Speed obsession is out of fashion

Source Tradewinds vom 09.12.2011

Tomorrow's ships will likely not be able to sail as fast but they are certain to be much more fuel-efficient than those being delivered today. New technology, the market recession and soaring fuel prices have led to a fundamental shift in the way ships are designed, according to one leading classification society. The new generation of vessels coming off the designer's drawing board will allow future owners to adapt their operating speeds to the ups and downs of the market more easily. German class society Germanischer Lloyd (GL) has identified a change in thinking where the traditional obsession with designing ships around a maximum speed, particularly in the containership sector, is waning. Instead, designers are looking to design around an optimum speed, somewhat lower than the maximum, where the vessel operates in the most fuel-efficient way within the current trading pattern. "Nowadays ship designs are directed not so much toward the maximum speed that can be achieved but an optimal speed that is the most fuel-efficient for the vessels operating conditions," said Albrecht Grell, executive vice-president of GL's Maritime Solutions. "Design technology has certainly helped speed up that process because we can now test thousands of different operating simulations," he explained. Grell gives the example of containership operators that are seeking to design ships within a profile of operating at 16 knots 30% of the time and a maximum speed of between 21 and 22 knots between 20% and 30% of the time, with the rest of the operation made up of scatter points around those two regions. The trend is also catching on in the dry and tanker markets and even in those with highly varied operating patterns, such as multi-purpose vessels (MPPs). The new initiative among designers also seems to reflect long-term concerns over rising fuel costs and the market downturn, which has made slow steaming preferable to operating ships flatout. The latest generation of vessels should have more flexibility to adapt speed more easily to market conditions. Grell says there is a noticeable trend toward maximum speeds being reduced in new ship designs, in part as a reaction to higher fuel costs. AP Moller-Maersk recently reduced the maximum speed of its 18,000-teu containerships ordered at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering compared with its previous series of 13,000-teu vessels. Grell believes that the introduction of minimum efficiency standards for ships under the Energy Efficiency Design Index (EEDI) will also encourage lower maximum speeds. An International Maritime Organisation (IMO) regulation requires new ships to reach a 10% improvement in efficiency by 2015, then a further 20% by 2020 and another 30% by 2025. Reducing speed is the easiest and most effective way for new vessels to improve their efficiency rating under the EEDI. However, the EEDI calculation focuses mainly on installed power and therefore maximum speed. The efficiency rating of the vessel will not improve much even if it is meant to operate at a lower and more efficient optimum speed. This is likely to encourage owners to focus on reducing maximum speed further. "In the first phase [of EEDI] I don't expect there to be much change but in the second and third phases maximum speed will have to be reduced to meet the regulation," Grell said. This will create a scenario where ships being delivered today will be competing with the new generation of fuel-efficient but less powerful ships. Grell believes that, with the expected increase in fuel prices and possible carbon tax, it will be the newer ships that will have a distinct advantage and they could eventually force older tonnage out of the market.