SWEDISH wind propulsion company Oceanbird has completed the installation of the foundations for a wing sail to be fitted to the Wallenius Wilhelmsen PCTC Tirranna.
Staff from Oceanbird, which is a joint venture between Wallenius and Alfa Laval, performed the work during Tirranna’s routine drydocking at the IMC Shipyard in Zhoushan, China.
Oceanbird is currently producing two full-scale (40 x14 metres) prototypes: one land-based in Landskrona and one to fit to the 2009-built, 7620 CEU vessel. The wing sail foundation, which connects the deck to the wing sail, has been welded on deck ahead of the actual equipping of the vessel with the sail in Europe in the first quarter of 2025.
Oceanbird´s customer project manager Emil Kotz said the installation went as planned.
“Overall, it was a successful operation. Since this is our first installation, we had a lot of valuable learnings,” Mr Kotz, who has just returned from the shipyard in China together with Oceanbird´s engineers Georg Svedling and Erik Lincoln, said.
Besides welding the foundation on deck, the modifications on Tirranna also included steelwork to strengthen the vessel and cabling work to ensure the interface between vessel and wing sail.
“We did as much preparations as possible to avoid unnecessary off-hire during the wing installation in port. Together with the crew from Wallenius Wilhelmsen and the shipyard, we managed to get everything done during the planned docking time,” Mr Kotz said.
The retrofitting process on Tirranna is part of the European Union project Orcelle Horizon, which aims to support the building of the primary wind powered vessel Orcelle Wind – the first concept-designed vessel from the Oceanbird concept.
Alfa Laval and Wallenius founded Oceanbird as a 50/50 jv in 2021with the purpose of reducing the carbon footprint of the marine industry.
“From Alfa Laval, we get production experience such as supply chain management and a global service network, and from Wallenius we get knowhow from ship design/newbuilding and vessel operation,” Oceanbird says.
More about the retrofitting can be found at Orcelle.eu
