On 13th and 14th of June 2024, the General Assembly of Innovation Action SYNERGETICS took place in Gothenburg, hosted by ScandiNAOS. The numerous participants representing all SYNERGETICS partners were greeted in Gothenburg with an engaging programme of activities and a comprehensive agenda, meticulously prepared by the event organisers.
SYNERGETICS consortium at the General Assembly in Gothenburg
The first day of the meeting was devoted to a presentation of the progress achieved during the first 18 months of the project. Each work package leader was invited to present the achievements his/her respective work package, accompanied by an account of the challenges encountered in fulfilling the tasks
Audience enjoying the presentations on the first day of the General Assembly
The three tasks of WP1, which aim to investigate the techno-economic possibilities for the implementation of alternative propulsion solutions in waterborne transport, are progressing as planned. The current literature as well as stakeholder interviews will be used to shed light on the potential of different business models in inland and coastal shipping.
The WP2’s most prominent achievement is the establishment of a comprehensive and distinctive database of pilot projects, namely the Pilot Database. This database has facilitated the identification of trends in the greening of inland and coastal ships. The database currently contains information on 185 inland and coastal shipping greening pilots that have been or are planned to be performed in the period between 2008 and 2026. The features and potential applications of the database have been presented in the paper titled “Exploration and synchronization of greening of shipping by means of retrofit: The SYNERGETICS perspective” prepared by a group of authors from the SYNERGETICS project partners DST, OST, SPB, and MARIN. The paper was presented at the Technical 3.4.3 Environmental Sustainability session at the Transport Research Arena conference (TRA 2024) which took place in Dublin in April 2024.
The Pilot Database – Electrification pilots on inland vessels, breakdown by ship type
Within the scope of WP3 MARIN conducted a series of workshops, which constituted the basis of the Ship-Propulsion-and-Energy-Concepts (SPEC) analyses for the demonstrators. The battery pack application from ZES for the inland container vessel Alphenaar (Demonstrator 3) has been in operation for some time, providing valuable lessons learned in respect to technical, economical, commercial, operational and political aspects. Subtask 3.3.2, which addresses the greening potential of hydrodynamic improvements of a ship’s hull and appendages, has also made notable progress. The operational profile of Demonstrator 5, the dry cargo motor vessel “Ernst Kramer” has been analysed and a towing tank model testing has been conducted at the DST in order to establish the baseline performance of the ship.
Towing tank testing of the “Ernst Kramer” model
The project is making encouraging progress towards its primary objective, namely the creation of a comprehensive catalogue of developed retrofit solutions that will accelerate the green transformation of inland vessels and coastal ships. The specification and creation of the database for the catalogue, as outlined in Task 4.1, has been successfully completed. Furthermore, a draft of the factsheets to be used in Task 4.2 was presented to the attending partners.
Draft of the factsheets to be used in Task 4.2
The first day concluded with a working dinner on board one of Sweden’s oldest and most beautiful ships, the steamer Bohuslän. Engaging discussions were held while navigating the serene waters of the Gothenburg archipelago, and a tour of the engine room provided the opportunity to observe the steam engine in operation, rendering the experience memorable.
Working dinner onboard the steamer Bohuslän
The second day was organized in form of workshops focused on the individual work packages and was dedicated to planning of future activities with focus on the demonstrations and development of the central SYNERGETICS tool: The Catalogue of the greening retrofit technologies.
The General Assembly was crowned by the visit to the site of SYNERGETICS Demonstrator 7, the testing facility where two different methanol solutions one compression ignite, the other one dual-fuel in internal combustion engines will be analysed.
Visit to the facility for testing the use of methanol in combustion engines