The second SAFETY4SEA Singapore Forum was successfully concluded on Wednesday 14th of November 2019 at Marina Bay Sands Expo & Convention Center, Singapore, attracting 250 delegates from 120 organizations.
The event was organized by SAFETY4SEA having as sponsors the following organizations: Bureau Veritas, DIAPLOUS Group, eVITALZ Information Management Pvt Ltd, Green Jakobsen, RISK4SEA, SQEMARINE, SQE ACADEMY, Standard P&I Club, Tangshan WD / CSSC-Worldwide Ship Equipment Group, VISWA Group of Companies, and Teichman Group, LLC. Participating companies included Ince, the Marshall Islands Registry, Mouawad Consulting, Sea Sentinels Pte Ltd., Synergy Group and Wikborg Rein. Supporters of the event included BIMCO, EGCSA, Green Award, IMarEST, IWSA, the Methanol Institute, MPA Singapore, The Nautical Institute, ReCAAP ISC, the Royal Institution of Naval Architects, Singapore Maritime Forum and WISTA International.
The event’s program formed equally among safety, green and smart challenges for shipping. Discussions touched upon key issues facing the maritime sector, with a special focus on how the future is expected to shape for the industry in the wake of the accelerated smart technologies and the big wave of environmental regulations that requires new solutions. Green challenges, such as alternative fuels and ship recycling regulatory implications, as well as smart challenges, such as automation and cyber security, were high on the agenda. Speakers also focused on security issues like piracy and analyzed loss prevention material from real life casualties.
Opening the event, Mr. Apostolos Belokas, Managing Editor, SAFETY4SEA, welcomed the delegates and speakers, thanked sponsors, and gave the word to shipping experts.
Presentations and discussions formed as follows:
Panel #1- Future Options
Opening the first panel, Dr. Khorshed Alam, COO, The Viswa Group of Companies, focused on the critical issue of air emissions and analyzed the available compliance options, specifically emphasizing on 2020 fuel production, as well as energy efficiency. Reducing consumption with a focus on EEDI and SEEMP is a primary aim for shipping, he argued, adding that a very effective mode for lower CO2 emissions is to lower sailing speeds.
Mr. Nick Makar, Senior Vice President, Maritime Administration / Regulatory Affairs, International Registries (Far East) Limited gave his insight on the Marshall Islands Perspective of IMO 2020. Mr. Makar discussed the existing regulatory framework for the enforcement of air emission standards under MARPOL Annex VI, and looked at the various measures incorporated into national maritime policies for achieving 2020 compliance.
Moving forward, Mr. Wong Fook Choy, Sales Director, and Capt. Cao Qingzhu, Chairman, Tangshan Worldwide Ship (Southeast Asia) Pte Ltd discussed about compliance challenges relating to scrubbers. Starting their presentation with providing an economic analysis of four different vessel types, they moved forward with offering best practices for those planning to install scrubbers.
Mr. Chris Chatterton, COO, Methanol Institute, presented the benefits of using methanol and hydrogen as marine fuels. Methanol, he noted, is an efficient, universal, future-proof, and safe, energy carrier that can be sustainably produced in large quantities. He also provided an overview of where we stand worldwide with respect to alternative fuels production, sharing the key players in renewable energy.
Panel #2 – Green Challenges
Ms. Ina Lutchmiah, Specialist Counsel, Wikborg Rein Singapore Pte Ltd opened the second panel by sharing key challenges with respect to ship recycling regulatory framework. Touching upon the Hong Kong Convention and the Basel Convention, she moved forward by presenting compliance challenges and legal implications associated with the EU Ship Recycling Regulation.
Rakesh Bhargava, Director at Sea Sentinels, examined the ‘IHM and its Maintenance,’ underlining that the preparation of IHMs are crucial for green ship recycling. Mr. Bhargava stressed potential problems, considering the mounting pressures on shipowners, surveyors and the capacity of those tasked, emphasizing on the importance of the IHM for recyclers.
Jad Mouawad, CEO, Mouawad Consulting AS, shared experience on the current BWMS market landscape. Starting his presentation with a timeline of schedules for fitting BWMS on ships with type approval requirements, he continued with key forecasts on BWMS retrofits and analyzed these figures with respect to the future. He concluded his presentation with future scenarios on BWMS regulatory and market developments.
Panel #3 – Smart Shipping Challenges
Mr. David Foo, Senior Director (Operations Technology), MPA Singapore talked about E-Navigation for Navigational Safety, establishing what e-Navigation is and how it can be used in order to enhance safety in the SOMS. Mr. Foo also gave his insight concerning updates on ongoing projects.
Mr. Jerome Floury, Project Manager, Bureau Veritas Singapore, discussed cyber risks in smart and autonomous shipping, providing an overview of recent cyber attacks in the maritime industry and potential motives of hackers. He then shared the key pillars of a proper cyber resilience program and recommendations for ships designed to help vessels maintain cyber resilience throughout their operational lives.
Mr. Sanjeev Namath, Chief Business Officer, Alpha Ori Technologies Pte Ltd., focused on digitalization of a ship’s operational data and its benefits, presenting key elements surrounding a ship operation model and providing prediction for the future marine ecosystem. He then presented the architecture of SMARTShip, the first single platform for the maritime ecosystem to gather data and drive insight.
Panel # 4 – Security landscape in a changing world
Masafumi Kuroki, Executive Director, ReCAAP Information Sharing Centre (ISC), spoke about the situation of piracy and armed robbery against ships in Asia, giving an overview of the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia (ReCAAP), further highlighting the ten-year trend of piracy and sea robbery in Asia, including the recent situation in the Sulu-Celebes Seas.
During his presentation, Dimitris Maniatis, COO, Diaplous Marine Services examined modern day piracy and gave his insights concerning its reasons and procedures, while referring to current events in the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Guinea, Somali-based piracy and Nigerian maritime aggression. Also, Mr. Maniatis highlighted the importance of risk mitigation and appropriate emergency response.
Panel 5 – Safety Challenges
Captain Hari Subramaniam, Loss Prevention Manager, Shipowners’ Club, examining the issue Fatigue Management and its recent developments. He further highlighted the importance of human element in shipping and questioned the progress made since the introduction of ISM, recommending the use of new technologies to get correct and meaningful analytics with an aim to reduce accidents.
Allan Raymond Olano, General Manager and Consultant, Green Jakobsen talked about measuring real safety performance, emphasizing on the importance of good communication. He stressed the need to move from being reactive to being proactive, as implied by requirements imposed by oil majors, clients, TMSA, management, while crews need to be able to reflect on their own performance before anything goes wrong.
Nanda Kumar Krishnan, CEO & Founder, Evitalz Information Management Pvt. Ltd talked about maritime telehealth and the importance of wellness at sea, noting that any lack of telehealth facilities could potentially lead to greater crew loss in future. He further highlighted the scale of the problem and suggested reasons, calling for smarter health for smart ships.
Apostolos Belokas, Managing Editor, SAFETY4SEA gave his insight concerning lessons learned from detention analytics, indicating how such insights may be used to facilitate better decision making. He noted that PSC Analytics are getting trickier and trickier to analyze, yet such analytics can provide useful insights, concerning ports, countries and inspection months amongst others.
Panel 6 – Loss Prevention
Ashok Srinivasan, Manager in Maritime Technology/ Regulation Department, BIMCO shared insight on container fires, ssuggesting that fires may be caused due to mis-declared cargo or non-declared cargo, misusing of larger ships, ineffective fire protection system and crew training and decision making, further stressing the need to study fire detection, fire protection and firefighting systems.
Harry Hirst, Partner & Master Mariner, Ince & Co examined collisions at sea and the reasons why they are still happening. Mr. Hirst highlighted that in order to avoid a collision it is important to detect and observe the approach, appraise situation and risk of collision, take timely and positive avoiding action and proceeding at an appropriate speed, allowing proper time to observe, appraise and act to escape.
Ken Lim, Director, TT Salvage Ltd talked about salvage and casualty management, while referring to a case study of a grounding of a bulk carrier, in regards to marine casualties; the sequence of events; the incident in particular; the course of the event; highlighting the importance of response and contracting, remote assessment, mobilization of advance team, onsite assessments and the marine salvage engineering.
Find photos from the event at SAFETY4SEA Flickr and explore more about the event at https://events.safety4sea.com/2019-safety4sea-singapore-forum/