The newly developed technology employs the use of Fujitsu Laboratories’ high-dimensional statistical analysis technology to estimate the performance of ships at sea.
The technology utilises massive volume of measurement data gathered while the ship is underway, including sensor data of meteorological and hydrographic conditions such as wind, waves and ocean currents, ship engine log data, and data on speed and position of the ship.
“By applying the results of this research to Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology's weather routing simulator for evaluation, Fujitsu Laboratories demonstrated it could improve fuel efficiency by about 5% from previous results, with ships that navigate the shortest shipping routes,” Fujitsu Laboratories stated.
The technology can also estimate a ship’s performance at sea with a margin error of under 5%.
“If maritime operators have an accurate grasp on the effects of meteorological and hydrographic conditions on a ship's fuel performance, they can determine whether it is better, in terms of fuel efficiency, to take the shortest route, or to take a longer route to avoid the wind and waves,” Fujitsu Laboratories said.
“However, as existing ship performance estimation technologies rely on experiments with model ships in tanks of water, or on physics model simulations, they could not take into account the complicated interactions of the wind, waves, and ocean currents with ship conditions. This problem led to large margins of error in predictions,” it said.
“Fujitsu Laboratories will continue to improve its estimation accuracy through further operational trials going forward,” the company added.
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