Confidence-centric vessel performance management: Perception vs. MeasurementConfidence-centric vessel performance management: Perception vs. Measurement

In fact, stakeholders are looking at different KPI’s depending on their immediate concerns and focus. There are different categories of performance: technical, operational and commercial.

Furthermore, shipping is not an isolated activity. It is integrated into a global flow that is increasingly more digitalized and where the speed of decision-making and the parameter variation is very high. Therefore, any part of this chain which is not digitalized (or automated) will form a bottleneck and be subject to pressure leading to human error or poor decision-making.

What is at stake?

According to the IMO (Report of fuel oil consumption data submitted to the IMO Ship Fuel Oil Consumption Database in GISIS), international shipping consumed about 200 million metrics tons of fuel in 2020. If we assume an average price of 500 USD/MT, the total annual cost of fuel is 100 billion USD globally. This represents about 608 million tons of CO2.

Regardless of the methods and tools used to save energy, the impact of such measures is significant:

Moreover, these savings estimates do not include the direct or indirect impact of the current or future regulations (CII, FUEL EU, EU ETS…).

In addition, the majority of shipping professionals would agree that achieving a 5% to 10% saving is possible with simple operational measures assisted by technology. Thus, the benefits are obvious. So, what is holding back the massive and systematic deployment of energy saving solutions on every vessel?

One of the reasons is certainly the confidence in the methodology of energy saving initiatives.

The “how” is as important as the “what”

When it comes to deploying digital solutions to help achieve the economic and environmental objectives of a shipping organization, there are many challenges to overcome. Here are a few of them:

The two first items are critical (misalignment and sponsorship). They are related to the organizations and cannot be solved by an external party (e.g. digital solution provider). However, they are very important prerequisites for the success of any project of this nature.

For the other items, there are good practices that can help tackle them.

Confidence-centric vessel performance management

It goes without saying that there is no single recipe to be applied uniformly to all projects. However, there are some common best practices that increase the chance of their success.

First, the project must follow a structured methodology. We see many projects running in all direction because of poor preparation. This includes identifying all the stakeholders and their interests, prioritizing the objectives and deploying as progressively as possible by starting with the low hanging fruit to create and maintain the motivation of the participants in the project.

Second, the project team, including the supplier, must conduct a realistic risk assessment. All plausible contingency scenario must be anticipated and corrective measures planned in advance.

Third, the project team and the leadership must encourage and reward transparent collaboration. The stakeholders must establish fast feedback loops and act quickly on the insights derived from the data.

Finally, it is important to rely on accurate performance measurement to build confidence and trust. This starts by identifying the meaningful data sources and assessing their quality. Then, automation in data collection and analysis must be privileged to reduce human error and increase efficiency.

Conclusion

Most of the time, the vessel performance management initiatives are evaluated from a technical point of view. While technology is key, the methodology to deploy it is also critical. We have seen many times how the deployment of vessel performance management projects have been deployed successfully in some organizations and delivered the expected results; and how, unfortunately, in others they have failed to do so. Very often, the reason resides in the absence of a methodology that builds confidence and trust in the vessel performance management project.

About Ascenz Marorka

With more than 1,300 vessels equipped, Ascenz Marorka, a GTT brand, is a leading provider of digital solutions for Smart Ships in the maritime industry, offering the one of the most comprehensive, innovative and reliable digital platform for ship owners and charterers around the world. Ascenz Marorka portfolio comprises solutions for Electronic Fuel Monitoring, Vessel Performance Management, LNG Cargo Management, Emissions Monitoring, Operational and Regulatory Reporting, Weather Routing… More details on the company and the products at: https://ascenzmarorka.com