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Intelligent & Resilient Ocean Engineering – Royal Academy of Engineering Chair in Emerging TechnologiesNews and Events

Chair in Emerging Technologies Susan Gourvenec addresses ‘Meeting the Environmental Challenge of implementing the Maritime 2050 Strategy’ at the Society for Maritime Industries Annual Conference

Published: 26 February 2020
SMI Annual Conference

Deputy Director of SMMI and Chair in Emerging Technologies Susan Gourvenec addresses 'Meeting the Environmental Challenge of implementing the Maritime 2050 Strategy' at the Society for Maritime Industries Annual Conference.

Susan delivered an invited presentation to a full house of industry, government and academic leaders at the Society for Maritime Industries 14th Annual Conference, this year held in London, on 26 February 2020. The theme of the conference was ‘Addressing the Challenges and Business Opportunities in Implementing Maritime 2050’ and Susan addressed ‘Meeting the Environmental Challenge’.

Susan’s presentation started with the strategic ambition for the environment set out in the Maritime 2050 Strategy of Clean Maritime Growth, presenting challenges and potential solutions to achieve a clean maritime future. Susan used the lens of ‘vessels and ports of the future’ to assess the requirements for clean maritime growth, touching on future fuels, fuel efficiency, electrification, digitisation and optimization. Challenges of infrastructure, training and regulation were discussed alongside the technological challenges. Susan highlighted how far we (as a sector and nation) are from meeting our current electricity demand from existing renewable sources as a backdrop for the additional renewable energy demand to achieve clean maritime growth, and more broadly clean industrial growth. Susan encouraged the sector to think bigger about their contribution to clean growth - to embrace the oceans as a space for renewable energy generation, carbon storage and food generation to meet the needs of an increasing and increasingly wealthy global population, and of the role of autonomy and AI to monitor and assess the effect of our interventions in the oceans at practical spatial and temporal scales.

The conference was opened by the new Minister for Maritime, Kelly Tolhurst, with the afternoon sessions opening with a keynote from Minister for Business and Industry, Nadhim Zahawi. The day was Chaired by Rear Admiral Rob Stevens, Chairman at Perpetuus Tidal Energy Centre, and involved wide ranging presentations addressing potential trajectories of the shipping, shipbuilding and marine technology sectors; technology, regulatory and security challenges; and the autonomy and digital transformation. Other presenters included economist Martin Stopford, President of Clarkson’s Research, Brian Johnson, Chief Executive of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, Tom Strang, Senior Vice President at Carnival, Iain Lower, Head of Naval Staff at the Royal Navy, Alex Duffy, MarRI-UK, Tim Lowe, Chief Executive of the UK Hydrographic Office, Hannah Green, Applied Intelligence BAE Systems, Neil Tinmouth, Chief Operating Officer of Sea-Kit International and Nigel Hearne, Pen Test Partners.

More information on the conference can be found here and the programme can be downloaded here.

 

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