After Covid, the Singapore Norway Innovation Conference is now once again a live conference and networking venue. A fully booked venue welcomed dignitaries, politicians, regulators, shipowners and other maritime professionals to a full-day event headlined 'a call to accelerate maritime decarbonization'. The conference is organized by NBAS (Norwegian Business Association Singapore), Innovation Norway and the Norwegian Embassy in Singapore.
The Odfjell Team contributed both on and off stage; Chair Laurence Odfjell is board member of NBAS and has contributed to the program planning and marketing with Odfjell as one of the sponsors.
On stage, VP Technology Erik Hjortland shared Odfjell's views and research on decarbonization, highlighting our achievements over the last decade or so and calling on politicians and regulators to take action:
"We urge politicians and regulators to:
- Ensure full scale-up of renewable electricity and shorebased carbon capture storage – it is the foundation of everything
- Electrify everything that can be electrified to minimize energy loss from production to consumer
- Stop silo-thinking in the ramp-up period; have a holistic approach – routing renewable energy to the wrong sector can give a global net negative climate effect. We must make sure that, in our desire to go green, we are part of the solution, not the problem.
We believe that shipping's best holistic contribution in the energy transition phase is not to change to green fuels (yet), but to further improve on energy efficiency until sufficient renewable electricity is available, and it is our turn."
Chair Laurence Odfjell echoed this perspective in the following panel discussion, where he was joined by Esben Poulsson (Chair at Enesel and former ICS President), James Marshall (Berge Bulk) Dr Liza Chua (ABB), Kaushik Seal (StormGeo) and James Tham (Penguin International Limited).
"Shipping does not have its own atmosphere, we can best contribute to the solution by thinking holistically. It's crunch time, no time for complacency."
As a comment to the sessions, Dr. Nikos Spath from DNV Maritime said that "Odfjell impressively showed how far they have come along this path and achieved fuel savings of up to 40% through a combination of measures such as ultrasonic propeller cleaning, waste heat recovery or optimized weather routing."
"I take my hat off for Odfjell's presentation at SNIC. It was an incredibly clear and thought-provoking review of the actual conditions and challenges. For me it was certainly a highlight of the event and I heard the same from several other participants."
As a warm-up for SNIC, our Asia team by Chartering Manager Zaidi Mohd, VP Asia Thomas Lund and Global Head of Tanker Trading Bjørn Hammer hosted a tailored meeting for around 40 customers and partners. Erik held a similar presentation, and the team gave a general status update and answered questions. The feedback from the guests was unanimously positive:
Rytik Rangoo, Integra:
"Thank you, Erik Hjortland and the Odfjell team for your fascinating insight today into the complex and extremely important topic of decarbonization in shipping. Your perspectives on energy efficiency is something everyone needs to hear."
Mike Gares, Netco:
“This was an excellent presentation. Very insightful and the info was put out in a manner so we mere mortals could comprehend it.”
Mark Mirosevic, Sorgo/ Quincannon Singapore:
"Thank you for hosting the talk and presentation this morning, explaining to the market the Odfjell position with respect to the new fuels, and the ways that Odfjell has been working to increase efficiency with respect to the chemical tanker fleet. Many thanks to all your colleagues there present as well."
The NBAS Seafood Dinner is widely acknowledged as THE seafood event of the year in Singapore. It was last held pre-Covid in 2019, so the doors were opened with a special sense of occasion at the Fairmont hotel this November evening.
The 1150 dressed-up guests enjoyed an evening filled with a lavish quality seafood buffet prepared in cooperation between Norwegian and Singaporean chefs, and – of course – paired with Odfjell wines.
Odfjell hosted five tables, and welcomed around 40 specially invited guests from a wide range of partners and customers:
Core Energy - Codelco Singapore - Port Singapore Authority - Shell - Sasol Singapore - Advario Oil Tanking - Grace Ocean - Mitsui - Oxyde - Cargill - ITOCHU - Rexon Energy - Sasol Singapore - SIETCO (Shell Trading) - BASF - Total Singapore - Integra Petrochemicals - Sumitomo - Neste - Wilmar - Aramco - IFFCO Chart - Aperion Bioenergy - Clarksons - SPI Marine - Eastport Shipbrokering - SSY Shipbroker - New Asia Shipbroker - Alma - Core Power.
