The new container ship will be one of 20 LNG-fuelled vessels in the CMA CGM Group fleet by 2022
Hamburg-based Containerships, a subsidiary of shipping giant CMA CGM Group, has taken delivery of 1,380-TEU, LNG-fuelled Containerships Polar, which will join its sister vessel Containerships Nord in a weekly service between northern Europe, the Baltic states and Russia.
Built by China’s Guangzhou Wenchong Shipyard, Containerships Polar is one of four LNG-fuelled feeder ships that will be phased into the Balt 2 service, which serves the ports of Teesport, Zeebrugge, Rotterdam, Helsinki, St Petersburg, Riga and Gdynia. Rotterdam is the transhipment hub and LNG bunkering port for Containerships Polar and Containerships Nord. Each vessel has an overall length of 170 m, beam of 27 m, with a capacity of 1,400 TEU, accommodating up to 639 units of 45-foot containers.
At the end of June, Containerships Polar is expected to carry out its first LNG bunkering, with approximately 200 tonnes of LNG via ship-to-ship transfer.
Containerships Polar was designed with fuel gas handling room rather than the conventional tank connection space, with fabrication and welding completed on board during the construction by the shipyard.
Additional innovations on the Containerships’ vessels include a power-takeoff shaft generator with a Wärtsilä controllable pitch propeller to supply the ship’s power while the main engine is running.
The shaft generator is fitted at the output side of a low-speed WinGD dual-fuel 7RT-Flex50DF main engine, with an MCR of 10,080 kW at 124 rpm. As a result of this arrangement, the Wärtsilä PTO shaft generator can produce supplementary electrical power for onboard use whenever the main engine is driving the propulsion shafting. This minimises using the auxiliary engine, reducing overall fuel consumption and operating costs. Wärtsilä also supplied the six-cylinder in-line Wärtsilä 20DF dual-fuel four-stroke auxiliary engine.
Germany-based TGE Marine Gas Engineering supplied three vertical Type C foam-insulated gas tanks and the low-pressure fuel gas supply system for the two-stroke main engine and four-stroke dual-fuel auxiliary engine.
The hull was optimised with computational fluid dynamics and tank testing. Other energy-saving measures include a Becker Marine full spade twisted rudder with a rudder bulb.
Containerships expects to take delivery of sister vessels Containerships Arctic and Containerships Aurora from Guangzhou Wenchong Shipyard by the end of the year.
By 2022, CMA CGM will have 20 LNG-fuelled container ships in its fleet, including nine 22,000-TEU vessels.
Containerships Polar
Owner: Containerships
Shipbuilder: Guangzhou Wenchong Shipyard
Year built: 2019
Length overall: 170 m
Beam: 27 m
Draught: 6.9 m
Capacity: 1,380 TEU/360 reefer plugs
Main engine: WinGD 7RT-Flex50DF
HP: 10,080 kW
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