Jadrolinija announced the arrival of hybrid ferries!
Oleg Butkovic, the Minister of Sea, Transport and Infrastructure, said at the actual session of Croatian Sabor that Jadrolinja plans on acquiring more boats that will run on “green” fuel. Also, some of them will be co-financed through the National plan for recovery and resilience.
He further elaborated on this by saying that: “COVID-19 made a big impact on Jadrolinija too. Their profit was low, especially in 2020, so they couldn’t invest and acquire new boats. Through the National Recovery Programme, we’ve planned on acquiring 6 new ships, 3 of which are passenger boats, 2 hybrid boats and 3 catamarans.
These projects are finished and will be submitted to the Jadrolinija Board so the company can publish a public competition. He also added that at least two ships would be built during 2023.
According to David Sopta, president of Jadrolinija’s Board, three boats are currently in plan, two of which are smaller passenger boats that will replace older boats currently in use. After that, more boats will be acquired. The investment plans and restoration of the fleet were slowed by the pandemic, but now we are continuing and plan to acquire in a three-year period 3 passenger boats with a capacity of approximately 400 people. The boats are planned to operate on routes in the Dubrovnik area and also the area of Losinj and nearby islands.
The third boat will be a much larger passenger ferry with a capacity of 200 – 1000 passengers. It will operate on the Split-Hvar route. Sopta also explained that all of the boats will be hybrid, which means there’ll be less CO2 emissions than with regular ferries. When leaving and arriving, the boats will use just electric energy, he also added.
Along with the acquisition of these three boats, Jadrolinija will design new ferries for the Zadar ferry port which will have a capacity of approximately 80 vehicles. Also, Jadrolinija plans to acquire a small passenger boat for the Šibenik area.
“These are exclusively new boats we’ll be building so we hope the Croatian shipyards will take part in these projects” – added Sopta.
When asked whether Jadrolinija will build boats that run on LNG gas, Sopta said when the time comes to choose the fuel type, economical factors will be taken into account and the accessibility of fuel technologies on the market.
To build ships that run on electricity, Sopta said, our ports need to have the appropriate infrastructure, especially for building appropriate charging stations. So far, no other port than Rijeka ferry port can handle these kinds of requirements.
To build an electric network, around 4 to 5 years are needed, Sopta added. That’s why for now we’ll be using hybrid technologies and when the conditions get better, we’ll invest in electric boats, especially on shorter routes.
Sources: Dalmatinski portal; Novi list
