Wärtsilä has received major orders for its recently established Wärtsilä Ship Design unit from customers in China, India and Germany.
The Ship Design unit was set up following the acquisitions of the ship design companies Vik-Sandvik and Schiffko. The most recent acquisition, the Singapore-based Conan Wu & Associates will also be part of the Ship Design unit.
The orders call for Wärtsilä to design a deepwater engineering survey vessel, a multi-purpose support vessel, a diving support vessel, and an emergency towing vessel. Each of these contracts comes as a result of successful bids to design sophisticated tonnage.
The deepwater engineering survey vessel design is for China Oilfield Services, and represents a 4,300DWT vessel capable of drilling operating at deep water for geotechnical surveys and geophysical surveys. To date, most of China's oil exploration has been in relatively shallow waters, but there is now a need to probe deeper.
The Chinese state-owned Shanghai Salvage Company ordered the multi-purpose support vessel design in order to carry out year-round tasks along the coastline of China. The key requirement is for multi-purpose flexibility since the vessel will be required to carry out a multitude of different operations, including salvage, offshore engineering services, diving and ROV operations, fire-fighting, anchor handling, ship supply, environmental protection, and route clearing.
The 4,500DWT diving support vessel design has been ordered by India's Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), and will provide a stable platform for saturation and air-diving operations. In addition to diving operations and construction work, the vessel is to provide field support and will, therefore, be fitted with sophisticated fire-fighting and oil recovery equipment.
The emergency towing vessel design is for the German company ARGE Küstenschutz. Because the vessel is intended for North Sea operation, the main criteria in producing this design included manoeuvrability and the capability to maintain position effectively in harsh weather conditions.
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