Trinity House, the General Lighthouse Authority for England, Wales, the Channel Islands and Gibraltar, has awarded a contract worth more than €220 million to VARD, the Norwegian subsidiary of Italy’s Fincantieri, to design and build two multi-function buoy and lighthouse maintenance vessels, according to the company.
The award forms part of Trinity House’s fleet renewal programme, with the two new vessels replacing the existing THV Patricia and THV Galatea. According to Fincantieri, the ships will support aids-to-navigation services, hydrographic survey activities and emergency response operations across UK waters.
The vessels will be based on VARD’s 9601 design and will feature hybrid propulsion systems and battery energy storage solutions, alongside modern digital and cybersecurity capabilities. According to the company, the ships will also be prepared for potential future conversion to methanol fuel.
VARD, headquartered in Norway, operates as part of the Fincantieri group, one of the largest shipbuilding concerns in the world, with the Italian state as its principal shareholder. Trinity House, a maritime charity and one of three General Lighthouse Authorities in the United Kingdom and Ireland, is responsible for the provision and maintenance of navigational aids including lighthouses, buoys and beacons across its area of jurisdiction, funded largely through light dues levied on commercial shipping.
The vessels being replaced have served Trinity House for a number of years. THV Galatea entered service in 2007, while THV Patricia has performed a dual role as a working tender and, unusually, offered a small number of berths to paying passengers wishing to observe the authority’s operations at sea. Both ships carry out the physical work of tending the thousands of aids to navigation that mark hazards and shipping channels around the coasts of England, Wales, the Channel Islands and Gibraltar.
The VARD 9601 design underpinning the new ships is a multi-purpose platform, and the contract specifies a build incorporating hybrid propulsion and energy storage as Trinity House moves toward lower-emission operations, with the methanol-ready provision leaving open a route to further reductions in the vessels’ carbon footprint over their service lives.
Part of the T26 offset.
Seems like a reasonable purchase. I would always prefer to see ships designed and built in the UK however with the amount of money the Norweigans are spending with us on Type 26 it would just offset their costs slightly.
Considering it is just two vessel’s I would imagine a UK design and build would likely come in over budget and with substantial delays. This is cost effective and good for International relations.
I wonder what the update is on the MCMV mother ships from Norway. I think it is very optimistic to get three ships for 90 million, unless that is just for the basic ship and then added cost for fitting out ect?