Americas News
AWT Software Shows Best Route Through ECA
Ship routing specialists Applied Weather Technology, Inc. (AWT) has announced its on-board weather-routing BonVoyage System (BVS) now provides Emission Control Area (ECA) information in its calculation tools to evaluate the most cost effective voyage track.
"With BVS's ECA zone calculation tools, captains can make informed decisions about how much time to sail inside or outside these zones," said Rich Brown, vice president of product management, AWT.
According to the statement, the latest version of BVS enables captains to display ECA zones and make them "no-go" areas.
In doing so, a voyage track outside and inside ECA zones can be seen and by moving waypoints in BVS, the impact of time in the ECA zone can be compared to the overall effect of time en route.
"Our goal is to give captains and ship operators the data they need to manage voyage costs while complying with IMO regulations," Brown said.
On August 1, 2012 an ECA surrounding North America went into effect meaning all ships operating within 200 nautical miles of the U.S. and Canada coastline must use a marine fuel with a sulfur content not exceeding 1.00% by weight.
Ship & Bunker reported at the time the average price of high sulfur IFO380 across the U.S. ports of New Orleans, Houston, LA / Long Beach, and New York was $623.50 per metric tonne (pmt), and $752.50 pmt for the maximum 1.00% sulfur ECA compliant product, a premium of $129 or 20.7%.
