TOTE, Inc. became the first U.S. company to take home the 'Next Generation Shipping' award at the recent Nor-Shipping 2013 expo.
The Nor-Shipping 2013 Awards recognize achievement in three different but very important areas – energy efficiency, innovative ship design and young entrepreneurship. With a focus on innovation, the Next Generation Ship Award honors the most promising design for ships that will be at sea in the coming decade. The award is given to the ship project demonstrating the greatest advances in design, as assessed with respect to energy efficiency, innovation, suitability and flexibility, technology utilization, safety and security, and environmental sustainability.
TOTE was honored for its Marlin Class of 3,100 TEU LNG-powered containerships, ordered from General Dynamics NASSCO in December 2012. Once completed in 2015, the 764-foot ships will operate in the U.S. Jones Act market between Jacksonville, Fla., and San Juan, P.R. The Marlin Class will be the world’s first LNG powered containerships. Construction on the ships will begin in March 2014.
"To say we are both honored and humbled by this prestigious internationally recognized award, would be a significant understatement. The team at TOTE, along with our partners at NASSCO, have spent many months working on this project, which we believe will have a lasting impact on our industry and the future of ship design. While we are proud to be the first ever ship owner to construct LNG powered container vessels, we are quite confident we will most certainly not be the last" stated Anthony Chiarello, President and CEO of TOTE.
The Nor-Shipping conference and awards ceremony took place in Oslo, Norway, June 4-7, 2013. An independent jury comprised of authorities including the IMO, DNV and The Norwegian Marine Technology Research Institute (MARINTEK) selected honorees for the nearly 50-year old gathering of industry leaders.
