ADOPTION OF UNMANNED SHIPS “WILL TAKE TIME”
The world’s first fully electric container ship, MV Yara Birkeland, has been a pioneer in autonomous maritime transport since it started commercial operations in 2022.
It undertakes two voyages a week, transporting about 100 containers on each journey with only three crew members.
Plans are in the works for five voyages weekly with two crew members.
But the widespread deployment of large fully autonomous ships, such as container vessels and tankers, in international waters will take time, experts noted.
“It’s far in the future,” said IALA’s Zachariae.
“In the foreseeable future, 20 to 25 years, you will have a mixed fleet. You will still have the normal ships with a normal crew on board, and more and more autonomous ships coming into the market.”
Newly constructed vessels will continue to operate for a couple of decades, and issues of reliability and communications also need to be managed, said experts.
“We are concerned about technology, whether it is safe enough … We need to have perfect communication between autonomous ships and the control centre,” said Yuichi Sonoda, secretary general of the Asian Shipowners’ Association.
“We are worried about cybersecurity issues, and we still don’t know how we can use autonomous ships in the busy sea lanes like the Straits of Malacca and Singapore, and also busy ports all over the world.”
To balance innovation with safety, the international maritime community is building a set of standards so that the autonomous systems are compatible worldwide.
But observers noted that this is easier said than done.
“It’s not easy to make these harmonised solutions, but it’s really important, otherwise we’ll not succeed,” said Zachariae.
He added that development in the area is largely driven by commercial companies, and not the authorities.
“They work from their own set-up in the country where they belong. And they do not always cooperate, and they might also want to protect their own solutions a little – so it’s actually difficult to harmonise these digital solutions,” he said.