It started with two \u2013 superficially straightforward \u2013 renewal requests he explained: Gisa\u015f Shipbuilding asked for harbour tugs that were both \u201clower emissions\u2026 and smaller\u201d than its previous fleet, since the yard\u2019s tugboats have to meet a rising environmental awareness along with a particularly tight operating environment inside the Port of Istanbul.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, these turned out to be conflicting demands: despite a growing utilisation of diesel-battery configurations for tugs and a number of clean-tech add-ons, NAVTEK\u2019s initial R&D studies showed fulfilling the contract \u201cwasn\u2019t possible with hybrid or diesel power solutions\u201d, he remarked.<\/p>\n
That was when a young design engineer proposed a fully electric, rechargeable solution: \u201cWe all objected at first, but he convinced us to run a study,\u201d remembered Acuner. Despite this, he added: \u201cI confess that during the R&D, I\u2019d been worried the final calculations would show that you couldn\u2019t apply the technology to this type of vessel\u2026\u201d He shouldn\u2019t have been concerned: although novel, the figures showed it was doable, and the NV-712 build got underway.<\/p>\n
However, realising it took \u201cmeticulous engineering\u201d. The main challenge was the sheer scale of the electrical power delivering the 32 tonne bollard pull: in fact, standard switching technology would result in \u201cdistribution panels needing more space than the whole ship\u201d, he explained. Usefully, a heavy-duty crossover from the mining industry was found to power the 925kW propulsion motors driving the ABB thrusters below. This, combined with locating the various elements around the vessel and connecting them with single core cables rather than power bars, helped pull it all into the limited footprint offered by the modest, 18.7m long, 6.7m beam tugboat.<\/p>\n
All this requires a substantially different developmental approach, said Acuner: he underlined that the most important lesson has been \u201cdon\u2019t design a conventional diesel drive and then try to convert it\u2026. but start from the very beginning as fully electric\u201d. There were also some useful surprises surrounding predicted efficiency: \u201cDuring the tests, we noticed that it needed less energy to complete an operation than we\u2019d calculated,\u201d he remarked.<\/p>\n
Despite its success, Zeetug\u2019s implications reach further than this first vessel, (which, he added, is \u201cperforming excellently\u201d for Gisa\u015f) or even the next three now on NAVTEK\u2019s order book.<\/p>\n
As Acuner noted, numbers of all-electric vessels are now rising, along with supporting technology: \u201cWords such as \u2018bunkering\u2019, \u2018fuel rate\u2019 and \u2018fuel treatment\u2019 are being exchanged for \u2018charging station\u2019, \u2018electric power unit price\u2019 and \u2018energy management software\u2019,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n
As Gold Sponsors of the Coastlink 2020 Conference, take the opportunity to meet with the team from NAVTEK Naval Technologies Inc throughout the 2-day event. Book now<\/a> to secure your delegate place at Coastlink. If you are a member of one of Coastlink\u2019s supporting associations a 10% discount is available \u2013 please quote the Supporter code when making your booking and the discount will be applied. Alternatively, please call the team on +44 1329 825335 or email info@coastlink.co.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It may have helped \u201crealise a revolution\u201d Ferhat Acuner of NAVTEK told Maritime Journal, but the groundbreaking Zeetug project nearly didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1047,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,7],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-1046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-news-coastlink"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1046","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1046"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1046\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1048,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1046\/revisions\/1048"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1046"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/coastlink\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=1046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}