AP Moller-Maersk and Hyundai Mipo Dockyards have agreed a contract for the building of a feeder vessel with dual engine technology, enabling it to sail on either methanol or traditional very low Sulphur fuel.
“This groundbreaking container vessel shows that scalable solutions to properly solve shipping’s emissions challenge are available already today,' said Henriette Hallberg Thygesen, Maersk's CEO of fleet and strategic brands. 'From 2023 it will give us valuable experience in operating the container vessels of the future while offering a truly carbon neutral product for our many customers who look to us for help to decarbonise their supply chains.”
The feeder will be 172 meters long and will sail in the network of Sealand Europe, a Maersk subsidiary, on the Baltic shipping route between Northern Europe and the Bay of Bothnia.
”Developing this vessel is a significant challenge, but we have already come a long way in our work with the yard and the makers to reach this milestone,' said Ole Graa Jakobsen, head of fleet technology at Maersk. 'While we are pioneering these solutions for our industry, we are working with well-proven technologies and the cost potential from further scaling is becoming very clear to us.”
Maersk noted that more than half its largest customers had set, or were in the process of setting, 'ambitious science-based or zero carbon targets for their supply chains', making the order another important step in it own efforts to support the rising number of customers calling for carbon neutral products.
