Industry partnership unveils LPG concept carrier design

The partnership comprising Consolidated Marine Management, Hyundai Heavy Industries, Wärtsilä and DNV GL unveiled a new LPG-fueled carrier design at the Gastech conference currently being held in Japan.

Under a joint industry project launched in 2016, named LPGreen, partners sought to develop a more energy efficient, environmentally friendly, and safer vessel for the transportation of LPG products, DNV GL said in its statement.

Speaking of the new design, Nikolaos Kakalis, DNV GL’s manager for R&D and advisory services in South East Europe and the Middle East said the new design needs to “simultaneously account for the market and trade route characteristics; excellent safety and ease of operation; cargo and fuel flexibility; and, overall energy efficiency combined with economic viability.”

The JIP has resulted in a new concept design that, compared to the reference vessel built in 2016, achieves an overall improvement of 6–9 percent in energy efficiency, depending on machinery configuration and fuel used.

A redesign of the tank allows for a filling limit of 99 percent, a 1 percent increase in overall carrying capacity. Loading duration has been decreased by 30 percent, while the newly designed cargo handling system concept results in a 5 percent reduction in energy demand, DNV GL said.

George Dimopoulos, principal specialist in DNV GL and project manager for LPGreen, said the JIP “has demonstrated the technical feasibility of an LPG fuelled propulsion concept, which, depending on fuel prices and the development of a commercial and chartering framework, could result in a cut of up to 30 percent in fuel expenses.” 

Every technology feature within the new design was compared against the performance of an existing, new (2016), and very modern LPG carrier from CMM’s fleet, which served as the base for documenting improvements.