The main propulsion dilemma for large anchor handler/tug/supply vessels

摘要

Diesel mechanical, diesel electrical and HYBRID DM/DE systems have their advantages and drawbacks. The choice of an optimum solution depends very much on a thorough working profile analysis. Still the lower price, robustness and high bollard pull benchmarks on DM systems will attract many owners. An increasing number of owners, though, choose to invest more in the power and propulsion system in order to gain long term fuel savings. This also results in configurations that are more environment friendly which may turn out to be a selling point for the vessel. In the longer term new technologies, such as fuel cells, will be easier to implement or retrofit into HYBRID and DE systems.