An Improved Ship Weather Routing Framework for CII Reduction Accounting for Wind-Assisted Rotors

Abstract

With the increasingly strict regulations for the energy-saving and emission-reduction technology of ships, minimizing fuel cost and thus reducing the carbon intensity index (CII) is one of the most critical issues in the design and operation of merchant ships. More recently, many wind-assisted devices, such as rotors, wind sails, etc., have been investigated and designed to utilize renewable wind energy. With the equipment of wind-assisted rotors, the optimization of ship routes becomes more important because the effect of this wind-assisted device highly depends on the local wind field along the shipping route. In this paper, an improved ship weather routing framework based on the A* algorithm has been proposed to determine the optimal ship route and ship operations with wind-assisted rotors. The proposed framework effectively utilizes different sources of data, including ship design, weather forecasting and historical sailing information, to produce a better estimation of fuel consumption under the effect of sea states. Several improvements on the classic A* algorithm, including directed searching and three-dimensional extension, are proposed to improve the routing effect and efficiency. Finally, the proposed method was applied to test cases of a VLCC operating from China to the Middle East and the results show that the total fuel consumption could be reduced compared to the minimum distance route.

Application of fuzzy cellular automata to optimize a vessel route considering the forecasted hydrometeorological conditions

“…Therefore, for the formation of a safe, optimal fuel consumption route of the passage of ships, taking into account the forecast of weather conditions, a possible way to achieve the set goals is the use of fuzzy sets and fuzzy cellular automata. This approach, in contrast to the one proposed in [9][10][11][12], takes into account the uncertainty and evolution of the navigation situation. This metric automaton lattice is a discrete hexagonal lattice.…”

“…Paper [10] proposed a framework that uses various data sources, including ship design, weather forecast, and historical sailing information, to calculate fuel consumption under the influence of navigational conditions. Improvements to the classical A* algorithm, including directed search and three-dimensional expansion, are proposed to improve routing efficiency.…”

Impact of Carbon Intensity Indicator on the Vessels’ Operation and Analysis of Onboard Operational Measures

“…One of the options could be to use one of the software developed by many weather routing services available in the market. The authors of [6] specify that the optimization of vessels' routes can be achieved using improved ship weather routing using wind-assisted rotors. This calculation is based on different data (ship design, past sailing information, weather forecasts) to reduce fuel oil consumption.…”

Effects of the Carbon Intensity Index Rating System on the Development of the Northeast Passage

“…The IMO's energy-saving framework is expected to have a significant impact on shipping patterns [16]. Therefore, the shipping industry is developing innovative energy-saving technologies such as organic Rankine cycle (ORC) [19,20], steam turbines, heat pumps, and heat recovery [20,21], where ORC and dual-pressure steam systems have been proven to be the most beneficial technologies for improving energy efficiency [19,20]. It has also been observed that some wind rotors and sails are installed on the deck to generate additional thrust to achieve energy-saving purposes [22].…”

“…As a result, it may lead to the low operating efficiency of ships and a gradual loss of competitiveness [24]. In order to effectively reduce the carbon emissions of existing ships and improve the CII rating, shipping companies may use all possible methods to obtain the best fuel consumption efficiency, including using alternative low-carbon or zero-carbon fuels [23][24][25], slow steaming, and optimizing the operation mode [21], e.g., using alternative routes or the great circle route to shorten the voyage, so as to reduce the attained CII value and achieve a better CII rating.…”