ABS Participates in Arctic Shipping Forum

ABS Director, Advisory Services, James Bond represented ABS in various sessions at the Arctic Shipping Forum in Helsinki, Finland earlier this month.  

Bond led a breakout session titled, “A guide to undertaking an operational assessment to comply with the Polar Code.” In this power hour, Bond explained the requirements for a good operational assessment, which personnel are needed, what resources should be on hand, what must be discussed and what needs to be decided. During this session, other International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) members substantially agreed with Bond’s statements.

At the start of the third day, Bond gave a breakfast briefing where he discussed applying ABS specific tools, such as ABS-POLARIS, to an actual operation to study the operational risks and financial benefits for a Polar voyage vs a more southerly route. During this talk, Bond discussed two vessels departing from Baffinland mine in northern Canada, transiting to discharge ports in Asia. He discussed the comparison between sea ice risk analysis, fuel consumption, icebreaker escort fees and canal fees.

This costing analysis continues, and Bond is available for further talks or discussion on a polar voyage vs a southern voyage.

“Responsible polar operations happen when extensive preparations that were the foundation for the journey to compliance are put into practice to protect the environment, the ships and the people that serve them,” said Bond.

Later that afternoon Bond joined a panel discussion on “Polar Code in Action.” The session provided a comparison of flag and class societies’ approaches to implementing the Polar Code; it also included shipowners’ responses and experiences as well as enforcement issues. Participants on the panel included industry professionals from across the shipping industry: class societies, flag states, bulk shipping companies, academia and more.

ABS directly participated in the development of the IMO Polar Code via IACS and the U.S. delegation.  Further, ABS has published the ABS Polar Code Advisory to provide an overview and introduction of the Polar Code to industry stakeholders.

ABS also recently published a case study on Oldendorff Carriers’ journey to polar code compliance. To read more, click here.

ABS has created a unique toolset called the ABS Polar Suite. This ABS in-house tool can be used to produce polar waters environmental risk analyses that are incredibly useful in operational assessments. Ship owners can use the ABS Polar Suite products to effectively determine a realistic operational profile for their existing vessels, or establish the required ice class to provide a newbuild vessel capability for select routing or a specific Polar destination.

Please contact Mr. Bond at jbond@eagle.org for further details on the ABS Polar Suite products.