eFoiler CTV

Project Lead: Artemis Technologies

Partners: ORE Catapult, Lloyd’s Register, Tidal Transit

Supported by: Department for Transport, Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition

Duration: September 2021 – March 2022

Project Description

The last 10 years have seen unprecedented growth in the contribution of offshore wind power to the UK’s energy needs. This growth is set to accelerate over the next decade, with a target to increase UK Offshore Wind capacity from 10GW today, to 50GW by 2030.

Today, there are over 90 high-speed Crew Transfer Vessels (CTVs) operating in UK waters, and a further 280 in the EU. On average, CTVs are operational for 250 days a year, burning 1,500 litres of diesel each day, resulting in a total of 472,850 tonnes CO2 of emissions across UK and EU each year. With an estimated 1,687 CTV vessels required to be built by 2050, to service the forecasted exponential growth in the UK and European offshore wind sectors, emissions are set to increase significantly in a ‘business as usual’ scenario. Therefore, it is imperative that a disruptive solution to decarbonise CTV operations is brought to market quickly.

Led by Artemis Technologies and building on the work of the emerging Belfast Maritime Consortium cluster as a global centre of excellence for zero-emission maritime technology, this project brings together partners from across the whole supply chain to investigate the feasibility of the Artemis eFoilerTM electric propulsion system as a transformative solution to decarbonise global CTV operations.

Key Objectives:

• Validate the technical and environmental benefits of the Artemis eFoilerTM electric propulsion system and correlation with Digital Twin simulations;
• Develop a Digital Twin of an optimised Artemis eFoilerTM electric propulsion system and vessel platform (eFoiler-CTV);
• Full mission simulation of the eFoiler-CTV undertaking crew transfer operations in the Artemis Technologies simulator;
• Investigate the potential reduction of lifecycle emissions of the solution and any barriers to future adoption; and
• Create a regulatory roadmap for the eFoiler-CTV and plan for large-scale demonstration of the solution.