The Most Recent Noise &amp; Vibration Assessment of the European Fleet, within the Framework of the “SILENV Project”

Publio Beltrán Palomo

doi:10.25043/19098642.93

Abstract

The EU’s new “Green Policy” to reduce the environmental impact of all types of vessels is generating new Directives that shall affect the Shipbuilding Industry. As a direct consequence, an intense debate has been opened with the participation of all the players involved: the European Commission, Marine Institutions, Shipbuilding Industry, Marine Sector, and Scientific Community. Participation of the authors in the SILENV, BESST, and AQUO projects within the FP7 has permitted noticing that for the complete assessment of the ships’ environmental impact it is essential to introduce the new so-called Noise & Vibration – Full Signature indicator. In addition to the well-known topics of Noise & Vibration (N&V) on board, it includes new ones: Noise Radiated to Harbour and Underwater Radiated Noise (URN) by the ships. Both, but especially the latter (URN) became the most outstanding novelty and the biggest challenge to be technically solved. In this sense, it is essential to know the “Starting Point”: How far is the current European Fleet from the Standard Regulations and from other Directives that will soon be compulsory? And which are the technical reasons and root causes of these deviations? To address these issues within the framework of the SILENV Project, the most recent N&V database compiled with 171 ships from the European Fleet and 12,000 N&V experimental data have been assessed. It became the largest ever N&V database in the marine sector, as well as a complete novelty. Therefore, the results, conclusions and recommendations obtained from it are of paramount importance to support current policies of the EC and other Marine Institutions that focus their efforts on combating the environmental impact of the ships.

Highlights

Noise and vibrations (N&V) induced by different N&V sources on board vessels have been among the most recurrent issues in the shipbuilding industry
In the concern of the abatement of the N&V FS of the vessels, it has been considered essential to know, in a first stage, the “Starting Point”, or in other words: How far is the current European Fleet from the Standard Regulations and from other Directives that will soon be compulsory? This assessment has been performed by done analyzing the large collection of experimental data that has been compiled in the SILENVN&V database, and that includes information from different types of vessels representative of the current European Fleet
The aim of the present paper is to present to all players (EC, Marine Institutions, Shipbuilding Industry, Marine Sector, and Scientific Community), involved in the N&V pollution debate, the results and conclusion of these analyses

Summary

Introduction

Noise and vibrations (N&V) induced by different N&V sources on board vessels have been among the most recurrent issues in the shipbuilding industry. This assessment has been performed by done analyzing the large collection of experimental data that has been compiled in the SILENVN&V database, and that includes information from different types of vessels representative of the current European Fleet. Both statistical approaches, developed in the framework of the SILENV project and the results obtained from them, have been contrasted and validated with a Mapping Analysis This analysis was conducted by using the experimental data collected through dedicated on-site measurement activities performed on a representative sample of different types of vessels. None of the vessels included in the SILENV-N&V existing database reaches the N&V Full Signature grade To fill this lack of experimental information and with the objective of enabling the N&V FS assessment of the current vessels, dedicated and extensive on-site measurement activities were developed within the frame of the WP2 of the SILENV project. SILENV limits?, and Which are the technical reasons and lack of requirements motivating these deviations? may be successfully answered

Background and introduction

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Assessment Results