Page 39: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (June 2023)

PROFILE: ARDMORE SHIPPING

A Unique Test of

Marine Coatings

According to Garry Noonan, Director,

Innovation, Ardmore Shipping, an essential fuel and emissions reduction tool is coatings. “When we look at hull coatings, paint is expensive; but when you compare it to the life cycle of the paint, it's relatively cheap,” said Noonan.

With that, Ardmore opts for the highest performing coating that it can, and historically it has used International get mass adoption.”

Paint and Jotun, though it is trialing

Despite the obstacles, Noonan and his team work daily toward one vessel now using Hempel's X7. traversing the sizeable hurdles, and although he sees ‘collabora-

Evaluating a coating’s real value in saving tion’ as a grossly over-used buzzword, he admits that coopera- fuel and emissions numerically is a bit tion and shared risk taking could help to clear the energy transi- more unclear, as no two ship or ship tion path.

routes are the same. “One of our energy transition business streams is energy tran-

With that, Ardmore has put sition projects, which would be working with our customers to

International Paint and Jotun to the help them to overcome their decarbonization issues, using our test in a fairly unique way: “I'm not sure expertise in helping them to build vessels speci? c for a trade if it's an industry ? rst, but it's certainly and then putting them on long-term time charter where we could not very popular. We managed to split that risk,” said Noonan. “We can build ships, we can take convince both International and Jotun the risk of the capital upfront, as long as we have contracts in to paint one side of a ship each. The place to share that risk.” proof is in the pudding; we can see

For the moment, building new ships is not an option for Ar- it. This, to us, was a way of actually dmore, but it maintains course in evaluating the technologies it cutting out that [paint manufacturer will feature onboard when the time to buy invariably presents itself. “To buy new vessels right now would be massively ex- product claim] noise and saying: ‘put pensive,” said Noonan. “When it comes to new build vessels, your best product on this ship and we'll right now the price is sky-high and no one's building for a rea- see whose is better.’" Noonan said they son. We’re building up a fund so that when the prices do come are in the middle of the test cycle, with back down, we can expand and hit our aspirations to be a bigger results to come at a later date.

company, a bigger ? eet.” www.marinelink.com 39

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