Newport Shipping Charts a New Path for the Ship Repair Industry

Newport Shipping is a Business Reporter client.

Newport Shipping is a ship repair company specializing in maintenance, retrofits, repairs and conversions with a low-carbon focus for commercial vessels, including tankers, bulk carriers and container vessels. Newport has a 60-year history in the ship repair business and is focused on innovation and sustainability for the long term. 

Newport is active globally, collaborating with 15 shipyards with 38 docks capable of handling approximately 2,500 repairs annually of all vessel classes and sizes. It has teamed up with the industry’s best suppliers of environmental technology, giving customers access to leading-edge innovation at its shipyard locations.

Environment

Environmental regulations are at the forefront of the changing maritime industry, with owners seeking reliable and proven technology. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has set a goal to halve international shipping’s greenhouse gas emissions of nearly a billion metric tons per year and reduce carbon intensity to 70% of 2008 levels by 2050. The new Energy Efficiency Existing Ship Index (EEXI) requires all cargo vessels to meet stricter class limits on emissions, with annual surveys performed from Jan. 1, 2023.

Newport Shipping has launched three liquified natural gas (LNG) retrofit designs for tankers, bulk carriers and container vessels onto the market, allowing shipowners to convert their vessels to a more environmentally friendly fuel solution. 

“Given the time pressure and scale demanded by the IMO decarbonization target, the right solution will make it easier for owners to commit themselves to execution,” explains Lianghui Xia, Group Managing Director, Newport Shipping. “LNG has the right characteristics as being the most practical choice for a marine fuel. We believe now is the right time for us to provide the market with our solution, which is both cost-effective and time-efficient.” 

As with all new technologies, price is always a key factor in adoption. Ingmar Loges, Managing Director of Newport Shipping’s Hamburg office, highlights the financial impact of adopting an LNG design: “When we discuss LNG retrofits, the motivation for the shipowner has been driven by several factors, including financial ROIs. But owners are also looking at the changing decarbonization/zero-emission shipping landscape; the savings in costs and to the environment can be tremendous, with shipowners also looking at the possibility of an expanded customer base.” 

Newport Shipping’s new designs are based on deck-mounted LNG tanks that can be installed without major modifications to the vessel hull, thereby reducing installation costs. Another advantage is that, as part of a retrofit solution using a dual-fuel engine, this design would also be suitable for future use of carbon-neutral methane such as bio-LNG. Tank capacity, which is based on typical ship profile and planned operating route, is sufficient for a single voyage. 

Newport Shipping has also developed a container-ship LNG design based on containers for LNG being stored on deck, which can then be discharged and replaced when a vessel enters port. 

The significance of these designs means that the shipping industry has solutions available today that will allow it to start cutting its carbon emissions immediately while meeting incoming environmental regulations.

Finance

Tighter lending requirements have made traditional sources of shipping finance increasingly difficult to access, at a time when the shipping industry needs significant investment to accelerate its transition to zero emissions and fund the growing fleet capacity required to transport the world’s goods. With sustainability demand growing, the maritime industry is moving toward a global green ship finance market, with major demand expected for retrofit funding, and there has been a corresponding increase in interest from finance sources. 

“Newport internally has a number of finance professionals, and has access to external green finance to support retrofit investment and other ship finance, and can assist in structuring customized financing solutions, subject to credit evaluation and approval,” says Loges, who is responsible for group sales and retrofits. “We would be pleased to assist in any introductions to our trusted, experienced ship finance contacts.” 

The digital step change

Adapting to the changing horizon that digitalization is bringing to the maritime industry, Newport has developed Newport Maritime Services (NMS), its online booking portal that provides access to all its services through the web. 

Digitalization is seeing many bespoke digital tools now being used daily to operate and manage the world’s merchant vessel fleet. However, the ship repair and retrofit sector has lagged in adapting to the digital age, with most of the work around vital activities still being conducted via complex spreadsheets, layers of brokers and reams of paperwork. 

The NMS portal offers a new way of managing ship repair and retrofit projects via its bespoke online platform, which enables shipowners and fleet operators to obtain instant quotes for routine maintenance work, have real-time visibility of shipyard availability and receive priority access to dry-dock slots and service, all at the click of a mouse. 

NMS board member Cenk Ozeker outlines how the platform bridges the gap between shipowners and shipyards: “Digitalization is on the agenda of all companies operating in the shipping industry, but the sector also remains true to its traditional roots. We wanted to introduce an online tool that works in harmony with the people that make the ship repair sector what it is today, enabling greater transparency and thereby validating the trust and personal relationships that the industry is built on.” 

“NMS employs a number of unique methodologies and technologies, such as auto-filling ship specifications; standardization of the quantities and unit prices of repair and maintenance items; standardization of retrofitting specifications; and ready-to-use special survey templates by vessel type and age,” explains Kagan Kongar, Chief Technology Officer, NMS.

NMS is a potential game changer for those responsible for the management of multiple vessels, empowering them with a level of transparency and control that more traditional methods cannot deliver, while significantly de-risking the whole process—providing a faster, cheaper, more efficient, controlled and audited experience. 

This article originally appeared in Business Reporter.

Image credits: Courtesy of Newport Shipping