French sailing container ships are a chance for cooperation in the EU with Polish shipyards

/in /by

By Marek Grzybowski

French shippers and Zéphyr & Borée remain determined to expand their fleet of sail-powered containerships. Canopée, a 121-meter-long ro-ro vessel developed for ArianeGroup, sails across the Atlantic and transports the Ariane 6 launch vehicle from continental Europe to French Guiana, where the space center is located. Its hull was built by Partner Stocznia in Police, and the ship was fitted with sails by the Neptune shipyard.

The vessel meets particularly complex specifications, taking into account technical requirements in terms of packaging (oversized dimensions, loading and unloading restrictions) as well as maritime restrictions on access to the port of Pariacabo in Guyana (shallow waters, narrow Kourou River).

Canopée makes up to 12 round trips to Guyana each year to fulfill ArianeGroup’s missions. In addition to using wind energy, which reduces emissions (fine particles, sulfur dioxide, etc.), the ship is equipped with a diesel engine. Canopée was named ship of the year at the Maritime Awards Gala, which took place last year in Rotterdam. We wrote more about the ship here

Williwaw – a container ship with wings
This is not the first award for the French team, which not only promotes but also constructs cargo ships with sail propulsion. On November 8, 2022, at the Assises de l’économie de la mer conference (a conference dedicated to the maritime economy), Hervé Berville, Secretary of State for the Sea, announced that the Williwaw project (formerly Mervent) was the winner of the AMI CORIMER 2022 award.
The project aims to build a container ship equipped with rigid wings and dual-fuel propulsion. The ship’s engine will be able to burn marine fuel or methanol, which – according to the designers – will reduce CO₂ emissions by at least 50%. The project is expected to be able to operate on the transatlantic route between ports in France and the United States.
The project, called Mervent 2025, is being carried out by Zéphyr & Borée and its partners CWS, GTT and Centrale Nantes. It was selected under the CORIMER 2022 call for proposals. The French government’s Research and Innovation Guidance Council for the Sea Industry supports research and development projects by companies in the maritime sector, focusing on four themes: the transition to zero-emission ships, smart ships and autonomous systems, new materials and smart shipyards/plants, and the next-generation offshore industry (renewable marine energy sources, renewable hydrogen). Today, the Williwaw project is led by four main stakeholders: the shipowner and operator of the Zéphyr & Borée, Computed Wing Sail (creator of the ship’s composite wing system), OSE Engineering and Centrale Nantes. The latter is responsible for work on the energy efficiency of ships.

 

 

AUTF shippers support
The work would not have been possible without the interest of French shippers in bringing to sea and supporting R&D in the maritime industries.

– French shippers’ group Association des Utilisateurs de Transport de Fret (AUTF) and France Supply Chain, which lobbies for more sustainable transport, have joined forces to promote the development of modern sailing vessels for cargo transport, writes Stuart Todd in TheLoadStar.com. In 2022, around a dozen shippers joined the Low Carbon Maritime Transport (LCMT) initiative, including such household names as Michelin, Moët Hennessy, Nestlé Waters and Remy Cointreau.
– They have confirmed their willingness to transport some of their containers by this innovative mode of transport to reduce the environmental impact of their operations, France Supply Chain reported.

LCMT emphasises that “while innovative solutions such as biofuels are already being implemented, they cannot be the only answer to the energy savings that we absolutely need at a global level. However, maritime transport is a vital part of the functioning of our economy, which is more than ever based on international trade.” LCMT launched a tender for two weekly transatlantic routes between Europe and North America, which – it was assumed – would be operated by container ships powered mainly by wind energy from 2024. The ambition was to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by at least half.

With the wind across the Atlantic
The following operational conditions were set for the project: delivery of 5 vessels per liner service, weekly departures from the container terminal. The vessel should ensure an 80% reduction in energy consumption, a 46 to 51% reduction in CO2 emissions. The boundary conditions for the designers assumed that each container ship would have a capacity of 600 to 1,080 TEU containers, propulsion allowing speeds of 11 to 13 knots. The possibility of employing 12 vessels in two liner services was later increased.
France Supply Chain reported: “At a time when the world must regenerate in the face of serious environmental challenges, the supply chain – the real nervous system of the economy – is once again proving itself to be one of the key areas of sustainable development and renewal.”
The president of the AUTF, Denis Choumert, told L’Antenne in 2022 that among the missions of the LCMT was to launch a tender for 12 wind-powered vessels, each of which would cost around 40 million euros. Shippers involved in wind-powered cargo ships would offer five-year shipping contracts to cover construction costs, Todd quoted. The ambitious plan was for the project to provide two weekly transatlantic services. Choumert envisioned that “the first would connect Northern Europe with the North American east coast, and the second would connect Southern Europe with the west coast. Each route would be served by six ships, offering the same transit times as the current transatlantic services.”

France 2030 to support the project of 5 1200 TEU containerships
The idea of ​​building five 1200 TEU containerships, mainly powered by sails, has recently been revisited. The Zéphyr & Borée project for AUTF shippers is still on-going and supported by volume commitments that guarantee the profitability of this new transatlantic service.

Zéphyr & Borée won the France 2030 award in 2023 for Williwaw, a hybrid cargo containership powered by sails. The shipowner is one of the first 11 winners of the award, which also involves financial support under the France 2030 plan.
France 2030 is an investment program aimed at enabling France to develop its competitiveness based on future technologies. This also includes supporting decarbonization initiatives.
As part of the implementation of this plan, Pascal Bolot, prefect of Morbihan, visited the headquarters of Zéphyr & Borée in May 2023 in the presence of Baptiste Rolland, sub-prefect of Lorient, and Marie Wencker, deputy secretary general and sub-prefect responsible for the implementation of France 2030 in Morbihan. During the visit, they were presented with the Williwaw project and a model of the vessel.

Since 2021, the France 2030 program has supported innovative players throughout France, whose ambition is to develop through innovation. 54 billion euros have been allocated for projects by 2030, reports the website info.gouv.fr. The 1,200 TEU sailing containership project can start because, according to Jean-Michel Garcia, delegate for international transport at the AUTF, “the volume commitments have been met. We know that we have enough cargo to transport to guarantee the profitability of weekly rotation between Europe and the east coast of the United States using the Zéphyr & Borée sailing container ships.”

A tender for the construction of five sailing ships was resolved over a year ago. Zéphyr & Borée chose the docks in the Korean Hyundai Mipo shipyards for the construction of the hulls. A few days ago, the order expired due to unforeseen problems with starting the financing process for the production of the hulls. It is noted that the delay does not mean the abandonment of the project, which has guaranteed financing from the aforementioned France 2030. Therefore, there is an opportunity to activate the potential of Polish shipyards to cooperate with shipyards from France. After all, this is consistent with the SEA Europe strategy, which was presented in Gdynia at the Maritime Economy Forum by Christophe Tytgat, Secretary General, CEO of SEA Europe & CESA. He clearly emphasized that it is about cooperation between the European shipbuilding industry. Therefore, for the common good, it is worth undertaking such cooperation, using the experience of CRIST and Partner Stocznia.