Subsea Industries’ glass-flake, non-toxic hard coating Ecospeed has been chosen to protect the exhaust scrubber outlets of three newbuild container vessels building at a yard in Zhoushan, China. A durable coating was required, with the ability to withstand the very high exhaust gas temperatures and the chemical pollutants encountered in this application. Scrubbers are intended to filter out oxides of sulphur and harmful hydrocarbons, soot, particulates, heavy metals and ashes to prevent pollution of the atmosphere. Some scrubbers, such as those fitted to these vessels, can also reduce the amount of nitrogen oxides and carbon gases. However, according to Subsea Industries, some shipowners hav

Funding to get a major project underway that is set to make Pembroke Dock a centre for marine renewable energy research and development has been given the go ahead by the Port of Milford Haven’s Board of Directors. The Port has allocated £650,000 to kick start dockyard improvements which will form part of Pembroke Dock Marine, the £76m Swansea Bay City Deal project which will see the Port of Milford Haven partner with Marine Energy Wales, ORE Catapult and Wave Hub to develop a world class centre for marine energy research and development, fabrication, testing and deployment, in Pembrokeshire. The funding will maintain momentum on the crucial planning and consenting work and will help ensure

Alewijnse has successfully completed the electric outfitting and automation for the new 114-metre eco-cement carrier Cymbidium. The sea trials were concluded on 28 November. The new advanced self-unloading cement carrier has been built for shipping company Eureka Shipping by Royal Bodewes Shipyards B.V. Scope of works Royal Bodewes contracted Alewijnse Marine, a global player with over a century of experience in maritime technology, to undertake the electrical engineering and installation on board Cymbidium. The project covered almost the entire scope of works, including the engineering, commissioning, delivery and installation of all cabling, lighting, main switchboard, e-motors (e.g. f

A manufacturer of workboats is reporting a rapidly expanding order book and customer base after becoming a stand-alone business. Hampshire-based Meercat, which employs 16 people at Hythe Marine Park, Southampton, now has enough work to last beyond the end of next year. A management buyout in November secured the future of the firm as a restructured, wholly independent, operation. This followed the financial difficulties and subsequent collapse into administration of the firm’s former parent company. Managing director Jason Coltman said: “We have been through a difficult and challenging period, but I can say without doubt that we are swiftly moving ahead and looking forward to 2018 with renew

Ship owners are now able to treat their unmanaged ballast water or load cleaned ballast water in eight different Northern European ports using Damen’s unique IMO certified InvaSave ballast water management system. In a cooperation between Damen Green Solutions and Damen Shiprepair & Conversion (DSC), this ballast water reception/bunkering service will be available in Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Brest, Dunkerque, Vlissingen, Den Helder, Stellendam and Harlingen. Damen’s InvaSave is the world’s first external ballast water treatment unit designed primarily to offer ship owners a port-based ballast water solution. With this cooperation, vessels coming into these eight ports will be able to take advan

Modulift provided a custom lifting beam, slings and shackles as specialist pipeline contractor Stockton Drilling completed multiple lifts of a 28t, 18m-long tunnel boring machine (TBM) that was working subsea at the Beatrice Offshore Windfarm / Direct Pipe Landfalls (BOWL) project at Portgordon, Scotland. The BOWL project is one of the largest private investments ever made in Scottish infrastructure and produces 584 megawatts from 84 turbines situated in the outer Moray Firth, powering approximately 450,000 homes at a cost of £2.6 billion to its investors SSE, Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Red Rock Power. Stockton’s scope of work included the trenchless installation of two independe

BIMCO and the international association for the marine electronics industry, CIRM (Comité International Radio-Maritime), have sent the industry's first proposal for an industry-wide standard for software maintenance to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) for consideration. Without an industry-standard, BIMCO sees an increasing risk of severe incidents on ships, delays and costs to shipowners and cyber security problems. "We hope the entire industry will adopt these standards, to make ships safer, to prevent cyber security problems and to save money," says Angus Frew, Secretary General and CEO at BIMCO. "The industry has been living in a world of hardware. But software has been inte

Penetration testing experts Pen Test Partners, have highlighted how hackers could sink a bulk carrier by manipulating the loading data of its hull stress monitoring systems (HSMS) to deliberately cause an imbalance of cargo on the vessel without the crew being aware. The consequences could be catastrophic with the vessel being put under intense strain leading to it breaking up and sinking. “The reason it is feasible is that when HSMS were first developed, there was no concept of a vessel being connected to the internet, allowing it to be accessed remotely. Therefore, many HSMS are just PCs connected to the ships’ network,” said senior partner, Ken Munro. “A hacker could interrupt the load

PD Ports, one of the UK’s major port groups, is calling on other employers to help plug the engineering skills gap as the Company celebrates 15 years of apprenticeships. To mark Tomorrow’s Engineers Week, (6–10 November), PD Ports is highlighting the value young people can bring to any business after the latest stats from the Department for Education revealed a 61% year-on-year drop in new apprenticeships. Last month PD Ports welcomed a further three new engineering apprentices. In an area renowned for its industrial heritage, the port operator is very proud of its commitment to investing in the training and development of young people but urges other businesses to follow suit. Russ McCallio

Addressing government trade negotiators in the OECD Working Party on Shipbuilding at a workshop on ‘green growth’ in Paris today, the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) asserted that the shipping industry could only be environmentally sustainable if it is economically sustainable too. "The perennial challenge facing shipowners is overcapacity, aided and abetted by government subsidies and support measures that encourage shipyards to produce ships that are surplus to requirements If governments are serious about helping the shipping industry deliver on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, the OECD needs to reboot efforts to have a global agreement on the elimination of m

PowerTechTM 6090HFM85 and 6135HFM85 complement existing engine offerings John Deere Power Systems is pleased to introduce the new 6090HFM85 and 6135HFM85 marine engines specifically designed for radiator-cooled marine gen-set and auxiliary applications. The new PowerTechTM 6090HFM85 is rated for variable speed at 242 kW (325 hp) at 2000 rpm and for generator drive and constant speed auxiliary at 262 kW (351 hp) at 1800 rpm. The PowerTechTM 6135HFM85 is rated for variable speed at 373 kW (500 hp) at 2000 rpm and for a generator drive and constant speed auxiliary at 416 kW (558 hp) at 1800 rpm. The new marine engines are well-suited for gen-set, constant speed and variable speed auxiliary appl

The Thome Group has opened a modern operations hub at its offices in Singapore to enhance the quality of its ship management services and reaction times to emergency responses. The state-of-the-art facilities enables situational awareness for both duty-personnel and Thome’s crisis teams, providing high tech systems allowing remote tracking of individual ships in the fleet, passage planning, security risk assessment, weather routing, video conferencing, integrated vessel management system (NAU) implementation, and individual on-board CCTV remote monitoring by the hub. “The Operations Hub means that we now have an even closer control of our managed fleet, offering our clients up to date inf

Jenkins Marine was commissioned by a private client who has a coastal property on the Isle of wight, and required a contractor to deliver and position about 200t of rock for essential sea defence work. The 35m Deck Cargo Barge JML 35 was loaded with suitable rocks in the Jenkins Marine yard in Poole using an excavator with a rock grab attachment. The 26m x 9m spud leg muti-Cat AVON was used to tow the loaded barge to the site. When close to the site the AVON ‘hipped up’ to the jml35. This enabled the use of the spud legs on the AVON to secure herself, and secure JML35 in position during unloading operations. This was a tidal critical operation given the necessity to operate so close to th

Propeller design and manufacturing company Stone Marine Propulsion has joined forces with NGC Marine of China to create a world leading supplier of propulsion and marine gearbox propulsion equipment. The new company, Stone Marine Propulsion NGC Ltd, which is a subsidiary of Stone Marine Propulsion and based in the UK, is marketing a range of technologically advanced propulsion solutions and high quality marine gearboxes at competitive prices. The company combines the considerable experience of Stone Marine Propulsion in propeller design, hydrodynamics and metallurgy with that of NGC Marine Ltd who are acknowledged as a leading manufacturer of high quality marine propulsion and gearbox equipm

Seapower Marine are appointed as official MAN marine dealers for the Channel Islands by the UK importer; PME Group. The Channel Islands will now have a dedicated, factory trained team to offer sales and support throughout the Islands. MD of PME Group, Peter Chalk said: “As part of our new status as MAN marine importers for the UK and Ireland our plan is to strengthen the dealership network to provide increased coverage throughout the territory to ensure that our clients receive the service and support that they should expect wherever they or their vessels are based.” “Having visited Johnathon Pereira and his team at their premises we were convinced that Seapower Marine would be the perfect r

UK subsea company Rovco has been awarded a three-year contract to support one of the world’s largest offshore windfarms, Gwynt y Môr, which lies eight miles off the coast of North Wales in the UK. Rovco will be providing its ground breaking underwater ROV 3D visual survey solution, alongside traditional video, blueview sonar and cathodic protection analysis techniques. Gwynt y Môr consists of 160 turbines that generate enough energy for more than 400,000 homes across the country. It extends over an area of about 80km² and includes two offshore substations and 134kms of onshore cable installations. The contract with windfarm operator innogy was won in a competitive tender. It will see the Bri

Sabik Ltd and Hydrosphere UK Ltd have agreed on a partnership for sales and marketing of marine aids-to-navigation solutions in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and the Channel Islands. Background for this partnership is the Carmanah acquisition of Vega Industries earlier this year and adding Vega to Carmanah’s Marine Division which is led by Sabik Marine. Hydrosphere has a long history of being Vega’s distributor in the UK market and now this new partnership enables Hydrosphere to offer clients an even wider range of products and services; the whole combined brand portfolio of Sabik Marine: Sabik, Carmanah, Ekta and Vega. “We’re pleased to now offer a complete range of products with the new

RUD Chains is a leading manufacturer of lifting and lashing equipment that helps guarantee ultimate safety when lifting and moving heavy loads. Their diverse product range offers over 600 tested and certified lifting and lashing points for bolting and welding covering a working load capacity range from 0.6-250 tonnes. The ever popular RUD VLBG load ring has been developed to offer the new VLBG Plus. The innovative VLBG Plus now includes RUD’s robust ICE- Bolt. The ICE-Bolt is made from their revolutionary patented fine grain steel which is operational to temperatures as low of -60°C. Lifting points are often used for turning, rotating and tilting which adds a considerable risk to the lift

Following a rigorous testing process, verified by Bureau Veritas, the world’s first Class approved 3D printed ship’s propeller, the WAAMpeller, has been unveiled at Damen Shipyard Group’s headquarters in the Netherlands. This ground-breaking success is the result of a close collaboration between RAMLAB, Promarin, Autodesk, Bureau Veritas and Damen. The five-company partnership started pooling their collective resources and knowledge to develop the world’s first 3D printed ship’s propeller seven months ago. Promarin provided the design of the triple-blade propeller. The Port of Rotterdam’s RAMLAB (Rotterdam Additive Manufacturing LAB) carried out fabrication using Wire Arc Additive Manufactur

Have you ever wondered how the first metal detector was invented? On July 2, 1881, U.S. President James Garfield was shot in the back. While he managed to survive the assassination attempt, a problem arose in that doctors could not locate the bullet. Alexander Graham Bell (then 34 years old) learned of this unfortunate instance and set out to build a device that could detect the bullet lodged in President Garfield’s chest. Although the machine worked properly, Bell deemed it a failure because it was unable to locate the bullet and resulted in the untimely death of President Garfield. What Bell did not know was that the President’s mattress was filled with metal springs that interfered with t