Navigating with "Windwings"
Finnish naval architects Deltamarin and BAR Technologies, a British marine engineering consultancy, are once again partnering in a wind propulsion project and working on a new build design, called Aframax/LRII.
The announcement comes off the back of previous collaboration on "Windwings" which, with saving of approximately 1.5 t of fuel per wing per day, will debut on the "Pyxis Ocean" soon. Early predictions suggest that as much as 10 t of fuel per day can be saved with an Aframax/LRII hull and four "Windwings" using a North America/ Rotterdam roundtrip as an example.
Esa Jokioinen, director, sales and marketing at Deltamarin: "So far, we have made fine progress in harnessing wind power using sails, but we are finding increased performance all the time and, with this hull design, we are witnessing a 15% improvement against our current fleet." (ah)