Japanese autonomous vessel project completes coastal round-trip

A vessel operated by Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha (K Line) has completed a demonstration operating on an autonomous navigation system as part of the Nippon Foundation’s MEGURI2040 project.

The demonstration test saw a 11,413 gt car carrier vessel, HOKUREN MARU No. 2, complete three separate 1,600km round-trips along a coastal route between Hitachi Port and Kushiro Port. The route chosen followed the route currently served by the vessel.

The autonomous navigation system was used to navigate while maintaining the normal crew navigation tasks, and in situations where avoidance was necessary, the autonomous navigation system proposed avoidance routes and controlled steering to safely avoid other vessels. The autonomous navigation system has achieved an average system operation rate of approximately 96% in the sea area.

K Line noted that the Proof of Concept (PoC) test, which was restricted to the On board system only, successfully validated the solution. It forms part of moves towards a 2025 demonstration test of an Fully Autonomous Ship connected to a shore-side-system.

The test forms part of the second phase of the MEGURI2040 project, will focus on demonstrating ship-shore operations using four different vessel types including a newly built container ship equipped with a fully autonomous operation system, an existing container ship, Ro-Ro vessel, and remote island route ship equipped for partial autonomous operations, as well as two fleet operation centres.

The final stage of the project will focus on the commercialisation of an autonomous navigation system (including a land-based monitoring system) and establish a certification scheme necessary to commercialise the system.