Oceanbird

The wind carries a shipping revolution

Designing a new sailing era

People have been sailing for thousands of years. The introduction of diesel engines meant faster crossings – at the expense of the environment. The sailing cargo vessel Oceanbird will leave 90% less emissions than today’s vessels, which shows that the maritime industry can bring about major change and that zero-emission shipping is possible. The design will be ready for orders in 2021 and we are aiming for a launch in 2024.

An efficient Swedish cluster

The main partners in the project is Wallenius Marine, KTH Royal Institute of Technology and SSPA. It is supported by the Swedish Transport Administration, which has allocated SEK 32 million for the three-year development project during 2019-2022. It is an efficient cluster collaboration that draws together experts from the public and private sectors and academia. We are not just developing the transportation technology of the future, but also the next generation of engineers. Working together, we enable sustainable growth. You can follow the whole process in our blog.

Wallenius Marine is the project coordinator, owns the concept and is also contributing design and logistics expertise.
KTH addresses the challenges within areas such as aerodynamics, sailing mechanics and performance analysis.
SSPA is contributing with expertise within the development and validation of new testing methods, aerodynamic and hydrodynamic simulation methods and risk simulation.

Introducing Oceanbird

The research project is called wPCC (wind Powered Car Carrier), and in September 2020 the collaboration presented the concept Oceanbird. Learn more about this revolutionary ship design in Oceanbirdwallenius.com

Carl-Johan Söder, Naval Architect at Wallenius Marine

The partnership is absolutely key. Between SSPA’s knowledge of model testing and advanced fluid dynamics calculations, KTH’s expertise in problem solving and our design and logistical experience, I think we’re on to a winner!

Related blog posts

Let’s talk about the wings

Oceanbird is like no other cargo vessel. Mostly because of its 80 metres high wings, which gives the ship enough power to transport 7,000 cars across the ocean.

Introducing Oceanbird

Last week, Wallenius Marine revealed the new design for the wind powered ship Oceanbird. At a digital press conference, journalists got a pre-view of the /../

Watch the sea trial of Oceanbird model

The sun was shining over the eleven naval design students from KTH, when they put the Oceanbird model in water. This first sea trial /../

Testing the hull of Oceanbird

Computer simulations can take us quite far but not all the way. The team that are designing wind powered vessels, needed a boat in /../

New insights from high level wind measurements

In designing wind-powered vessels, we need to understand how the wind behaves 200 meters above the surface. Therefore, the design team have installed advanced laser measurement, so called LIDAR, on an oceangoing ship.

Why does the government invest in sailing vessels?

The Swedish Transport Administration (Trafikverket) have invested about 27 million Swedish crowns for the development of the concept wind-powered car carrier, also known as wPCC. Chief Strategist Rein Jüriado tell us why they did that.

Young minds gave wPCC a flying start

This summer, three naval architecture students from KTH was given the task to explore alternative wing designs for wind-powered vessels. “A dream job” says Filip Wängelin, who will continue to work in the project.

Other ship designs from Wallenius Marine

Oceanbird

The wind carries a shipping revolution

HERO class PCTC

HERO combines innovative design and new technology to get highly efficient post-Panamax vessels.

Multi-fuel vessels

LNG and multifuel engines is an important step on the way towards emission free shipping