From Carbon to Chokepoints. Here are 17 Hidden Costs Shipowners are Mispricing in 2026 Budgets
Most 2026 fleet budgets are built around fuel curves, TCE targets and OPEX lines that feel familiar, while the real risk sits in a new layer of carbon costs, chokepoint detours and compliance traps...
e1 Marine Review: Hydrogen Power at Scale
e1 Marine is trying to sidestep one of the messiest parts of the hydrogen story: how you actually get fuel-cell grade hydrogen to a working vessel. Their pitch is to reform methanol and water...
Red Sea Lane Back In Play as CMA CGM Tests Suez Return
After almost a year of widespread container diversions around the Cape of Good Hope, CMA CGM is starting to route its INDAMEX service back through the Red Sea and Suez Canal on both headhaul...
Digital Twins Made Simple: 2026 Update
Digital twins have moved from buzzword to working tool on real ships and in real ports. Into 2026, owners are using “performance twins” of hull and machinery to trim fuel use and monitor fouling,...
FSB Security Checks and Hull Dives Slow Foreign calls at Russian Ports
Russia has tightened control of foreign ships calling at its ports, with new rules that require Federal Security Service (FSB) clearance for every arrival from a foreign port and allow for mandatory underwater hull...
HD Hyundai’s $2bn India Mega-Yard Aims to Reset Global Newbuild Map
HD Hyundai is reported to be preparing a multibillion-dollar greenfield shipyard project in southern India, with planned investment around $2bn. For owners and financiers, the significance is less about one site and more about...
VLCC, Capesize, Container: Which Segments Are Really Under-Ordered Going Into 2027?
Orderbook charts in 2025 tell three different stories: VLCCs are finally rebuilding after years of near zero fleet growth, dry bulk (including Capesize) is still relatively disciplined, and container owners are sitting on a...
Onboard Carbon Capture Systems Made Simple: 2026 Update
Onboard carbon capture has quietly shifted from PowerPoint to real hardware. By mid-2025, full-scale systems were running on ships like Solvang’s Clipper Eris and pilot units from Wärtsilä, Seabound, Langh Tech and others were...
Liner Heavyweights Circle ZIM as Takeover Battle Heats Up
Reports that Hapag-Lloyd has submitted a bid for ZIM, with MSC and Maersk also linked to possible offers, have pushed the Israeli carrier into the center of a major consolidation story. Any deal would...
HAV Group Review: Redesigning a Vessel’s Energy Profile
HAV Group sits where a lot of owners’ current headaches meet in one place: hull form and ship design, hybrid and electric propulsion, hydrogen energy systems, and ballast / water treatment. Instead of a...
Exchange Of Fire Off Yemen Puts Bab el Mandeb Back In The Spotlight
A bulk carrier transiting close to the Bab el Mandeb has reported an exchange of fire with around fifteen small boats about 15 nautical miles west of Yemen. According to UKMTO and security sources,...
Bulker Newbuild Tap Runs dry as orders sink to five-year low
Global contracting for new dry bulk carriers has dropped sharply in 2025, with just about 25 million dwt of bulker newbuildings ordered between January and November, a 54% year-on-year fall and the lowest level...
China Container Volumes Reset the Bar as Shanghai and Ningbo-Zhoushan pass 90M TEU
Despite trade tensions and policy noise, China’s box volumes are still climbing. Shanghai has crossed the 50 million TEU mark for 2025 a month earlier than last year, while Ningbo-Zhoushan has passed 40 million...
Oceanology International 2026 (London) Review
London’s blue-tech community sets the table in March 2026. Oceanology International brings ocean scientists, subsea engineers, navies, energy developers, and autonomous systems builders into one hall to compare tools, share data, and plan real...
Ammonia for Ships Made Simple: 2026 Update
Ammonia has moved from whiteboard idea to real metal in the water. By early 2025 there were hundreds of ammonia-fuelled or “ammonia-ready” vessels in the orderbook, mostly carriers and bulkers, with the first deep-sea...
Capesize Earnings Break $45,000 As Year-End Tightness Bites
Capesize earnings have surged to their strongest levels in roughly two years, with the Baltic C5TC benchmark jumping around 16% in a single day to just under $45,000 per day and more than triple...
Alicia Bots Review: Clean Hull Guarantee
Biofouling eats fuel and CII headroom every day a hull sits even slightly dirty, and Alicia Bots is pitching something very specific into that gap: shipboard robots that groom the hull and cargo holds...
Zodiac Maritime lines up $1.6bn VLCC and Boxship Wave at Jiangsu New Hantong
Eyal Ofer’s Zodiac Maritime has committed to a multi segment newbuilding program of about $1.6 billion at China’s Jiangsu New Hantong Ship Heavy Industry, covering crude and container capacity for delivery from the second...
The New Chokepoint Map: 9 Flashpoints Every Shipowner Watches Before Fixing a Voyage
Moving in to 2026 the “chokepoint map” is no longer a theory exercise. Before every long-haul fixture, owners and chartering desks are weighing very real trade-offs between Red Sea transits, Cape detours, war-risk premiums,...
Pirates: LPG Crew Kidnapping off Equatorial Guinea revives Gulf of Guinea Piracy Risk
A Portugal-flagged LPG carrier, CGas Saturn, was boarded by armed pirates about 50 nautical miles west of Mbini, Equatorial Guinea, while sailing toward Malabo. Security reports indicate that most of the crew were taken...
Norsepower Review: Lower Fuel Bills and Emissions on the Same Routes
Norsepower is one of the more visible attempts to make wind-assist a normal line item on a fuel and emissions plan, not a nostalgia project. From its base in Helsinki, the company installs tall...
Black Sea Risk Escalates As Kremlin Floats Retaliation On Allied Shipping
Recent statements from Moscow have pushed Black Sea risk up a notch. The Kremlin has condemned a surge of attacks on Russian commercial vessels as “piracy” and warned it may consider retaliatory measures against...
Smart Shore Power Made Simple: 2026 Update
Smart shore power is the quiet part of the energy transition that sits between the ship and the city. Instead of running auxiliary engines in port, the vessel plugs into a high-capacity electrical connection....
Wind Sails to be Deployed on Supertankers in 2028: Idemitsu Bets On Norsepower VLCC Pair
Idemitsu Tanker has ordered two methanol ready VLCC newbuilds in Japan that will each carry a pair of Norsepower rotor sails from delivery at the end of 2028, marking the first time VLCCs will...
South Africa’s cartel case shakes Asia–Africa box trades as Eight Liner Giants Face GRI probe
South Africa’s Competition Commission has sent a decade-long price-fixing case to the Competition Tribunal that targets the local units of eight major container lines. Regulators say the carriers coordinated general rate increases on routes...
Ship Finance Shifts as Leasing Multilaterals and Blue Bonds Rebalance Capital
Recent announcements from Chinese leasing houses, Indian policymakers, multilateral banks and bond markets all point in the same direction, capital is still available for shipping, but it is becoming more segmented and more demanding....
Ship Recycling Facing Weak Prices and Tough Rules
Ship recyclers are ending 2025 in a strange mix of tight supply and weak pricing. Subcontinent yards in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are struggling to keep offers near 400 dollars per LDT as steel...
Amogy Review: Turning Ammonia Into Clean Power
Amogy sits in the “fuel tank of the future” bucket: instead of asking shipowners to wait for green hydrogen or giant batteries, they use liquid ammonia, crack it into hydrogen on board, and feed...
Turkey’s Quiet Pivot On Russian Oil Shakes Up Med Crude Trades
Turkey has sharply cut its purchases of Russia’s flagship Urals crude in November, trimming volumes by around 100,000 barrels per day to about 200,000 bpd, according to Kpler and LSEG data. That is a...
Air Lubrication Systems Made Simple: 2026 Update
Air lubrication systems turn the flat bottom of a big ship into a moving carpet of bubbles. Instead of dragging steel through dense water, the hull rides on a thin air layer, which cuts...