Newport Shipping urges efficiency focus

Hakan Ozcan, chief financial officer of Ecoships, explained that lower bunker fuel costs should allow ship owners to improve their profitability and reinvest in new ship designs, equipment and technologies capable of reducing fuel consumption even further.

“It just makes economic sense,” Ozcan said. “It is highly unlikely that we will see a return to fast steaming, so vessels designed for low fuel consumption to minimise shipping’s impact on the environment will continue to be an integral part of the ship manager’s business model.”

Harald Lone, chairman and chief executive officer of Newport Shipping Group, confirmed that vessels under the Newport’s management will continue to operate sustainably.

“All our vessels continue to operate to optimum energy-efficiency and have systems installed capable of providing a better return for the owner,” said Lone. “The industry must continue to do all it can to operate ships more effectively so that the economics of shipping remain commercially and environmentally viable.”

In September Ecoships unveiled its energy-efficient bulk carrier design. The Green Lotus 32 is a 32,500dwt geared, wide-hatched, double-hulled bulk carrier designed to meet existing and future C02, NOx and SOx emissions regulations.

The 170.90m long, 27m wide hull form is optimised for energy-efficient operation using computational fluid dynamics and finite element analysis. The propulsion arrangement is based around a Tier III compliant MAN B&W SG50ME-B9 two-stroke main engine driving a large diameter, fixed-pitch propeller.

The configuration provides a heavy fuel oil consumption of just 15.6 tonnes a day at a service speed of 14 knots and 7.6 tonnes a day at 11 knots.