with the new DFEP system. As soon as this first step was taken, other ship yards and owners followed, and by the end of 2005, almost all new orders for LNG carriers with capacities between 145,000 and 170,000 m3, were ordered with DFEP (Figure 2). The main message from Gaz de France was that they could deliver more gas, more efficiently using clean gas as fuel.

Not all LNG carriers have opted for the electric propulsion solution. The Qatar Gas Project has opted for LNG carriers with capacities up to 260,000 m3 and use a traditional two-stroke engine propulsion system alongside an onboard auxiliary plant to reliquefy the boil-off gas and return it to the tanks. This system, however, still requires quite a large HV electric power plant to feed the cargo pumps and the reliquefaction plant, which can consume up to 6 MW of electric power. This additional electric power consumption is much higher than the electrical losses experienced with an electric propulsion plant. With a propulsion power of 30 MW, for example, the electric propulsion plant’s electrical losses would be at a maximum of 2.5 MW (Figure 3).

The DFEP system not only provides energy efficiency, it also permits increased cargo capacity. The arrangement of the electric power and propulsion plant equipment is more flexible than that of mechanical propulsion systems. Even if additional electric components are installed, the flexibility of the DFEP system means it can still accommodate more cargo.

The engines can be mounted on a higher deck level, reducing the volume of exhaust-gas piping that is

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Figure 4: A typical electric propulsion configuration common to all ships under construction compared with the conventional steam turbine configuration and electric power plant configuration for conventional LNG carriers.

Figure 5: AMZ propulsion motor electric marine propulsion

separate drive systems, each with a corresponding drive transformer, frequency converter and propulsion motor. Finally, the two motors are mechanically connected via a common gearbox, with one shaft outlet to the propeller. This system combines simplicity with reliability. There is sufficient redundancy to keep the propeller operating even when maintenance or repair work force one of the engines or one of the electrical networks to be shut down. Mechanically, the propeller system is almost identical to that of the traditional steam-turbine system, with a gearbox and single shaft outlet to the propeller. Some schemes have twin propellers, which provide 50 percent redundancy all the way to the propeller shaft. Electrically, the twin system is identical to the single-propeller system, with the exception that the control system (located on the ship’s bridge) allows the speed of each propeller to be controlled independently.

The propulsion power requirements for LNG carriers are in the range of 25 to 30 MW, which means each propulsion motor is usually rated somewhere between 12.5 and 15 MW. The power ratings vary depending on the ship’s power to speed requirement and the design of the hull.

ABB typically supplies all HV electrical equipment for a ship, from the generators to the propulsion motors, and all the related propulsion control systems.

ABB has a long and proven track record in electric propulsion, especially in cruise vessels with similar sized propulsion requirements and power plants to LNG carriers. In fact, as indicated in November 2008, ABB has delivered or has on order electric power and propulsion systems for 33 LNG carriers.

ABB’s electrical propulsion products are manufactured in ABB factories dedicated to marine applications. To meet the high reliability demands of LNG carriers, ABB is able to draw on its long experience earned in the cruise-ship business and upon wellestablished ABB products. ABB’s synchronous AMG generators and AMZ motors (Figure 5) have efficiency levels among the highest on the market. For some projects, these motors and generators have achieved efficiencies of 97.9 percent and 98.4 percent, respectively, in factory test facilities1).

ABB’s robust medium-voltage switchgear (UniGear) and air-insulated motor control switchgear (Uni-

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Figure 6: ABB RESIBLOC Transformer

Motor), including the HD4 (SF6-type) and VD4 (vacuum-type) circuit breakers, are used for HV distribution networks. The metal-clad, arc-proof switchgear housing provides high-level protection for personnel, even working in the same room. The cabinets also have a door interlocking system and compartment segregation to prevent access to live parts when the equipment is operational.

The propulsion system’s drives use ABB’s unique resin-encapsulated transformer, the RESIBLOC® (Figure 6), and the ACS6000 medium-voltage frequency converter. The RESIBLOC transformers have a high mechanical strength, well suited to marine environments, where they experience strong vibrations and rough sea movements. Another feature of the RESIBLOC design is the linear impulse voltage distribution between the windings. This feature is especially

Figure 7: Power, torque and RPM recordings from sea trials; Endurance test — constant power mode

electric marine propulsion

important for marine applications where the switching voltage transients are much steeper than the normalized impulse voltage used standardly in transformer design.

The ACS6000 is a voltage source inverter (VSI)type frequency converter, introduced to the market by ABB in 2000 (Figure 7). It is controlled by an ABB-patented algorithm known as Direct Torque Control (DTC®) and can be combined with the wellestablished, synchronous AMZ motors, which suit the power requirements of LNG carriers.

100 experience from sea trials Since 2003, when the first electrical propulsion LNG carriers were ordered, more than six carriers have been delivered with ABB propulsion systems. The performance of these carriers, all of which are still in operation, has met or exceeded design expectation in terms of control and energy efficiency. When selecting the DFEP system, one of the key concerns is that, when operating in gas-mode, the engines are more sensitive to load variations than when operating in standard dieselmode. It is, therefore, essential that the propulsion drive system (the largest onboard consumer of electric power) keeps the load on the switchgear as constant as possible, even in rough seas. For this reason the control system is equipped to perform in two operation modes:

– RPM mode, in which the controller maintains a near-constant RPM. – Power mode, in which the controller maintains a near -constant level of power.

When the ship is maneuvering, RPM mode is selected automatically in order to gain a rapid response

to the captain’s actions on the bridge. In open water, above a certain power level (>50 percent), power mode is selected, so that the RPM and torque on the propeller can fluctuate with sea conditions, while the electric power consumption remains near constant (Figure 8). During a six-hour endurance test, when the ship was sailing continuously at full propulsion power (ie, in power mode), data collected showed that the power consumed by the propulsion system indeed remained constant. One of the reasons for this unique performance profile was that the DTC algorithm, used in the ACS6000 frequency converter, was able to adjust the motor torque within milliseconds and compensate immediately for the varying wave-induced torque on the propeller.

Crash-stop tests have also been performed and demonstrate that the machinery is capable of reversing the propeller thrust to rapidly bring the ship to a halt (Figure 9). In such situations the electric motor is superior to mechanical propulsion, since it can provide a stable reverse torque on the shaft whatever the RPM. Under such conditions, the motor actually operates as a generator, feeding energy from the propeller back to the drive system as the propeller speed is reduced to zero. This reverse energy is dissipated using separate brake resistors in order to avoid any reverse power disturbance of the main engines. The test showed that the ship could be stopped within about 7 minutes, which is much faster than can be achieved using traditional steam-turbines. Here, reported stopping times are in the range of 20 to 30 minutes.

Another important feature of electric propulsion is the blackout prevention capability, which allows continued operation even during failure modes. The worst-case scenario is that one generator-engine trips and the disturbance from this leads to additional

Trip of DG1

Trip of DG2 Trip of DG3

electric marine propulsion

Running full Speed

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Figure 8: Crash stop test recordings of propulsion motor power, torque and RPM

generator-engine trips, leading to a total blackout. The rapid load reduction in propulsion power protects the remaining generators. As soon as a generator trip is detected, the propulsion control system instantly reduces the propulsion power to avoid overloading the remaining generators. This feature was tested at sea with a generator configuration of 3 x 11 MW and 1 x 5.5 MW. During the test, the three 11-MW generators were intentionally tripped, one by one, until only the small, 5.5-MW generator remained. During this test, the generators were protected and the equipment passed the test without a blackout (Figure 10).

To measure efficiency, the shipâ&#x20AC;&#x2DC;s owner installed a system from KYMA that was able to measure, using strain-gauges, the mechanical power driving the propeller shaft. By comparing the value obtained on the propeller shaft with the electrical load supplied to the propulsion drives from the switchgear, the efficiency of the propulsion drive system, including the gearbox, was obtained.

When a maximum (100 percent) load was applied to the propulsion drives, the reading showed an efficiency of 94.3 percent (Figure 11). The calculated expected efficiency of related equipment was approximately 93.6 percent (including 1.5 percent estimated losses in the gearbox). These measurements proved that the system efficiency was better than predicted by theoretical calculations.

The LNG market is still changing, and is expected to increase in volume more rapidly in the coming years than ever before. For LNG carriers, alternative propulsion methods are under consideration, such as steamturbines with higher efficiencies, two-stroke motors with gas injection, etc. Today, with leasing contracts no longer tied to 30-year periods, LNG carriers must be more flexible. Carriers built for spot-markets need flexibility in operation speed, sailing distance, fuel type, etc. All these requirements make the electric propulsion system even more attractive. Future requirements for LNG carriers in the arctic will further strengthen de-

Kyma ship performance trial report: 2 hours average G/E Total El. output 28,321 kW El. motor total power 27,391 kW El. machinery mech. eff. 94.3 % 11000 kW

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94,3%

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Figure 11: Efficiency measurement from propeller shaft to switchgear

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mands for electric propulsion with ice breaker design, where ABB Azipod速 propulsion has already proven its functionality and performance. The Azipod unit has previously been successful for ice-breakers and cruise ships, and also, more recently, for other vessels, such as oil tankers and container ships. ||| footnotes

1. Efficiency is measured at the Factory Acceptance Test [FAT] with sinusoidal supply, and with the addition of harmonic and auxiliary losses.

2. A company who supply various performance monitoring devices, in this case shaft power measurements. This was not ordered by ABB or the shipyard, but directly by the ship owner to verify the performance. See: www.kyma.no

Redundant propulsion in transportation vessels Sami Kanerva, Marine & Turbocharging, Finland ||| Jan-Fredrik Hansen, Marine Systems, Norway

High availability requires a higher level of redundancy introduction From the vessel operatorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s point of - that is, more installed components, entailing higher view, redundancy is a critical part of ship performance.

Any sudden systems failures in open seas should nev- complexity and higher cost. Again, installing more er compromise further operations, since this would equipment raises the potential for equipment failure.

On the other hand, if the configuration is too simple, place crew and passengers alike in danger and require the risk of a total loss of propulsion is increased. Anhigh cost maintenance. Today, a certain level of redundancy is required by regulatory authorities and classi- other factor to be aware of in modern marine power fication societies, but it is the twin needs of increasing systems designs is that they tend to feature a high equipment reliability and availability that remain the number of crossovers, changeovers etc. This means that a lot of interdependencies are introduced into the main drivers for redundant solutions.

Figure 1: Illustration of the system complexity The level of redundancy installed usually repre- system, which in some cases may be hidden, thus reducing overall availability (see Fig. 1). sents a trade-off between availability and simplicity.

Single: - high reliability - low availability - low price

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Redundancy: - low reliability - high availability - high price

Interdependencier - low reliability - low availability - high price

redundant propulsion

writers:

& & & Figure 1: Illustration of the system complexity

Figure 2: Simple propulsion system with one drive train

redundancy in electric propulsion

level of redundancy Full-scale redundancy is generally not a feasible solution in main propulsion, because it requires substantial over-dimensioning. In terms of initial cost and footprint, partial redundancy is an economically viable alternative, since full power is not necessarily needed from the propulsion train under all conditions. The level of redundancy in such systems is expressed as the percentage of available power versus the total rated power in case of a single failure.

For example, two or four parallel systems have 50% or 75% redundancy against single faults, respectively.

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fault tolerance As redundancy is a measure of available capacity after a failure, the way systems handle the failures at the time they occur also needs to be considered. At the highest level of fault tolerance, operations will continue without interruption regardless of the fault. For partially redundant systems, a faulty system will be disconnected and the application will automatically continue at lower capacity.

A slightly lower level of fault tolerance can be identified in cases where an interruption is allowed for a short period after the failure. Typically, automatic protection will shut down the application and possibly disconnect the faulty system before the remaining systems can be started again. In improved configurations, the whole process may be automated. redundant drive configurations There are several means of gaining redundancy in propulsion systems.

These solutions not only provide different levels of redundancy and fault tolerance, but also have an effect on the systemâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cost and complexity. In fact, systems often combine several solutions and are specifically engineered to meet the requirements and optimize the balance between system cost and productivity. redundant drive trains A simple propulsion system with only one drive train, as illustrated in Fig. 2, is extremely vulnerable to failure. When there are two propulsion trains in parallel, half of the rated power is available regardless of any fault in the system. Such configurations provide a high level of redundancy and fault tolerance, but the system cost is high.

Figure 2: Simple propulsion system with one drive train

redundant propulsion motors The cost of redundancy can be reduced by coupling two motors into a single shaft. Fig. 3 presents a configuration where the motors are mounted directly on the shaft. Another configuration, shown in Fig. 4, utilizes a reduction gearbox. Here, the motors are smaller and can be mounted side by side. Both configurations can run the shaft with only one motor, in case of a fault in the other drive system.

Figure 3: Two motors on single shaft

Figure 4: Two motors coupled through a gearbox

Figure 3: Two motors on single shaft

Figure 4: Two motors coupled through a gearbox

redundant frequency converters Due to the power ratings of frequency converters, high-power drives typically utilize two or more converters in parallel. The principle is presented in Fig. 5. However, this configuration has relatively low level of redundancy and fault tolerance, because the converters are hard-coupled to the same stator winding. Fig. 6 presents a redundant configuration in which the two converters supply a dual-stator motor.

Figure 5: Two parallel converters supplying a single-winding motor

pellers. Each of the drive trains comprises two parallel frequency converters with drive transformers, auxiliary devices and excitation units, supplying Azipod速 propulsion units with dual-stator synchronous motors.

In a two-propeller configuration, at least 50% of the rated power/torque is available after a fault in the main switchboard, electric motor or the propulsion Figure 6: TwoFigure parallel converters supplying supplying a double-winding motor 5: Two parallel converters unit itself. After a single fault in any other part of the a single-winding motor system, at least 75% of the rated power/torque can be retained.

The propulsion motor is a dual-stator synchronous machine with brushless excitation system. Although research papers have presented new solutions using superconducting and permanent magnet technology, these are still not yet applicable to commercial shipbuilding.

Nevertheless, they will be interesting options in the future. Today, traditional synchronous motors are superior in this power range in terms of efficiency, power factor and reliability, while also drawing on extensive previous references.

The synchronous motor has two stator windings with 30 degrees of phase shift. The basic concept is similar to the motors used with a cycloconverter, but the motor is specifically designed for VSI supply. Due to the pulsed voltage supply, the stator insulation must withstand higher voltage stress and the common mode voltages on the shaft must be mitigated. The phase-shifted configuration with two separate stator windings provides redundancy and fault tolerance, because the motor can also operate with one stator winding. Due to the winding layout, the stator systems reside in separate slots providing isolation and low levels of mutual coupling between the systems. In addition, certain harmonic components are cancelled in the air gap because of the phase shift between the stator systems. This results in a substantial reduction in the torque ripple, noise, and also in motor losses [1], [2].

Figure 6: Two parallel converters supplying a double-winding motor

At the lowest level, only the most critical components of the drives are redundant. Such components typically include data links, control boards, shaft encoders, excitation units, DC links or even whole inverter units. Here, the level of redundancy and fault tolerance in the systems as a whole is strongly dependent on the number of redundant components and is usually specifically agreed on case-by-case basis. redundant drive components

example 1: cruise ship overview of the propulsion system Typical characteristics of a cruise ship include its alternating speed profile, high hotel load, low noise and vibration, and strict requirements on safety and availability. As vessel sizes have increased, diesel-electric propulsion systems have commonly come to provide the most economical solution to match these characteristics.

Such systems allow for high flexibility in the electric plant and machinery layout and achieve a high level of redundancy in all parts of the propulsion system.

Figure 7 presents a modern propulsion system for a large cruise vessel. The electric plant, with 11 kV main switchboards, is powered by four diesel generators, and there are two separate drive trains with pro-

Each motor is supplied by two independent frequency converters in redundant configuration [3]. Both converters have their own rectifier and inverter units, intermediate circuits, control boards, supply transformers, excitation units, cooling frequency converters

redundant propulsion

azipod速 with synchronous motor

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Figure 7: Propulsion system of a cruise vessel with two propellers

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Figure 7: Propulsion system of a cruise vessel with two propellers

systems and other auxiliary devices. They also run their internal control systems independently, being only connected through the outer control. The rectifier units are typically of the passive type for reasons of efficiency and, accordingly, there are separate braking resistors for emergency crash stops.

The frequency converters operate normally in the master-follower mode, where the master receives a speed reference from the upper control and creates the torque reference for the follower. In case of a fault in one of the converters, the system will automatically continue with one converter as the faulty converter is switched off. Because of electrical isolation, maintenance can be performed on one converter while the other is still operating. When the converter is switched back into operation, the system will continue with the full available power without interrupting the propulsion.

example 2: lng carrier overview of the propulsion system Traditionally, liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers have been propelled by steam-turbine propulsion systems consisting of a single, fixed pitch propeller, a gear box, a steam turbine and a dual boiler system. LNG Carriers carry their cargo at a temperature of -163oC in insulated tanks. The temperature is maintained by the insulating materials, but also by the natural boil-off of LNG. In this process, the boil-off gas is taken from the cargo tanks and used to power the ship propulsion system via the steam plant. Additional HFO has been required to provide enough propulsive power for required service speeds of 19.5 knots.

Steam-turbine propulsion systems proved themselves over time in terms of reliability and maintenance for these types of vessels. However, the efficiency of

line propellers with a reduction gearbox at each shaftline, due to arrangements and cost considerations at the building yards, although the electrical system and equipment is identical in both cases.

Typically, four or five Dual Fuel engines power the electrical plant, which consists of two 6.6kV main switchboards and two 6.6kV cargo switchboards. The propeller is powered via the electric drive system comprising four propulsion transformers, two frequency converters and two synchronous propulsion motors.

The main motivating factor for changing the system has been efficiency gain, although there are other known benefits of electric propulsion; namely higher efficiency at lower power ranges, redundancy in the power plant, and the increased manoeuverability and crash stop performance ensured by the excellent torque characteristics of variable speed electric drive systems.

Figure 8: Propulsion system of an LNG carrier

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Figure 8: Propulsion system of a LNG carrier

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redundant propulsion

the propulsion plant is low (approx. 30%) when compared to combustion engine propulsion systems (approx 45 to 50%). With the introduction of Dual-Fuel four stroke combustion engines in the early 2000, new, more efficient propulsion systems became available.

Combined with electrical propulsion plant, Dual-Fuel Electric Propulsion (DFEP) has become more or less standard for newly built LNG carriers with capacity of the less than 200,000 cbm. Since 2003, about 50 LNG carriers have been delivered or ordered with electric propulsion.

Most of these ships have been ordered with a configuration of single fixed pitch propeller powered by two electric motors via a twin input/single output reduction gearbox, as shown in Fig. 8. This configuration provides redundancy in the electrical part, but uses basically the same mechanical single shaft-line configuration as traditional steam ships. However, a few vessels have been ordered featuring twin shaft-

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gearbox and synchronous motors The LNG shipping industry is very familiar with using the gearbox solution in combination with steam turbines. Hence, the use of a reduction gearbox (twin input/single output) was also a natural choice when electric propulsion was chosen for the single propeller vessels. Also, the initial cost and shipboard arrangement were better than other possible configurations, such as tandem motors etc. For twin propeller arrangements, the use of a gearbox was not the first choice in the early stage but, considering cost and arrangement benefits, this solution was also applied for this system. This means that the motor and drive configuration is practically the same for the both configurations.

The propulsion requirement for LNG Carriers is in the range of 25MW to 30MW. In this power range, it is natural to have two propulsion motors rated at about 12MW to 15MW each. This automatically yields a 2 x 50% total electric redundancy, which is a minimum requirement for this type of vessel. Hence, for any single failure, at least 50% of propeller torque would be available from the electrical propulsion system.

The propulsion motors are of standard synchronous design, which provides the highest efficiency and the lowest weight to power ratio at this power level among the designs that are available today. The motor speed is around 675 rpm, which allows the building yards to use a gearbox with a single stage design. The motor has two stator windings, basically because of the power level demands double inverter units in the frequency converter. The double winding does not provide any special design compared to single winding, taking 6 phases to the terminal box instead of 3. Hence, the motor can be operated with a single winding in case of faults in the power supply or in the other winding.

This provides additional redundancy on the motor side, as 75% of the total power/torque is available for certain faults without increasing the complexity of the propulsion motor fabrication and system design. frequency converters In principle there is one frequency converter per propulsion motor. However, each converter consists of several input and output modules in order to match the required propulsive power. This offers some potential to implement a cer-

tain level of redundancy without increasing complexity and cost. For these ships, each converter consists of double rectifier modules and double inverter modules.

Redundancy is implemented in a way that it is possible to operate the converter system in the half power mode, when one propulsion transformer or related circuit breaker is out of operation or there is a failure in one rectifier or inverter module. In all these cases, the converter will trip and restart in the half power mode.

For the failures on the input side, half power will be available for the converter and operations can continue with both motor windings. If the failure is on the output side, the fault will be isolated from the motor by opening the related output isolator, and the operation can continue with half motor torque.

Redundancy is required in propulsion for reasons of safety, availability and reliability. In transportation vessels, it is not feasible to build full-scale redundancy into the system but, today, achieving levels of 50% and 75% has become common. This paper presented two example solutions providing redundancy and reliability for applications that require high availability and safety. The solutions have been tailored to meet the specific requirements in an economical manner, and without notably increasing system complexity. ||| conclusion

references

[1] Khan K.S., Arshad W.M., Kanerva S., “On Performance Figures of Multiphase Machines,” ICEM’08, Vilamoura, Portugal, 6–9 September 2008.

[2] Kanerva S., Toivanen O., Sario P., Arshad W.M., “Experimental Study on Dual-Stator Synchronous Motor with Redundant Voltage Source Inverter (VSI) Drive,” ICEM’08, Vilamoura, Portugal, 6–9 September 2008.

[3] H. Burzanowska, P. Sario, C. Stulz, “Redundant Drive with Direct Torque Control (DTC) and Dual-Star Synchronous Machine, Simulations and Verifications,” EPE 2007 – 12th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications, Aalborg, Denmark, 2–5 September 2007.

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