What if the biggest opportunities for improving a vessel’s energy efficiency are determined long before construction begins? With more fuels, technologies and operational requirements to consider, ship design is becoming increasingly complex. But advances in AI and computational capabilities are also opening up new possibilities – allowing engineers to explore more alternatives, challenge established design choices and optimise the entire vessel concept much earlier in the process.
In this episode of HANSA.newscast, Janne Silden speaks with Mia Elg, R&D Manager at Deltamarin, about how conceptual ship design is evolving, the role of AI in engineering and where significant potential for improving vessel energy efficiency remains.
Deltamarin is currently developing AI applications in three areas: document screening, structural 3D modelling and hydrodynamic optimisation. In the latter, mathematical optimisation algorithms make it possible to evaluate hundreds of design alternatives in a fraction of the time required by traditional methods. Tasks that previously took engineers several weeks can potentially be completed in days.
But the real opportunity goes beyond saving time. By moving hydrodynamic optimisation into earlier design stages, engineers can explore fundamental parameters of the vessel concept rather than focusing primarily on refining an already established hull design. Human expertise remains central, particularly in defining the design parameters, evaluating alternatives and understanding the operational requirements.
The potential of a more holistic approach is illustrated by the EU-funded CHEK project. By combining different technologies, including wind-assisted propulsion, hull optimisation and machinery matched to actual operating profiles, a conceptual bulk carrier design demonstrated the potential for almost 50% energy savings compared with a modern reference vessel.
“It is possible to make huge energy savings, I would say, in almost any ship,” says Elg. However, achieving such improvements requires looking at the vessel as an integrated system from the very beginning. Rather than adding efficiency technologies to an existing design, the challenge is to consider how the different solutions work together and how the vessel will actually operate throughout its lifetime.
