K Line unit to build battery-powered electric tugboat

K Line’s group company Seagate Corporation will build a new electric tugboat powered by battery, the Japanese shipping company revealed.

The new tugboat will be equipped with a propulsion system running on hybrid EV system. It has an electric motor as the main power source running by a large capacity lithium-ion battery charged by a land charger. It is also equipped with a generator as the auxiliary power source.

The tugboat will be the first of its kind to have an electric motor as the main power source in Tokuyama and will be deployed in the first half of 2025 to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the Tokuyama area, according to K Line.

In the future, it will be possible to achieve zero emissions by replacing the fuel for the generator with zero-emission energy.

In November last year, the company partially revised the K Line Environmental Vision 2050, its long-term policy on environmental measures, replacing the goal of halving emissions by 2050, which was the same as the goal of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), with the new goal of achieving net-zero GHG emissions by 2050.

As part of this long-term strategy, K Line intends to add zero-emission vessels to its fleet by 2030.

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