Tag: Finland

TRAFI requires vessels whose keel was laid before 1 September 2003 to comply with the minimum power requirement of the current Finnish ice class rules, when they reach the age of 20. The vessel can only keep its current Baltic ice class when the installed engine power complies with the minimum requirement.

The Finnish Chairmanship will organize an Arctic Environment Ministers’ meeting in Rovaniemi, Finland, from 11 to 12 October 2018. The meeting will discuss climate change, biodiversity, and pollution prevention. It will also aim to explore common solutions to these important issues.

To measure how nations are dealing with illicit trade, the Transnational Alliance to Combat Illicit Trade commissioned the Economist Intelligence Unit to produce the Global Illicit Trade Environment Index. At the bottom of the overall index are generally developing economies, with Libya ranking last. 

Speaking about the problems that the Arctic faces at the moment, the President of the Republic of Finland, Sauli Niinistö and the Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed that there is indeed a need to move to cleaner ships’ fuels such as LNG in the Arctic.

An autonomous ship model has been successfully tested in Aker Arctic's ice model test laboratory in Helsinki. The video shows how the ship model was able to detect obstacles in the ice tank utilizing onboard sensors, maneuver around them without operator input, and moor itself automatically to a target pier. 

Finnish Government submitted a bill on ships’ crews and the safety management of ships, promoting autonomous tests in maritime transport. Under the submission, in future, exemptions to minimum vessel manning requirements and watchkeeping may be made for a fixed term in order to promote technological innovations. 

Wärtsilä was granted all the necessary building permits and is ready to start the construction of the LNG terminal at the Finnish Port of Hamina. The company will build the terminal under a turnkey contract which reached a financial close. The LNG terminal is expected to start operations in 2020.

INTENS, a Finnish research collaborative consortium, led by the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, has jointly committed over €13 million in the next three years, with funding support of €5.6 million from Business Finland, the public agency for research funding, to promote and digitalize the country's marine industry.

Finnish Shipowners’ Association will cooperate with One Sea ecosystem to create better conditions for significantly a more energy-efficient and safer shipping, and to promote autonomous shipping. Digitalization and automation will revolutionize shipping, and FSA want to be a pioneer in this development.

Canada has proposed a measure to tackle the risks of heavy fuel oil pollution in the Arctic, which is currently being considered by the maritime industry. In the meantime, Finland proposed another plan to ban HFO in the Arctic, but Canada seems to not be in favour of this. Such a plan can have significant economic impact to indigenous communities