By
Rebecca Gibson |
The main focus for the yard in recent months has been not only on interior and exterior changes to ships, but on technical features such as exhaust gas cleaning, ballast water treatment, green ships and reducing the resistance of the hull through underwater coatings – all the techniques which are available to reduce power and fuel consumption for a cleaner maritime environment. These features create a task for the shipyards, to be the ‘trouble shooters’ for ship owners.
At present, we are introducing new developments in ballast water treatment. We already have orders now to design, on behalf of ship owners, the infrastructure to instal ballast water treatment systems.
We like to work as a partner of the ship owner to look for the right equipment for the ship. For example, in the case of ballast water treatment, we assess the ship in the first instance, to see how much space is available onboard, and plan accordingly for the best equipment. We do the piping diagrams and we propose how much it will cost, and later on instal it. For technology such as exhaust gas cleaning systems, we leave it with the engine specialists to look into these features, as we are not the manufacturer of the engines.
In 2012 and 2013, we are doing works on some passenger ships. In all our projects, we are getting enquiries from the owners regarding health and spa areas and balconies. My personal guess is that in future we will also see demand rise for more attractions for passengers on the open decks – water slides and things like that.
We have exciting projects on the table for the longer term (looking beyond the next five years), regarding the use of solar panels on the open decks and also the use of LNG gas. We are working on technical features to reduce fuel consumption and help cut the emissions of the ships. This will be a big thing that both shipyards and ship owners have to look into.
Looking to future trends, there is the question of whether ships will tend to become larger or smaller over time. I believe that the big ships are the ‘door opener’ for the smaller ships – if a person enjoys the hotel room at sea of a large cruise, they will also one day take a smaller cruise.