AZTI

On 7-8 November, scientists of Seaglow’s partner AZTI travelled to Võiste, Estonia, to install the data acquisition system named SIMUL. The installations were carried out on a small-scale fishing vessel that fishes for Baltic herring, with a fishing technique known as “kakuami”, in which two boats work together to catch the herring inside the traps. A typical fishing trip consists of visiting different traps previously set at sea and lasts 4-5 hours.

 

The installed acquisition system allows to capture information relating to the operational and energy consumption patterns of a certain vessel, by measuring and monitoring engine and operational parameters, such as vessel speed, distance covered and fuel consumption. This setup allows the skipper to stay informed in real time about the measured parameters and the calculated fuel consumption.

 

The main PC box was installed on the bridge of the vessel. This box receives all the measured data and couples the information which is subsequently sent to a server. This allows to analyze the historical data of multiple trips based on the registered parameters.

 

SIMUL is designed to measure the operational parameters during the different trips conducted by the fishing vessel, thus serving three main purposes:

• Operational and Energy Consumption Analysis: Defining the operational and energy consumption patterns of the vessel. It permits to approximately understand which are the energetic requirements of the vessel for different trips.
• Comparative Energy Consumption Evaluation: Registering data to later compare the energy consumption of the vessel with the conventional diesel propulsion system to the upcoming hybrid propulsion system or other decarbonisation solutions installed onboard.
• Performance Optimization Tool for Skippers: Providing the skipper with a tool to better understand the relationship between the engine speed, the vessel speed and the fuel consumption of the vessel. In this way, he can test which is the increment in fuel consumption given by an increment in the engine or vessel speeds (eg. the increments in L/h to gain one knot while steaming to fishing zones).

The initial sea trials to test all the sensors were conducted on the 8^th of November. The following figure shows the tracking of the vessel during the test, as well as the engine speed and fuel consumption.

 

The installations for the other vessels of the Seaglow project, located in Denmark, Norway and Sweden, have already started. AZTI will provide regular updates on progress in subsequent communications.

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Photo credits @AZTI @Argo Mengel

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