Norway's Westcon Yards recently delivered a new factory trawler to local seafood company Bluewild.
Designed by Norway's Ulstein Design and Solutions, Ecofive was developed to ensure 100 per cent catch utilisation, minimised quality losses during handling, and reduced energy consumption. The concept focuses on utilising resources so that the main product, the by-products, and residual raw materials will be of very high quality.
The trawler will primarily be used for shrimp and whitefish trawling. Ulstein has developed a battery hybrid propulsion solution that the company expects will reduce diesel consumption and emissions substantially.
The newbuild has a length of 74 metres, a beam of 16.8 metres, a displacement of 2,200 tonnes, a speed of 14.5 knots, and accommodation for 30 people.
The propulsion delivers bollard pulls of 85 tonnes at 2.5 knots and 75 tonnes at 4.5 knots.
The cargo hold has a total capacity of 2,000 cubic metres and a freezing capacity of 100 tonnes per day. To avoid significant quality losses during the handling and intermediate storage of the catch, Ulstein developed a concept in which the catch flows into the storage tanks from below the waterline.
The factory can produce fillets from whitefish, cooked and single-frozen consumer prawns or deliver raw prawns frozen in blocks for further production on land.
Ecofive also features Ulstein's proprietary inverted bow, which ensures gentler acceleration and a soft encounter with oncoming waves while minimising noise and vibration.