As said the most visible and eye-catching technology will be the “sails” but our journey towards sustainability doesn’t end there. In an effort to minimize environmental impact of sailing our vessels, we have implemented other technologies which will help to optimize fuel efficiency and thus reduce CO2 emissions. One of the other means to improve our sustainability is the introduction of a special Lube oil, called Dex Oil. The initial testing of this lube oil took place on board of MT Chemical Voyager, where the lube oil was used in the auxiliary engines of the vessel. After promising results in the auxiliary engines, the testing was extended to the main engine of this fine lady. Intensive testing in different circumstances and promising results, made us decide to continue with Dex Oil in order to reduce CO2 emissions on other vessels in our fleet as well.

Propellor Boss Cap Fins (PBCF)

A PBCF, which are specially designed small propellors which are installed behind the vessels’ main propellor. More official words to describe what a PBCF does are as follows “When a vessels’ propellor is rotating it creates a swirling motion, which is officially called hub vortex (and in ordinary words can be seen as “turbulence”. This hub vortex can increase drag and it will reduce the propellors’ efficiency and thus the vessels’ efficiency. The PBCF is developed and designed to “disturb” the turbulence and improve the efficiency of the vessel. The objective is again to reduce the CO2 emissions of our fleet.

All the initiatives as described above should not be seen in isolation, they are all designed and implemented to significantly reduce our CO2 footprint. Where some measures will create a saving of 8 – 10% reductions, other measures will be scoring a 2 – 3% reduction, but we do believe that all efforts combined will generate a major change in the future of shipping. We as an industry, we only stand at the beginning of an era full of challenges and changes to improve our carbon footprint and what can be learned from what we have done so far, will help us with future developments and decisions to make our fleet more and more sustainable.