Thu, 01 August, 2024
A new initiative, the EcoShipYard project, is poised to revolutionise the European shipbuilding industry with its innovative approach. By providing tools to assess ships' environmental impact and shipyard processes, this ground breaking project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme, aims to address key challenges related to competitiveness, innovation and sustainability in the industry.
The primary focus of EcoShipYard is to create solutions that will help minimise the environmental impact of shipyards, enhance energy efficiency, streamline operations, and measure and reduce non-operational impacts. One of the key objectives is to develop innovative methods to oversee the circularity of materials, by creating and implementing an EU-material passport specifically tailored to ships. The European shipbuilding industry faces challenges related to greenhouse gas emissions arising from non-operational floor processes, such as shipbuilding, maintenance, repairs and re-fit, which generate pollution and waste, leading to high energy consumption and related costs. Additionally, dismantling practices undertaken at ships’ end-of-life produce waste and scrap, contributing to environmental concerns. Therefore, the development and implementation of an EU-material passport for ships will enable the source and utilisation of materials used in shipbuilding to be monitored, and provide crucial handling details on the circularity of materials.
To achieve its goals, EcoShipYard will explore methods and systems to minimise the ecological footprint in shipbuilding and enhance energy efficiency. This will include deploying sustainable energy sources, port electrification, and streamlining logistics and operations.
The project has brought together a consortium of esteemed partners including the National Technical University of Athens, the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), Atlantec Enterprise Solutions, Astilleros de Santander (Astander), Azimut-Benetti Group Shipyard, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Danaos Shipping Company, Epsilon Malta Ltd, Floorganise B.V Shipyard Engineering, Grieg Green, Instituto de Soldadura e Qualidade Technological Interface Center (ISQ), LTH Baas Integrated Maritime Services, ShipReality Research Ltd, the University of Strathclyde Naval Architecture & Engineering and the Foundation WEGEMT European Universities Association. The collaboration will drive sustainable practices and innovation in the European shipbuilding industry, underlining the commitment to environmental responsibility and long-term viability.
Notably, TWI Hellas is spearheading the operational testing, system integration, and data and IPR management of the EcoShipYard platform. “I firmly believe that the consortium has the potential to deliver impactful results” says TWI Hellas' engineer and technical lead for the project, Lampis Papakostas. “The developed digital twin platform will create a roadmap for shipbuilding processes and ships’ material circularity, that will revolutionise and improve performance in the shipyard environment, help to minimise environmental impacts and provide a decision support system throughout the ship’s life cycle.”