Page 24: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (June 2002)

Design Insights

A Naval Architect's Look At Design Trends

By John W. Waterhouse, P.E.,

President, Elliott Bay Design Group.

Reading tea leaves on a boat underway is an exercise in frustration because just as the leaves start to settle, another wave comes along and changes the pic- ture. Similarly, trying to foresee trends in the marine industry. Just as you see things shaping up, a change occurs and the industry is re-shujfled. However I believe that I can discuss three particu- lar trends that are part of our collective future.

Regulations

The first of these is the fact that the marine industry will continue to see a growing body of regulations affecting how we design, build, and operate ves- sels. Some examples of the alphabet soup that we must deal with include

ADA, STCW, ISM, EPA, etc. These regulations are being created by organi- zations both within and outside of the marine industry. Many marine regula- tors such as the U.S. Coast Guard are increasingly relying upon other bodies such as the American National Stan- dards Institute (ANSI), National Fire

Protection Association (NFPA), and

American Society for Testing of Materi- als (ASTM). Their purpose in doing so is to try and keep the regulations more current. However, this also can mean that the regulations are getting further away from our industry.

We have also seen a shift from pre- scriptive regulations to performance- based regulations. What does this mean to the industry? Let's look at some examples: • Prescriptive Regulation — "Each compartment must have two means of escape, one of which must be a pathway or ladder meeting regulation ABC, the other way be a vertical ladder on hori- zontal egress via a designated widow with minimum dimensions of X by Y." • Performance Based Regulation — "Demonstrate that there is a safe egress path from each compartment given the following hazard scenarios: fire, flooding, extreme heel and trim."

The prescriptive regulation is more objective. It's easier to measure compli- ance. The performance based regulation is more flexible but requires more effort by all parties (designer/builder/opera- tor/regulator). We have seen that both the U.S. Coast Guard and the Interna- tional Maritime Organization (IMO) are increasingly working on risk-based approaches to regulations, which are

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