The tanker Stena Arctica was named in its home port of Gothenburg. With its 117,100 deadweight tons, the vessel is not only the largest Swedish-flagged ship in the Swedish merchant navy but also the world’s largest tanker with the highest class in service.
Its hull is heavily reinforced and its propulsion system is considerably more powerful than that of normal tankers, thus enabling it to safely manoeuvre in the icy waters of the Baltic Sea. The Stena Arctica, together with additional ice-strengthened units and in cooperation with Sovcomflot – the largest shipping company in Russia – will mainly transport Russian crude oil from the Gulf of Finland to the Continent.
“The Stena Arctica and our cooperation with Sovcomflot are important steps in our ambition to provide the Baltic and North Sea with safe seaborne transportation of Russian oil,” says Ulf G Ryder, the CEO of Stena Bulk. In 2008, Stena Bulk and its sister company Concordia Maritime will be operating a fleet of about a dozen large ice-strengthened tankers.
Cooperation
The cooperation between the shipping companies Stena Bulk and Sovcomflot includes building up a pool of 10–15 ice-strengthened tankers. The objective is to ship 20–25 million tons of Russian oil per year from the Baltic to the UK/Continent. This is equivalent to about one third of the volumes shipped from the terminal in Primorsk in the Gulf of Finland.
The volumes of Russian oil transported through Swedish waters have rocketed since the new terminal in Primorsk was built in 2001. The first year, 0.3 million tons were exported and, in 2005, 57 million tons of oil were transported out from the Gulf of Finland.
Another ambition of Stena Bulk and Sovcomflot is to jointly develop a so-called B-MAX tanker, in which B stands for Baltic. This vessel type will be extremely wide-bodied with a shallow draft and will carry as much as 250,000 tons. All propulsion systems will be doubled, which will give even better manoeuvrability while also enhancing safety.
Finally, cooperation in the training of crews for sailing in icy waters has been initiated. This includes sponsorship of a training programme and a training centre at the Makarov Institute in St Petersburg.
Date: 2006-03-13