Maritime insurance company, Gard, is to provide hull & machinery and P&I insurance to the world’s first autonomous vessel – the Yara Birkland.
Norwegian company, Yara International, and Kongsberg Maritime are designing and building the battery-powered, no-ballast, no-crew vessel, which will transfer Yara’s chemicals and fertiliser products from the manufacturing site to port.
Once built, the vessel will have an automatic mooring system for berthing and unberthing so no human intervention will be required. There will also be no need for special implementations on dock-side.
Bjørn Tore Orvik, Yara project manager for the Yara Birkland says: “Yara Birkland is a game-changer that will set a new standard in the maritime sector. It is also a commercial solution that will help the world deliver on the climate goals as set forth in the Paris agreement.”
Orvik says the autonomous, electric vessel has received NOK 133m (USD 16m) from the Norwegian government towards its total cost of around 400m (USD 49m).
The vessel will be 79.5m long and will have a service speed of six knots. It is scheduled to enter service in 2019, first as a manned vessel with a captain and small crew located in the container-based bridge and crew unit and then as an autonomous vessel from 2020. Yara Birkland will sail in the Norwegian fjords between Herøya and Brevik, a distance of seven nautical miles, and between Herøya and Larvik, a 30nm distance.
According to Yara, the vessel will reduce the demand for products to be transported by road, lessening the truck journeys by around 40,000 per year, also reducing nitrogen oxides and CO2 emissions.
Image: The Yara Birkland. Courtesy of Kongsberg.
