The construction of Crowley Maritime’s first two liquefied natural gas (LNG)-powered liner ships have taken major steps toward completion.

Construction of the pair of combination container-roll-on/roll-off (ConRo) ships is currently underway at the Pascagoula, Mississippi, shipyard of VT Halter Marine, Inc., a subsidiary of VT Systems, Inc. and is now 25 percent complete.

The two Commitment Class ships – the El Coquí and the Taíno – are scheduled for delivery second and fourth quarter 2017, respectively, and will be operated in either Crowley’s Puerto Rican/Caribbean or Latin American liner services.

“Designed to maximize the carriage of 53-foot, 102-inch-wide containers, which offer the most cubic cargo capacity in the trade, the 658-foot, 25,500 ton ships will have a capacity of 2,400 TEUs (20-foot-equivalent-units) and additional space for nearly 400 vehicles in an enclosed ro/ro garage,” according to Jacksonville, Florida-based Crowley Maritime.

The main propulsion and auxiliary engines will be fueled by LNG, the cleanest fossil fuel available, netting a 100-percent reduction in sulphur oxide (SOx) and particulate matter (PM), and a 92-percent reduction in nitrogen oxide (NOx), the company said.

LNG also has the ability to significantly reduce carbon dioxide (CO2), a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, as compared with conventional fossil fuels.

The ship design is provided by Wartsila Ship Design in conjunction with Crowley subsidiary Jensen Maritime, a Seattle-based naval architecture and marine engineering firm.
The new ships will replace Crowley’s towed triple-deck barge fleet, which has served the trade continuously since the early 1970s.