Alps News

U.S.-based SEACOR Marine has completed the installation of a hybrid power system on its platform supply vessel (PSV) SEACOR Yangtze.Beginning in February 2024 in Norway, Kongsberg Maritime started the upgrade of the UT771 CDL SEACOR Yangtze with the Deckhouse Energy Storage System.The installation of the system has been completed, SEACOR Marine informed on April 4, 2024, adding to its fleet of hybrid battery-powered PSVs.To remind, SEACOR Marine announced it will convert four other of its PSVs to battery hybrid power in a move to enhance efficiency and slash emissions.The Houston-headquartered

SEACOR Marine announced it will convert four of its platform supply vessels (PSV) to battery hybrid power in a move to enhance efficiency and slash emissions.The Houston-headquartered marine transportation firm said on Thursday it has ordered containerized energy storage systems (ESS) from Norway's Kongsberg Maritime for install aboard SEACOR Ohio, SEACOR Alps, SEACOR Andes and SEACOR Atlas.The four 278.4-foot-long PSVs are all of Kongsberg Maritime's UT771 CDL design and were built in China from 2018 to 2020.

Pieter van Oord is candid in discussing the future growth of his storied company’s activities in offshore wind with specific insights on challenging current jobs, Van Oord’s recent order of a massive and groundbreaking Wind Turbine Installation Vessel, and the company’s future working in the United States.Pieter, to start, can you give a ‘By the Numbers’ look at your company today using the metrics of your choice?Well, 2021 was a disappointing year for us. As we said in our annual report…

Francois Mayor nudged back on the power and made a subtle adjustment on the wheel as he coaxed his cargo vessel through a narrow point in the Suez Canal—not the Egyptian one, but a replica in the middle of a French forest.This stretch of water was built to train ship captains and maritime pilots how to navigate the Suez Canal—a skill now in the spotlight after the Ever Given cargo ship got wedged in the Egyptian waterway last month in high winds and a sandstorm.The channel is built to one twenty-fifth the scale of a section of the real Suez Canal.

Dubai-based global ports operator DP World has taken a 44% stake in Frenkendorf-headquartered Swissterminal Holding, the container terminal operator in Switzerland.The parties have agreed not to disclose financial details of the transaction.Swissterminal, which is headquartered in Frenkendorf close to Basel, operates additional locations in Zurich-Niederglatt, Basel-Birsfelden, Basel-Kleinhueningen and Liestal. The terminals are well connected to Europe’s leading container ports in Rotterdam and Antwerp as well as the ports of La Spezia, Genoa, Ravenna and Trieste south of the Alps.DP World has grown from its roots in Jebel Ali Port…

Hurtigruten’s MS Roald Amundsen is nearing completion at Kleven Yard. This weekend the world’s first hybrid powered cruise ship completed her first sea trials in the fjords along the western coast of Norway.With Norwegian fjords as testing ground – and the famous Sunnmøre alps as a spectacular backdrop – MS Roald Amundsen’s advanced, green technology was put to a test in the waters off Kleven Yard in Ulsteinvik, Norway, over the weekend.Custom built for some of the most extreme waters on the planet…

The offshore marine support vessels operator Seacor Marine Holdings announced it has entered into definitive agreements to acquire three platform supply vessels (PSVs) from Cosco Shipping Heavy Industry, an affiliate of Cosco Shipping Group, the world’s largest ship owner.Aggregate consideration for the vessels will be approximately $46 million, of which 30% will be paid in cash and 70% will be paid under a four-year deferred payment agreement between Seacor   Marine and Cosco Zhoushan.Half of the cash payment will be funded in the first quarter of 2019 with the balance per vessel to be paid upon physical delivery of each vessel. The parties currently expect the vessels to be delivered on September 30…

The 3,500 m³ trailing suction hopper dredger (TSHD) Diogo Cão was launched last Saturday at the Keppel Nantong shipyard in China, a subsidiary of Keppel Offshore & Marine. The green vessel is the second of three 3,500 m³ hoppers to be launched, equipped with an exhaust gas treatment system filtering out and virtually eliminating many pollutants from the exhaust gases. In total, Jan De Nul Group ordered six such ultra-low emission TSHDs, called ultra-low emission vessels, five of which are being built at Keppel: three small 3…

The Port Authority of Strasbourg (PAS) in France and port operator HAROPA of the Port of Le Havre have inked an agreement regarding four areas of cooperation – in rail, river and sea, innovation, and promotional capabilities, PAS said. "In the presence of Catherine Trautmann, Chairman of PAS, Jean-Louis Jérôme, Executive Director of PAS, and Hervé Martel, Vice-president of HAROPA & Executive Director of HAROPA-Port of Le Havre, have signed a partnership agreement aiming at enhancing their cooperation," said a press statement. The cooperation between HAROPA and PAS will focus mainly on four major lines of development. Firstly, multimodality is on their joint agenda. They wish to make a scheduled and high-performance rail service emerge, that connects their business areas in Day A – Day B.

Seaspan Corporation said it has accepted delivery of the MSC Shuba B, an 11,000 TEU containership that will commence a 17-year fixed-rate bareboat charter with Mediterranean Shipping Company S.A. (MSC). Upon completion of the bareboat charter period, MSC is obligated to purchase the vessel for a pre-determined amount. The MSC Shuba B, which was constructed at HHIC-PHIL INC., is Seaspan’s first 11,000 TEU SAVER design containership in a series of five ships, all of which are signed to bareboat agreements with MSC. Seaspan also announced that it has entered into fixed-rate time charter contracts with a leading liner for two 10,000 TEU newbuilding containerships currently under construction at Yangzijiang’s shipyards.

A project to build a canal to link Paris with major harbours of northern Europe will depend on lining up the necessary funds, the French government said on Wednesday, without saying if it believed the finance could be found. France has long planned to build the waterway dubbed the Seine-Nord canal to allow large barges to sail from Paris to the harbours of Antwerp and Rotterdam, reducing truck traffic on its motorways. The project has been studied for more than a decade and funding options for the 4.5 billion euro ($5.3 billion) programme have been discussed with regional governments and the European Union. The previous government had set up a project company with a view to start work on the 107 kilometre canal in 2017 and have it ready by 2023.

What a difference a year makes. Twelve months ago, the mood of the Russian delegation at the World Economic Forum in Davos was distinctly gloomy, with oil prices near 12-year lows below $30 per barrel and Western sanctions depressing their economy and financial markets. Since then, however, Russian stock and bond markets have risen about 50 percent, boosted by rebounding oil and - more recently - expectations the new U.S. presidency of Donald Trump will ease the sanctions imposed over Moscow's actions in Ukraine. Russian officials and company executives at the forum attended by the world's political and business elites in the Swiss Alps this week were far more bullish, with many predicting the markets rally would continue this year.

Chicago based Alps Wire Rope Corporation has been appointed as a distributor for U.K.-based stainless steel shackle and wire rope fitting manufacturer Petersen Stainless Rigging Ltd. Stock is currently being held for immediate delivery from Alps’ Houston location of Petersen’s high-strength ‘PH’ stainless steel lifting shackles. All Petersen stainless lifting shackles are proof-load tested, marked and certified as standard meaning they are ready to be installed the minute you receive them. “[Alps has] four strategically placed locations in the USA: Houston; Saint Charles, Ill.; Harrisburg, Pa. and Alhambra, Calif., from which they are well equipped to provide excellent service.

Cruising on pleasure boats goes back a long way on the large lakes of Central Europe. There has been a so-called White Fleet in Switzerland for more than 175 years. Now, the Lake Lucerne Navigation Company’s (SGV) latest generation of passenger boats has the countenance of a superyacht, designed by the Bremenhaven company, judel/vrolijk & co – design GmbH from the DEUTSCHE YACHTEN, Superyacht Germany working group. Following on from the MS Saphir, the SGV now has its flagship under construction.

On the European continent, the Alps form a natural barrier for international transport. Containers can be transported to Southern Germany, the Czech Republic or Poland cheaper as well as more sustainably via North European ports than via Southern European ports. This is despite the fact that the container ships between Asia and Europe always take the Suez Canal with the ensuing shorter sailing route to southern ports such as Koper, Constanta and Genoa. Research by Panteia into the environmental footprint logistics chains in Europe proves this. Panteia also has identified opportunities for making the transport more sustainable. Allard Castelein…

Drewry Supply Chain Advisors’ whitepaper finds that the traditional gateway ports in North-West Europe no longer hold all of the trump cards. A recently published whitepaper from Drewry’s Supply Chain Advisors looking at the ‘Best Routes’ for containerised imports into South Germany from China found that for some shippers using Mediterranean gateway ports is a viable alternative to the traditional North-West Europe gateways. To establish shippers’ best-route Drewry examined a variety of routes to find the best mix of cost, transit time and the number of service options. Firstly, the whitepaper looked at the number of maritime services from Shanghai to South Germany’s so-called Northern and Southern gates that were available to the market as of March 2016 (see Table).

Continuing support from key markets across Asia helped Contship Italia Group, the leading container terminal and intermodal transport operator in Italy, to report a steady set of results for 2015. Contship Italia Group terminals handled a total of 6.3 million TEUs last year on the back of increased volumes at La Spezia Container Terminal (LSCT), its main gateway for Asian cargo. LSCT, with four weekly calls from China, the Far East, and South East Asia, continues the positive trend that has seen Asia trade via La Spezia increase by 3.5% on the previous year (up 19% over the past five years). In 2015, 197 of 938 total calls at LSCT were associated with Asia services offered by the 2M, O3 and CKYHE alliances handling vessels in the 10,000-14,000 TEU capacity range.

Reinsurance rates in the marine sector continued to fall at the start of the year, in spite of the huge cost of explosions at China's Tianjin port last August, reinsurance broker Guy Carpenter said on Thursday. Rising competition to offer reinsurance and slower activity in China, were two factors depressing rates, it said. The blasts at Tianjin caused insured losses of up to $3.3 billion, Guy Carpenter has estimated, while reinsurer Swiss Re has called it the largest man-made insurance loss in Asia. The explosions killed more than 170 people. "Tianjin has had little or no impact on marine pricing," Chris Klein, head of EMEA strategy management at Guy Carpenter, told a news conference.

Cargo and passenger handling rise by 3%. Handling in the Port of Kiel continued to grow in the first half of the year. A total of 3.24 million tons of cargo were handled in the first six months of 2014 which is an increase of 3% over the same period of last year. In the passenger sector, about 900,000 ferry and cruise ship passengers – a rise of 3.1% - embarked or disembarked. The main pillar of growth was once again ferry traffic, which accounted for 80% of all handling. Routes…

Man-made greenhouse gas emissions have become the dominant cause of melting in glaciers from the Alps to the Andes that is raising world sea levels, a study said on Thursday. Human emissions accounted for an estimated 69 percent of loss of ice from glaciers from 1991-2010, overtaking natural climate variations that had been the main driver of a retreat since the mid-19th century, researchers wrote in the journal Science. Until now, scientists have struggled to quantify the impact of human behaviour on glaciers because the frozen rivers of ice take decades…

swissnex Boston welcomes "PlanetSolar DeepWater Expedition," June 22-26, 2013. In support of its mission to build stronger relationships between scientists, entrepreneurs and innovators in Massachusetts and Switzerland, swissnex Boston is welcoming the world's largest solar-powered boat to Boston's Fan Pier for its inaugural visit. Together with PlanetSolar and the University of Geneva, swissnex Boston is hosting a series of educational, business and media events about solar technology and climate change…

Alps Wire Rope Corporation announced the opening of a new warehouse location in Houston, TX. Abe Guerrero will be joining the existing sales team of Rick Coughran and Bill Lee, to manage the facility. The demand for wire rope products from the region has led to the opening of the new distribution point. The new facility will provide Alps Wire Rope close proximity to customers and business partners in the area. In addition to Oilfield Products, Alps will stock Elevator Rope, Stainless Steel Ropes & Strands, Specialty Crane Ropes, and of course General Purpose Rope Products.

This past weekend a dear friend and colleague, Randy Duenn, ended his battle with Prostate Cancer by passing away quietly in his sleep. Randy spent most of his career in the wire rope business starting with UNA-Anchor Wire Rope as Warehouse Manager, then Criterion Metals, and finally Alps Wire Rope Corporation as one of our key Customer Service personnel. Those who knew Randy can certainly attest to his fun loving nature and positive attitude. He was always attuned to the things that mattered, and seldom wavered in exuding a positive outlook on everything.