Russia's state-owned United Shipbuilding Corporation has confirmed that the modernisation of the Saint Petersburg facilities of its Severnaya Verf business unit will commence in the third quarter of 2026.
Severnaya Verf Technical Director Roman Obukhov said the works have a scheduled completion date of 2030, by which time the facility's total area coverage will have nearly doubled to 100 hectares.
Following the completion of upgrades, the company will switch to the hull block assembly shipbuilding method wherein entire blocks weighing up to 900 tons each will be pre-assembled and painted and then integrated with each other to form a ship's hull.
Severnaya Verf's shipyard will be modernised through the establishment of dedicated facilities. These will include a 100-metre-high indoor dry dock with cranes that are each capable of lifting up to 1,000 tons, a warehouse, and painting areas.
Severnaya Verf expects that the upgraded Saint Petersburg facilities will enable it to complete up to eleven large shipbuilding projects each year. These will include Aframax tankers, LNG carriers, container vessels, bulk carriers, and research ships.
The company had said earlier that the modernisation will be undertaken without interrupting in its current vessel construction projects.
