Project partners Wärtsilä, Carnival Maritime and Hamburg Vessel Coordination Center (HVCC) have announced the successful implementation and testing of a new just-in-time sailing system based on real-time ship-shore data exchange.
The new Wärtsilä Navi-Port system is a middleware which hooks up to Wärtsilä’s Fleet Operations Solution (FOS), an online infrastructure for ship-to-shore reporting and fleet performance management that combines individual processes to optimise voyage planning, weather routing and fuel consumption.
The new system facilitates the exchange of accurate arrival times between ports and ships, enabling vessels to automatically adjust speed to achieve a just-in-time arrival. It applies the port call message standard defined by the Sea Traffic Management (STM) validation project.
If port conditions are incompatible with the vessel’s planned time of arrival, the berth scheduler can suggest a new Requested Time of Arrival (RTA). The RTA is shared with the FOS and then sent directly to the vessel’s navigation system, along with an optimised, automatically calculated sailing speed. If the RTA is accepted by the Captain, the ship’s speed is automatically adjusted to respond to the new arrival time.
Depending on the specific decision-making process, the information can also be shared with the shipping company’s Fleet Operation Centre, so that shore-side personnel can be involved in the approval chain.
“We are committed to making cruising more sustainable, and to setting an example in greener and safer operations. For this, we welcome the development of new and more efficient technologies, such as the Wärtsilä Navi-Port,” said Michael Salzmann, Senior Nautical Superintendent, Carnival Maritime.
“We have tested the solution with two of our ships, the ‘AidaSol’ and the ‘AidaPerla’. The ships’ onboard Wärtsilä NACOS Platinum navigation systems were connected directly to HVCC, which allowed continuous communications, resulting in JIT (just in time) arrivals in Hamburg.”
