Tag Archives: hull cleaning

Your Ship’s Not Clean Unless It Is EverClean

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Managing biofouling on ship hulls has been a topic of interest for thousands of years. Like many things in the marine industry, progress in this field has been the result of a slow, steady churn of technological improvements, punctuated by periodic significant advancements (e.g. copper sheathing, anti-fouling & fouling release paints). We are now in the midst of another advancement: hull cleaning. Hull cleaning refers to the gentle, habitual and frequent mechanical maintenance of submerged ships’ hulls in order that they remain free from extraneous matter such as fouling organisms and particulate debris, with minimal impact on the coating. In hindsight, it seems remarkably simple – clean it regularly in a way that doesn’t damage the paint. As it turns out, some of those adjectives (gentle, frequent, habitual) are not easy to achieve.

EverClean™ is an autonomous robotic hull cleaning service that delivers always clean hulls made possible by combining a Robot-as-a-Service (RaaS) business model with the next generation of hull cleaning robotics. The Armach vehicle has some distinct advantages – a small platform to get into tighter spaces on the hull, and caterpillar tracks which are kinder to hull coatings.

Because the Armach vehicle is scalable and efficient, cleanings can be performed more regularly using a thoroughly tested brush system that is non-destructive to the hull coating with built-in system intelligence which means it won’t overwork the coatings – adding yet another cost benefit. The system also saves costs by reporting valuable information back to the shipowner, effectively creating a hull condition survey every time it cleans a hull. If any damage or corrosion is picked up early by the robot’s cameras and sensors, decisions can be made on whether rectification is necessary or whether ongoing monitoring will suffice.

EverClean, makes operating with always clean hulls finally possible in an industry that has been doing things the same way for centuries and stands ready to provide a service solution to always clean hulls and hull intelligence for the marine industry today.

Don’t let biofouling drag you down. Schedule an EverClean consultation today and see how to save fuel, reduce carbon emissions, and mitigate invasive species transfer.

Carnival Corporation Driving Technical Innovation

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“Where there are particularly large refits or complex ones, we provide project management resources to support the brands,” said Chris Millman, vice president of corporate marine technology at Carnival Corporation.

Perhaps the biggest project coming up for Carnival Corporation is a battery system retrofit for AIDA Cruises, as the German brand will get a 10MW battery installation with the goal to manoeuvre into port, hook up to shore power, and then sail out of port, all with zero emissions.

“The impact of that will be zero emissions for a port call, which is something we are looking at,” Millman said, adding that a fuel cell installation was also happening in the near future on an AIDA vessel.

Long-term planning is centred around fewer emissions with the eventual goal of finding the zero-emissions fuel of the future.

Varying Projects

Many of the ideas and project topics come from the brands themselves, noted Mike Kaczmarek, vice president of corporate shipbuilding.

Thus, those projects can turn into company-wide refit projects, energy-efficiency initiatives and help lend resources and support to prototype future technologies.

“We have been running a technical prototype initiative whereby we are assessing the impact of different technologies on the ships,” said Millman, pointing to variable speed pumps, fan controllers, different hull coatings and LED lights.          

“We’ve developed a recommended package for all our ships … it brings all the ships into line with technologies we’ve identified as being effective at improving energy efficiency and waste management,” he said.

After seeing the results of an air lubrication system on a pair of newbuilds, that technology has now been retrofitted to a handful of existing ships, where Carnival first equipped the ships with the fastest itineraries in the fleet that would benefit the most.

Hull Coating

““Following the pause period, and with ships returning to service, they needed hull cleaning and we needed to understand which ones needed it the most,” Millman explained.

New is a remote hull cleaning drone that also collects all the fouling of the hull, alleviating concerns from port authorities and letting Carnival evaluate what was on the hull.

With no shortage of hull coating options available, different water temperatures ship speeds and itinerary patterns, the company is constantly evaluating new hull paint.

Carnival ships are sailing globally with different hull coatings, and test patches of new coatings.

“In one case we coated a whole hull with completely new paint. It has proven to be very successful,” Millman said. “We haven’t seen it through to the end of five years yet but we are moving to do another couple of trials.”

Support

Supporting initiatives include a host of subject matter experts at the corporate level – whether it’s a hydrodynamics wizard, a waste heat genius or other top minds in specific fields.

“The background assistance is there for the brands,” said Millman.

Getting pitched all the time with the latest emissions-saving gadgets, the corporate technology team goes through potential projects, brings in subject matter help and then evaluates proposals.

“We would then prioritize what to trial depending on what we feel would bring the best ROI on improving energy efficiency,” Millman said. “Then run the trial and report back.”

Company-wide, a technical team gathers twice a year for two to three days, going through all the projects, providing updates and making decisions on where the future focus should go.

“The biggest (future) tech initiative will be on alternative fuels … that is a major way to decarbonization.”

Excerpt from Cruise Industry News Quarterly Magazine: Winter 2021-2022