Kratt: Estonia’s new CBM-burning SAR battery hybrid-electric workboat

Kratt has a beam of 10 m, an operating draught of 2.5 m, accommodation for six crew members and up to 10 researchers and sufficient fuel storage to operate at sea for up to seven days without replenishing supplies.

It strengthens Estonia’s maritime emergency reaction capabilities as it can cover around 25% of Estonia’s oil pollution response capacity. It has a mobile and portable pollution containment and recovery unit, an off-ship firefighting system, a daughter craft and advanced SAR radar.

For research missions the vessel features sonar, towlines, environmental sensors, a 50 m² wet and dry laboratory, sampling equipment, a seawater flow-through system, offices and utility spaces.

“We needed to develop our fleet intelligently,” said Mr Leis. “One vessel should be able to perform as many different tasks as possible while doing so with a lower environmental impact,” he said.

Researchers on Kratt can undertake water and sediment sampling, seabed hydrographic surveys, and meteorological and biological observations, while the vessel can tow research equipment, deploy remotely operated and autonomous systems and install and recover buoys and seabed stations.

“It is important that state vessels are used as efficiently as possible,” said Estonian State Fleet director general, Andres Laasma.

“Kratt is designed as a genuinely multipurpose platform, allowing us to carry out a wide range of essential tasks with one highly capable vessel,” he said.

“It’s combination of biomethane propulsion, battery-electric operation, research capabilities and heavy-duty deck equipment gives us significantly greater flexibility in organising the state’s maritime tasks,” Mr Laasma added.

Kratt has Ice Class 1C for operating in up to 40 cm of level ice at a speed of at least 2 knots, extending its operations into the northern hemisphere winter months, an A-frame on the aft deck for deploying buoys off the stern, and a deck crane for lifting 15 tonnes at 3 m from the vessel’s side.

“We needed to develop our fleet intelligently”

Baltic Workboats secured the contract to construct this vessel in January 2024 and subcontracted Damen Shipyards to build the ice-resistant hull at its facilities in Gdansk, Poland.

After it was completed and launched in Q4 2025, the hull was transported to Saaremaa, Estonia, where Baltic Workboats completed the vessel’s outfitting, systems integration and construction.

The complete design and construction process took around 30 months and cost €22M (US$25.5M), financed through the European Union’s NextGenerationEU Recovery Fund.

“When building this vessel, it was essential to find a solution that combines high work capacity, versatility and a lower environmental impact,” said Baltic Workboats management board chairman, Margus Vanaselja.

“Combining biomethane and electricity offers strong opportunities to achieve this and makes the vessel unique in its solutions on a global scale,” he said.

Baltic Workboats is also building a semi-autonomous modular SAR vessel with hybrid propulsion for Euroguard, a European Defence-funded project ready for delivery in 2027 or 2028.

This 45-m vessel will be built to support maritime emergencies, surveillance and reconnaissance, mine countermeasures and drone operations. It is funded under a €95M (US$110M) project that includes €65M (US$75M) from the European Defence Fund and €30M (US$35M) from participating countries and industry.

Other Baltic Workboats vessel projects

In May 2026, Baltic Workboats passed a critical design review of the proposed Euroguard vessel at its shipyard in Nasva, Estonia, where it presented progress on constructing the hull and a virtual system demonstration. The project brings together 27 organisations from 10 European countries to strengthen Europe’s defence and industrial co-operation.

In June, a new hydrogen-powered waste collection tanker, built by Baltic Workboats in partnership with BLRT Group, was officially named Rasa at the Port of Klaipėda, Lithuania.

This 42-m vessel can collect waste oil, bilge water and sewage from visiting vessels. It has a 2-MWh energy storage system, two 40-kW hydrogen fuel cells and electric propulsion, enabling it to operate in zero-emissions mode for more than 10 hours continuously. It can store 400 m³ of cargo and thanks to its automation and control systems, it can be operated by a crew of just three people.

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