Peace Boat’s Ecoship Project calls for suppliers at SMM

During the SMM 2016, Peace Boat’s Ecoship Project will be one of the members showcasing their initiatives in the International Windship Association (IWSA) booth, A301. Peace Boat, Japan’s largest cruising organization and an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the United Nations, is leading a program to create the world’s most sustainable cruise ship. Planned to sail in 2020, this whole-system, future-ready 55,000 ton cruise ship has been developed by a world-class team of over 30 engineers, scientists and thinkers from the fields of ship-building and cutting-edge eco-technology. In Hamburg, the Ecoship team will announce the latest developments in the project, as well as organize a special event to call for suppliers for its varied technological needs.

On September 7 from 10am, Peace Boat will lead a three-hour event at the IWSA Innovation Forum, located in the new A5 Hall, which is specialising in sustainable and alternative propulsion solutions. The event will begin with a general presentation of the project, its main environmental features and innovations. It will concentrate on five aspects for which further technological inputs and elaboration is needed:

10:30 to 11:00 LNG propulsion and LNG tank makers
11:00 to 11:30 Waste Energy recovery
11:30 to 12:00 Waste and Water recycling
12:00 to 12:30 Solar panels-solar energy
12:30 to 13:00 HVAC systems

The director and founder of Peace Boat, Yoshioka Tatsuya, is very excited at the idea of bringing the Ecoship Project to Hamburg. “The world is entering a new area and we need to change to a low-carbon economy. The maritime industry must play a major role in this transition. A proof of a first step in this direction is the creation of the new Hall 5 at SMM this year, exclusively dedicated to clean technologies. We are very proud to contribute to this historical development with our Ecoship Project”, he says.

This enthusiasm is shared by Ecoship’s Project Director, Andrés Molina. “Traditionally, SMM has been the world’s most important meeting point for the maritime industry. Therefore, we would like to use this opportunity to call on the industry to think out of the box and to provide new solutions that could fit the Ecoship’s specifications”, he comments.

With architectural naval design by Spanish company Oliver Design, the Ecoship Project is the brainchild of Peace Boat, which has grown from its foundation in 1983 to be Japan’s largest cruising organization. Working on social business lines, it runs three around the world cruises out of Japan per year with over 300,000 passenger nights annually. The Ecoship Project will create a ship for Peace Boat’s educational voyages, while sailing as a flagship for climate action and developing sustainable energy solutions for the cruise and shipping industry. The Ecoship’s design was publicly announced at COP21 in December 2015.