The fuel costs are the second largest item (after salaries) on a big vessel’s budget. The fuel consumption for a large ferry ranges between 1000 and 5000 liters per hour. This means that the ship consumes more oil per hour than a one family house does for one whole year’s heating.1 The annual fuel budget for a ship running 275 days per year is roughly 4,5Mil euros. Even small reductions of a few percent off the fuel consumption means considerable annual savings. Moreover saving fuel has a crucial environmental impact in terms of emissions of greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4, N2O, HFCs, PFCs, SF6) and other relevant substances (NOx, NMVOC, CO, PM, SOx).

EMI proposal aims to launch into the marine sector, at international level, the eco-innovative technology “Energy Management Interface - EMI” developed, successfully tested and patented by EASY Marine. EMI is a high precision instrument for the ship’s RPM/PITCH optimization to maximize the saving of fuel, and consequentially to minimize the C02 production, by changing weather and sea conditions.



EMI technology is made up by 3 main parts:
- An electronic one. This part includes the board and its components.
- A mechanics one. This part includes the torque shaft power meter made up by two laser sensors and two rings
made of appropriate material.
- A software. The algorithm makes an intelligent correction, based on the Vessel Experience Factor using a three-dimensional database, which is carried out in different weather conditions.

EMI has been already tested on 3 ships:
- a Bulk of 100.000mt and
- 2 Tankers of 50.000mt
The results of the first test show a remarkable fuel/C02 saving: between 3 and 15% daily according to weather and engine conditions with an average saving of 5-6% on total voyage.

As shown in the following graphics, based on the data collected with 2 transoceanic voyages with and without EMI, the fuel consumption is reduced up to 5-6 tons of bunker per day thanks to the EMI system, in particular in bad weather conditions (> 4-5 BF).

Moreover, as shown by the second graphic, the ratio between fuel consumption (Tons) and miles (Mls) covered increases up to 3-4% that means that the ship performance is improved.

On a yearly basis (275 sailing days with 145d of good and 130d of bad weather) EMI gets an average saving of 272 tons of bunker and 142.000€ per ship.

Currently all the major ship owners are working on the development of such an optimization system to save fuel and most of them have already adopted saving strategies (e.g. slow steaming) or technologies (e.g. Sense Shaft Power Thrust Meter, MetaPower) but none of these is all-features-inclusive (engine, ship geometry, weather, sea, etc.) and provides the Captain with a precise input (the ideal RPM). Nonetheless, most of these ship owners have already found and implemented their partial solutions and they are reluctant to try something new that partially overlapped with their systems. Moreover the issue is quite complex and it is not easy to communicate to the end-user the way EMI works and its effectiveness.
Source: EMI