Page 15: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (January 2023)

“What are the toughest things on a conversion like this? First and foremost, it’s having the funds available! There’s a lot of PSV’s out there that are crying out for such upgrades such as these [but as an industry, we need to get creative in ? nding ways to fund these conversions]. One thing that we’re looking at and hope to pioneer is an ‘energy as a service’ – leasing energy containers – which could help to get over the CapEx hurdle, to start.”

Tim M. Clerc, VP Engineering,

Seacor Marine we didn’t go bankrupt, but it did give us an opportunity to right- brid doesn’t necessarily have to mean batteries, although they size the ? eet and really focus on that assets that matter. do play an important part in most hybridization. But batteries,

During that time we brought nine hybrids to market, without at the moment, make the most sense. At least it does to us.

the bene? t of grants or subsidies; we had to do it ourselves.

We started looking at hybrid technology back in 2013, and So tell us a bit more about the Seacor Yangtze.

it took us another three years, but in true Seacor fashion, we The vessel was under construction at Cosco (Guangdong) have really gone for it. Shipyard. She is a UT-771 CDL class, clean design length,

Our ? eet today is diverse, made up of PSV’s, both conven- diesel electric install. It has Caterpillar main engines, four tional and hybrid, fast support vessels, fast cats and premium 3512 engines, a full Rolls Royce package with alarms, au- lift boats. There have been a lot of ‘? rsts’: we were the ? rst to tomation, power management, energy management, and DP

DP1 fast support vessel; we were the ? rst with a DP2 fast sup- onboard. It’s a modern PSV and that was delivered around port vessel, and importantly, we’re the ? rst with a DP3 a fast 2018. In total in China during that time we delivered ? ve UT- support vessel. We have presence here in the US Gulf, Mexico, 771 CDLs both in Cosco Guangzhou and Cosco Zhoushan

West Africa, the Persian Gulf, Central America and Guyana. shipyards. We also delivered out of the yard six WP class UT- 771’s, and we hybridized those in the yard prior to delivery.

Can we look closer at the Seacor hybrid ? eet, as you have All of those boats came out and went immediately to charter number 10 in the works right now. where they remain, and we’ve operated hybrid vessels in the

I suspect you could hybridize anything if you had enough North Sea, the Mediterranean, West Africa and in Guyana. money, but what are the real bene? ts? For us it’s hybridiz- Importantly, we were the ? rst to operate hybrid vessels in the ing modern diesel electric [vessels, because] you are already Persian Gulf on a long-term ? xture with Aramco. Some say halfway there, if not more. Those were the initial three target it’s better to be second rather than ? rst, but we were fortunate vessels. And then we were able to build on that with a series to have great partners in Kongsberg, Rolls Royce and ABS. of seven vessels under construction in China, which we took over in the shipyard. Seacor Yangtze is the vessel currently What’s your best advice to fellow shipowners that are con- under construction. sidering hybrids: what are the challenges, what are the les- [In choosing to build new or convert to hybrid], you have to sons learned?

understand why you’re putting battery hybrid on board. Hy- What are the toughest things on a conversion like this? First www.marinelink.com 15

MR #1 (1-17).indd 15 1/4/2023 10:46:21 AM