Denmark News

Shipbuilding group Austal said its Austal Philippines arm has a 109-meter high-speed catamaran ferry to Fjord Line of Norway.The vehicle-passenger ferry, named FSTR, is said to be the largest aluminum vessel ever constructed in the Philippines. It is currently the largest ferry (by volume) to be constructed by Austal, at any of the company’s shipyards worldwide.Austal CEO, Paddy Gregg, said, “It’s impressive to see a large high speed ferry like this delivered in the best of times…

A set of welding robots will help Halter Marine to improve productivity as it ramps up to build the U.S. Coast Guard’s new Polar Security Cutter (PSC).Denmark-based Inrotech said it will deliver its Inrotech-MicroTwin, Inrotech-Classic and Inrotech-Crawler to the the Pascagoula, Miss. shipyard in early 2021.Inrotech’s automated robot welding solution is customized according to Halter Marine’s production needs to efficiently weld components of the 460-foot Polar Security Cutter along with other oceangoing vessels, the company said.

Shipping group Maersk said on Tuesday it was among a group of companies backing a plan to build Europe's largest green ammonia plant in Denmark as part of its ambition to shift to carbon-neutral ship fuel.The project, led by fund management firm Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP), will convert green power from North Sea offshore wind parks to zero-carbon ammonia that can be used to power ships and as agricultural fertilizer.Maersk said last week it would accelerate plans to decarbonize seaborne container shipping by putting the world's first vessel powered by carbon-neutral fuel into ope

Danish energy infrastructure investments firm Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners is looking to build what it says is Europe’s largest production facility of CO2-free green ammonia, with the final product aimed at the shipping and agriculture sector as a means to reduce emissions.The project will be located in the town of Esbjerg on the west coast of Denmark, where the facility dubbed "Power-to-X-facility" will convert power from offshore wind turbines to green ammonia. This will be used by the agriculture sector as CO2-free green fertilizer and by the shipping industry as CO2-free green fuel.

Offshore wind developer Vattenfall has awarded the Dutch-based offshore installation contractor Van Oord a 4-year operations & maintenance (O&M) contract.Working through its MPI Offshore organization, Van Oord will provide jack-up and associated lifting services for main component exchanges across Vattenfall’s portfolio of offshore wind farms. Vattenfall, based in Sweden, has 10 offshore wind farms in Sweden, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK. During the contract period, Vattenfall's offshore portfolio will be extended to 622 turbines with a combined capacity of 2.6 GW.

The Biden administration on Friday identified a Russian ship and a company it believes are helping to build the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, but the entities had already been sanctioned by the Trump administration and the project's opponents in Congress said the move would do little to halt work on it.The State Department said in a report to Congress that the Russian ship, the Fortuna, and its owner, KVT-RUS, had been designated, a process that starts new sanctions, two lawmakers said.Both…

The Biden administration is expected to name as early as Friday the companies it believes are helping build Russia's Nord Stream 2 pipeline, five sources said, a move that could eventually prompt sanctions on the nearly-completed project.The State Department report to Congress, which may come on Friday, is expected to list companies the administration believes are helping to complete the natural gas pipeline that Russia's state energy company Gazprom says is more than 90% complete.Sanctions law that went into effect on Jan.

Several U.S. Representatives on Wednesday raised pressure on the State Department to share plans on potential sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline Russia is racing to finish to take fuel to Europe."If completed, Nord Stream 2 would enable the Putin regime to further weaponize Russia's energy resources to exert political pressure throughout Europe," two Republicans including Michael McCaul, and two Democrats including Marcy Kaptur, wrote in a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.U.S.

In collaboration with naval architects Hauschildt Marine and shipyard Fayard in Denmark, Smyril Line’s ro-pax ship Norröna has been retrofitted with more luxurious facilities for its regular service between the Faroe Islands, Iceland and Denmark.The RoPax, originally built in 2003 in Germany, at Flendern Werft in Lübeck, had a nearly $16m refit which included 50 new luxury cabins being added. The ferry originally cost $115  million to build.Room for the luxury cabins was found by moving the crew’s cabins to a different location on the ferry and getting rid of the old shared cabins.

Nigeria’s navy plans to strengthen its measures to root out and punish personnel who collude with kidnappers and criminals, its new naval chief said.Kidnappings in the Gulf of Guinea, which covers 2.3 million square kilometers and borders some 20 countries, hit a record last year, according to the International Maritime Bureau.Well-armed, violent pirates operate there out of Nigeria’s hard-to-police Delta swamps, and experts say their increasingly bold tactics show that better enforcement is badly needed.Rear Admiral A.Z.

The consortium behind the Russia-led Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline has resumed laying pipes in the waters of Denmark, it said on Saturday, despite mounting pressure on the project from Washington.Construction of the link, which would double the capacity of the existing Nord Stream pipeline to 110 billion cubic meters of gas per year, was suspended in December 2019 due to the threat of sanctions from Washington.However the German government has stood by the project and late in December a vessel called the Fortuna…

Denmark has reached a deal on the construction of the first of its kind wind energy hub in the North Sea that promises to produce yet unseen amounts of green electricity, in what has been described as the largest construction project in Danish history.The energy hub - an artificial island - will serve as an offshore power plant gathering and distributing green electricity from hundreds of wind turbines surrounding the island directly to consumers in countries surrounding the North Sea.

The Biden administration said on Wednesday it would restart permitting for the first major U.S. offshore wind farm, reversing a Trump administration decision that canceled the process late last year.The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) said in a statement it would resume environmental review of the Vineyard Wind project as part of the administration's broad plan to speed renewable energy development on federal lands and waters."BOEM is committed to conducting a robust and timely review of the proposed project…

President Joe Biden believes the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline is a "bad deal for Europe" and his administration will be reviewing restrictions on the project included in a bill that passed during the Trump administration, the White House said on Tuesday.The restrictions on the undersea pipeline project were included in the annual defense policy bill that passed on Jan. 1. Sanctions in the measure apply to any companies helping Gazprom, the Russian state energy company leading the project…

Vineyard Wind, the developer of the first major U.S. offshore wind farm, said on Monday it has asked the Biden administration to restart its permitting process after former President Donald Trump's government abruptly canceled it last month.The company said in a statement it had notified the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management that the project would not need to change its construction plan as a result of switching to a new turbine supplier, General Electric Co.Last month, Vineyard…

Pirates are stepping up attacks on ships in West Africa’s Gulf of Guinea, defying regional navies. On Saturday, pirates off Nigeria kidnapped 15 sailors from a Turkish container ship and killed one.Pirates in the Gulf of Guinea kidnapped 130 seafarers in 22 separate incidents last year, accounting for all but five of those seized at sea worldwide.Who are the pirates and why are the attacking?The pirates come from Nigeria’s turbulent Niger Delta, experts say. The region produces the bulk of the nation’s petroleum…

Ship management company V.Group has announced the appointment of Bjoern Sprotte as chief executive officer, Ship Management.Based in Hamburg and reporting directly to V.Group CEO René Kofod-Olsen, Sprotte replaces Franck Kayser, who has requested to refocus his overall responsibilities and will be assuming leadership of the Group’s activities in Denmark.Sprotte joins V.Group from OSM Maritime Group, where he spent four years in a number of senior roles, including chief operating officer…

The developer of the first major U.S. offshore wind farm said on Wednesday it will soon apply for a federal permit from President Joe Biden's administration, after former President Donald Trump's government abruptly canceled its initial application last month.Vineyard Wind will resubmit its construction plan to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management "very very soon," Avangrid Inc CEO Dennis Arriola said in an interview, without specifying an exact date. "We believe that the pause button is going to come off and we're going to continue right where we were…

Auxiliary wind propulsion systems provide Norsepower said it installed the world’s first tiltable Rotor Sails for SEA-CARGO, a logistics provider in the North Sea market.According the analysis conducted by Norsepower and SEA-CARGO, installation of the two 35-meter tall Rotor Sails on board the SC Connector, a 12,251 gross tonne (GT) sidedoor RoRo vessel, can achieve a fuel consumption, fuel cost and carbon emissions reduction of up to 25%. In good wind conditions, the sailing…

The United States on Tuesday imposed sanctions on a ship involved in building the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to take Russian natural gas to Europe, as the Trump administration sought to raise pressure on the project on its last full day in office.The U.S. Treasury Department said it imposed the sanctions on the Russian pipe-laying ship "Fortuna" and its owner, KVT-RUS, under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).Nord Stream 2, designed to double the capacity of the existing Nord Stream undersea gas pipeline…

Damen Shipyards Group said it has signed a contract with Svitzer for the delivery of an ASD Tug 3212. The vessel, to be named Svitzer Thames, will operate in the Port of London and will be the fourth Damen ASD Tug 3212 in the company’s U.K. fleet.Damen and Svitzer signed the contract for the vessel in December last year. Thanks to Damen’s practice of building proven, standardized vessels for stock, Svitzer is able to take delivery of its new tug in the first quarter of 2021.Kasper Karlsen…

M.A.R.S. Europe said it has been awarded a contract by Teekay Petrojarl Floating Production UK Ltd. for dismantling and recycling of the Petrojarl Banff floating production, storage and offloading unit (FPSO). The deal includes engineering, preparation, dismantling and green recycling of the long-serving floater.Teekay's Petrojarl Banff FPSO is expected to arrive at M.A.R.S. Europe’s EU-approved facility in the Port of Frederikshavn, Denmark prior to the end of Q1 2021.The decommissioned FPSO, which ceased production in the U.K.

The U.S. State Department this month told European companies which it suspects are helping to build Russia's Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline that they face the risk of sanctions as the outgoing Trump administration prepares a final round of punitive measures against the project, two sources said on Tuesday."We are trying to inform companies of the risk and urge them to pull out before it's too late," a U.S. government source said on condition of anonymity.The U.S. source said the State…