Page 59: of Maritime Logistics Professional Magazine (Q2 2011)

58 60

www.maritimeprofessional.com Maritime Professional 59

T

Technical

Sherwin-Williams Coatings: Protect Brazil’s

First Oil Tanker in 14 Years

Coatings

At a time when the shipbuilding industry is undergoing a renaissance in

Brazil, Sherwin-Williams is playing a strategic role in the fortunes of the ship- builder Atlântico Sul, which this sum- mer launched Brazil’s first ship in 14 years, João Candido, under the

Brazilian government’s Program for

Modernization and Expansion of the

Fleet (PROMEF).

In a ceremony attended by Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the 150,000 dwt tanker left drydock follow- ing the closure of its hull and was rolled out to sea to finish for December deliv- ery. It is the first of a series of 22 ships that are already on the shipyard’s order book, along with the hull of the P-55 platform of Brazilian oil giant

Petrobras, according to Angelo Alberto

Bellelis, Atlântico Sul president.

Sherwin-Williams’ Euronavy ES301 coating system is protecting the new ship’s ballast tanks, and the coating is a significant factor in the shipyard’s pro- ductivity as it fulfills its contract to build ten Suezmax (able to carry up to one million barrels of oil) tankers under

PROMEF for Petrobras.

Atlântico Sul is the first of a number of new shipyards coming on line to meet Petrobras’ surging demand for ships. Keeping up with that demand requires innovative approaches to short- ening building schedules, and Sherwin-

Williams has been driving that innova- tion. Using the ES301 coating technol- ogy, Atlântico Sul has been able to dou- ble its productivity in terms of square meters of surface prepared.

Construction of João Candido occurred while the shipyard itself was being completed.

Typically secondary surface prepara- tion at the block stage involves abrasive blasting to prepare steel surfaces and weld seams prior to topcoating.

Euronavy ES301 can accomplish the same task using ultra-high-pressure (UHP) water jetting, or hydroblasting, which saves shipbuilders time and money. Petrobras pioneered the con- cept of combining hydroblasting and coatings that are solvent-free and toler- ant of humidity across the operations of

Transpetro, its shipowner subsidiary.

Now Transpetro considers ES301 hydroblasting the new standard for coating in the shipping industry.

A further advantage is the chemistry of the Euronavy pre-construction primer, which is zinc-free. The primer is applied before undertaking block construction as a precaution against flash rust on the steel following its ini- tial pass through an automated abrasive blasting system. Typical primers con- tain zinc dust; zinc primers are more expensive than epoxy primers because zinc is a commodity so its price fluctu- ates, making it difficult for shipyards to project costs. Euronavy PE 31 PCP has a lower cost projection and was the first non-zinc product to be IMO PSPC-type approved.