Viking has taken delivery 10 November of the 47,800-ton Viking Neptune which features a hydrogen fuel cell module which will be tested onboard.
Constructed at the Fincantieri shipyard in Ancona, Italy, the cruise ship is the ninth in her class. Ten vessels have been ordered by Viking since 2012 and in September Fincantieri announced that it will be building a further six vessels for the line, which will be designed for future operation with hydrogen fuel cells.
The fuel cell on board Viking Neptune will have a nominal power of 100kW. Viking and Fincantieri are working together to develop large-scale hydrogen applications.
As a first step, the two companies have designed an enlarged vessel configuration, to be applied to vessels to be delivered after 2024, which defines the spaces and arrangement for accommodating the increased size of hydrogen tank, the fuel cell system and other auxiliary equipment.
The second step will be the development of a hydrogen-based generation system with a total power of about 6-7 MW. This will be the largest size to be tested on board a cruise vessel and will ensure smokeless port operation and slow steaming navigation.
According to Fincantieri, such systems, once finalised, could be installed on vessels under construction and, as far as possible, retrofitted on the vessels already delivered.
Neptune will be the cruise industry’s first ship to test the use of hydrogen power for onboard operations, through the use of her small hydrogen fuel system.
‘We are especially proud to welcome this newest sister ship to our ocean fleet, as it also marks a significant advancement in testing hydrogen as a future fuel for our vessels’, said Torstein Hagen, chair of Viking.
