The Royal Danish Navy is the first to have DNV class all its ships. If all goes as DNV and the Danes intend, this will mean a better Navy at lower cost.
Says Rear Admiral Bjørn Sørensen, Chief of the Royal Danish Navys Materiel Command: We have good ship projects that have been agreed by our politicians. We also hope that we can continue with this programme after the next Defence Agreement, since that means our fleet will be completely renewed in ten years time.
The Danish navy has never been afraid of trying out new technology, and has been a pioneer, particularly in containerisation. Denmark has a number of flexible ships that, by quickly changing their weapons and equipment, can undertake a wide variety of tasks.
Maritime operations are in general conservative, and the same is true of national navies, states Admiral Sørensen. When the NATO countries assessed aspects of containerisation of weapons and equipment in naval ships in the mid 1970s, Denmark was quick to start using them. We had our first project ready in 1985 and obtained our first grant then. The first ship was ready in 1987 and we had 14 ships by 1994. Later, a number of corvettes were also modified. Weve had several delegations visiting us, including some from France and the U.S.A., and they have shown great interest in our containerisation concept. Weve seen clear synergy effects in our fleet, and longer time in service than for conventional ships. Among other things, we dont have long downtimes due to errors in the weapons systems. If something goes wrong, we just switch containers - quick and effective.
Newbuilding and training
Denmark is to build two new large standard-flex ships, as support ships for naval operations. Later on the Royal Danish Navy has plans for 2-4 ships in a patrol version. Three 60m inspection vessels will be built to operate in Greenland and the Faeroe Islands. Sixteen smaller vessels with one or two container sets are also planned under a programme extending over the next eight to ten years.
The agreement with DNV will cover the training of personnel, IT systems in which DNVs Nauticus will be used in a separate stand-alone solution class-entry for ships that are already in operation, newbuilding contracts and additional services, including work during the pre-contract phase.
Five naval staff will be trained to carry out tasks as non-exclusive surveyors. A further two will become rule engineers whose task will be to maintain the Navys own rule database similar to Port State rules in commercial shipping. Shipping company inspectors project engineers as in the shipping companies will also be trained. They will be taught about classification in general, and emphasis will also be placed on defining the shipping companys role and that of the classification society.
Lower costs throughout
Rear Admiral Sørensen admits that cuts in grants mean that the realities of life have to be faced: The entire Navy is being re-structured. Most of its activities have been moved to the naval stations at Frederikshavn and Korsør. The Naval Materiel Command central staffs will be reduced and, besides developing our own capacity, weve also looked into the opportunities for bringing in outside expertise. Thats where DNV and the other classification societies came into the picture. With our areas of operation, we saw an advantage in using DNV. Through training both our current and new personnel, we can brush up the Navys knowledge and also gain new impulses from international shipping. We achieve a higher level more quickly this way than if we were to do everything ourselves. Similarly, when new ships are being built, the yards will have the classification societies in at an early stage.
Admiral Sørensen says that Danish yards and the shipyard association are positive to the new moves. They are also used to working with classification societies when building conventional ships.
Emphasises Sørensen: If we can rationalise our procedures, we get more defence for our money. We have planned this for several years. Naturally, there will always be a certain amount of uncertainty regarding anything new, but in general I expect the new procedures will serve us well.
Systematics and experience transfer
Admiral Sørensen gives credit to DNVs knowledge of systematisation and experience feedback. The Navys own experience can also be picked up by the system. Thus errors can be avoided in the future. Key tasks for the Navys own people will be to develop ships and weapons projects and control the fleet stations. But as much as possible is to be decentralised. In our relationship with DNV, there will be a clear dividing line between a ships technical systems and its weapons systems. The latter will be dealt with solely by Naval staff.
Challenge for DNV
DNVs main challenge will be the IT system and the training of the Navys own people, explains Henrik Bach, head of DNVs classification activities in Denmark. They will be given training, which will partly be carried out at DNVs headquarters in Norway and partly here in Denmark. This is a challenging task for DNV, and Im looking forward to see things develop as the Navy gains experience with the classification role.
DNVs own admiral, Rolf Pedersen, former head of the Royal Norwegian Navys Materiel Command and now head of DNVs Naval Surface Craft Technical Committee, feels it is very positive that Denmark has started to use the DNV Rules for Naval Surface Craft.
These are good Rules that we will further develop as regards health, safety and environmental aspects, for the Navys combat sustainability and for Composite Materials. Weve received 1,900 comments from the 10 NATO-countries plus two others on this committee. This represents a unique quality assurance of the Rules. Once we start to use the new Rules, we may find some things have to be changed. The Rules must keep up with the times. Denmark has gone ahead and shown us the way.