SNAME Chesapeake Section Elects Officers- Hears Paper On Domestic LNG Vessel Construction

The Chesapeake Section of The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers held its final meeting of the 1976-77 season at the Officers Club of the Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C. The meeting included election of officers for the next year, awards, and the presentation of a paper on domestic LNG vessel construction.

Following a dinner and social hour attended by about 65 members, the Nomination Committee, headed by past chairman Ron Kiss, presented a slate of officers for the next year. The slate included Dr. Reuven Leopold for chairman, Walter Schmid for vice chairman, James Lisnyk for secretary- treasurer, and Alexander Landsburg for Executive Committee.

The slate was elected unanimously.

The award for the best paper of the year was then made to Lt.

Comdr. W.D. Snider, Lt. Comdr.

G.J. Buffleben, Lt. Comdr. J.R.

Harrald, Comdr. K.F. Bishop, and Lt. Comdr. J.C. Card, all of the USCG, for their paper, "Management of Mid-Atlantic Offshore Development Risks." Following this presentation, a Certificate of Appreciation was given to Frank Sellars, this year's chairman, for a job well done.

Comdr. W. Kime then acted as moderator for the presentation of the technical paper entitled, "Update: Domestic LNG Vessel Construction." The paper was authored by Thomas G. Connors, manager, Marine Engineering Division of Engineering Office and Ship Construction of the Maritime Administration. In his paper, Mr. Connors noted that in the nine-month interval between September 1972 and June 1973, the Maritime Administration entered into contracts with three separate U.S. shipyards and nine shipowners to construct a total of nine 125,000-cubic-meter LNG vessels under the Title Y — Construction Differential Subsidy (CDS) Program.

The total value of these contracts was almost $900,000,000.

Under the Title V Program, the Maritime Administration will pay the difference between the domestic contract price of a vessel or series of vessels, and the calculated foreign cost. The shipowner then only pays the foreign cost.

The paper then went on to convey an understanding of the problems that have been encountered in the LNG vessel construction program, so that the success of that program in overcoming the initial hurdles could be more fully appreciated.

All problems encountered in the design and construction of the vessels have been overcome by hard work, careful planning, cooperation between the involved parties, plus a certain amount of ingenuity. The LNG vessels presently under construction in the United States make up fully 50 percent of the LNG vessels under construction in the world. The LNG program to date has been a huge undertaking for many people and companies in the marine industry: shipyards, owners, design agents, equipment suppliers, regulatory bodies and Government.

It is an undertaking for which any and all involved can justifiably be proud. All three vessel designs described in the paper have approximately the same principal characteristics — power, speed, etc. The only basic difference between the three designs is the choice of the cargo containment system. The particular cargo containment system utilized for each vessel design gives it its own distinctive outboard profile, and sets it apart from the others. For this reason, the cargo containment system of each design was given the most attention in the paper.

Following the presentation of the paper, discussions were given by W.D. Thomas, M. Roberts, Lt.

Comdr. T. Green, and N. Hammer.

Other stories from July 1977 issue

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