Two affiliates of the Dutch Spliethoff Group and Finnish company UPM have entered into a long-term charter agreement covering seven new LNG-powered vessels.
Finland-based Bore, the Netherlands-based Wijnne Barends and UPM will together design and build seven vessels for sustainable sea transportation for UPM in Europe.
As informed, Bore is to build three ice-class 7,000 dwt RoLo vessels for transporting UPM’s paper products. The RoLos would be a combination of pure roll-on/roll-off (RoRo) with lift-on/lift-off (LoLo) transportation concepts.
What is more, Wijnne Barends will construct four LoLo vessels for transporting UPM’s pulp and other forest products.
The vessels will be built in China and are scheduled to be delivered in 2021 and 2022.
All vessels will be time chartered by UPM and fully operated by the company. They will be ice-strengthened and meet the latest technological, operational and environmental standards.
“The vessels will be fueled with liquid natural gas (LNG) which results in a significant (approximately 25%) reduction of CO 2 emissions compared with commonly used marine gas oil. In addition, nitrogen oxides (NOx) and sulphur oxides (SOx) emissions will decrease approximately 85% and 99%, respectively. The emissions of soot particles will also decrease by 99%,” Lauri Rikala, Director, Global Break Bulk Shipping, UPM Logistics, commented.
“We are very pleased to be able to offer UPM these next generation sustainable vessels. Minimizing our environmental footprint has long been a focal point for the Spliethoff Group and the reduction of emissions is a fundamental part of this. The new vessels running on LNG fit well in our continuous drive for greener operations,” Michael van den Heuvel, CCO of Spliethoff, said.
Read more: Spliethoff to Equip Almost Its Entire Fleet with Scrubbers