Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd, Japan, has announced the development of a technology that analyses a ship’s data to estimate fuel efficiency, speed and other performance parameters in actual sea conditions with a margin error of less than 5%.
Using statistical analysis, the technology utilises large quantities of data gathered while the ship is in operation, including sensor data of meteorological and hydrographic conditions such as wind, waves, and ocean currents, ship engine log data, and data regarding the speed and position of the ship.
Carrying out joint research with Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, Fujitsu Laboratories applied the technology to measured data held by the University from actual ships at sea, including wind and wave data, and the ship’s fuel consumption. They accurately estimated the ship’s speed performance and fuel consumption performance to within a 5% margin of error. By combining this technology with the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology’s weather routing simulation, they verified that, for a Pacific Ocean shipping route from Tokyo to Los Angeles, taking an optimal route determined by the technology for best ship performance (rather than taking the most direct route) led to a reduction in fuel consumption by 5%, reducing both fuel costs and CO2 emissions.
Currently, ship performance estimation technologies rely on experiments with model ships in tanks of water, or on physics model simulations, and so they are not able to take into account the complicated interactions of the wind, waves, and ocean currents with ship conditions, which has resulted in large margins of error in predictions.
With this technology the ship’s performance can be accurately estimated based on real sea conditions in order to facilitate design feedback and to improve fuel efficiency when used in ship navigation.
Fujitsu Laboratories aims to continue to improve its estimation accuracy through further operational trials.
Ship Efficiency Review News
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