Just-in-time sailing success for Wärtsilä

The partners have achieved a seamless exchange of data between ship and shore under real-life conditions. Furthermore, the applied solution, Wärtsilä Navi-Port, has received approval in principle from Bureau Veritas Marine and Offshore for meeting cyber security requirements.

“Wärtsilä’s Smart Marine Ecosystem approach is aimed at eliminating wasteful practices in shipping operations, and the Navi-Port solution does just that,” said Torsten Büssow, director, Voyage, Wärtsilä. “Collaboration between industry stakeholders is a key enabler to our approach, and once again, this project shows what can be gained when the industry works together in a transparent and cooperative way,” he added.

Data between vessels and ports is poorly shared meaning that ships often find themselves queuing for a berthing slot. Wärtsilä Navi-Port is part of Wärtsilä’s Fleet Operations Solution (FOS) system which enables ship-to-shore reporting and fleet performance management by combining individual processes that are otherwise separated.

Wärtsilä Navi-Port now also enables the exchange of accurate arrival times between ports and ships, enabling vessels to automatically adjust speed to achieve a just-in-time arrival. If conditions are incompatible with the planned time of arrival, the berth scheduler suggests a new time which is shared with the FOS and sent directly to the vessel’s navigation system, along with an automatically calculated sailing speed.

If the new time is accepted, the speed is automatically adjusted and the ship then arrives to the berth at the allotted time, having saved fuel and having emitted far fewer exhaust emissions.