Oceanking has been active in the Greek shipping market for almost 35 years.
All these years its mission remains unchanged. i.e., “to provide the Greek Maritime Community with technical and commercial services of high added value satisfying the applicable regulations through its Partners”.
Greek owners have proven to be leaders in NBs activity by ordering new ships of various types including high-value ships like LNG and LPG carriers. In fact, almost 2000 ships were ordered by Greek owners at Far East shipyards. Oceanking, always adapted its portfolio to provide solutions according to the needs of the ship- owners and has been very successful in doing so.
At the beginning of the new decade, many new regulations have come to force for limiting the pollution of the sea and the combustion emissions. In addition to these, the continuous improvement for the safe operation of the ships and control of their performance created the need of applying digital technology which provides the operator with the full picture of ships’ data, situational awareness, and recommended optimization potential.
Over the last two years, world commerce has gone through changes that could not predicted, and still, there is a lot of uncertainty due to the covid-19 pandemic and the geopolitical situation with the war front in Ukraine, affecting the energy balance due to sanctions against Russia by the Western countries. As a result, shipping is trying to cope with the decompression of world commerce after covid-19 hiked charter rates for container ships mainly. B/Cs and PCTCs are also enjoying high charter rates. Second- hand ships cost more than NBs, a phenomenon that reminds us
of 2006-2008. There have been a lot of orders for containers and PCTCs by worldwide owners, however, Greek owners focused on conventional M.E. and standard makers’ lists. Of course, a few exceptions are comprising a small fraction of the NB order book. What is important is the delivery time and the cost. This is logical due to the aforementioned situation, since “ships in the water make money”. The sooner a delivery takes place, the better it is. This puts the environmental policies in second priority because
the need for more containers, small to medium size, are needed to cover the transportation demand. After all, carbon capture systems and scrubbers can be retrofitted later at a less demanding time. Another characteristic of the current period is the cost of new ships. Prices went up considerably, thus discouraging owners to
place orders for lower value ships e.g., B/Cs. It is preferable to earn money from the existing fleet than investing money on a ship that will be delivered in one and a half years at the earliest, at a higher cost, and during a period in which no one can predict what it will be like.
Almost all NB orders by Greek owners are mainly repeating orders of the past or resale contracts keeping the contractual cost as low as possible aiming to short deliveries. This limits the upgrading of the specs about the ships’ environmental footprint, postponing the adoption of greener shipping technologies after 2023.
This, however, does not mean that shipowners should not focus on environmental policies by adopting the NB specifications solutions like alternative fuels e.g. LNG, methanol, ammonia, hybrid systems, carbon capture scrubbers, and performance monitoring for optimization of operation.
Oceanking has already adapted its portfolio according to these needs and can provide solutions through its Partners which are very successful and leaders in their field of technology, such as:
• Carbon capture technology through an innovative carbon capture scrubber
• Alternative Maritime Power (cold ironing), in reducing the ship- ping emissions when ships are berthed
• Core sensors & data collection systems for ship performance
• AI-based vessel performance & voyage/route/emissions optimization
• Engine performance (M/E & generators)
• Powertrain assessment
• Condition monitoring / Vibration analysis of rotating machinery
• Intelligent Navigation Assistance & Berthing Assistance Systems
Oceanking acting as consultants and as an extension of the technical departments of our clients can provide information on the latest technologies, as well as service through its subsidiary, Oceanking Engineering.
* Operations Manager, Oceanking