On December 2, shipping giant Maersk announced on its official website that it has placed orders for 20 dual-fuel container ships at three Chinese and South Korean shipyards to implement a fleet renewal program announced in August.
Maersk has signed a contract with three shipyards to order a total of 20 container ships equipped with dual -fuel engines. The total capacity of the new ship has reached 300,000 TEU. The signing of these orders marked Maersk’s new shipbuilding part in the fleet update plan announced in August 2024.
All 20 new ships will be equipped with liquefied natural gas (LNG) dual-fuel propulsion systems, with sizes ranging from 9,000 to 17,000 TEU. The first ships are expected to be delivered in 2028, with the last scheduled for 2030. The new ships, when delivered in phases, will be used to replace existing capacity in Maersk’s fleet.
Specifically, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding has obtained 6 17000TEU container ships and two 9000TEU container ship orders; New Times Shipbuilding obtained an order for 6 15000TEU container ships; and South Korea’s Hanwha Ocean obtained an order for six 15,000 TEU container ships.
Maersk did not announce the cost of the order. According to previous news, the price of a single ship of the 17000TEU dual fuel container ship in Yangzijiang Shipbuilding is expected to be about $210 million, and the price of a single ship for 9000TEU dual fuel container ship is expected to be about $130 million. Based on this calculation, the total value of eight orders from Yangzijiang Shipbuilding was about $1.52 billion.
New Times Shipbuilding’s 15,000 TEU container ships are expected to cost about $200 million for a single ship, with a total value of about $1.2 billion for the six ships.
Hanwha Ocean had already announced this order previously. On October 10, Hanwha Ocean announced that it had signed a contract with a European shipping company for six 15,000 TEU LNG dual-fuel container ships, with the price of a single ship being about $208 million, and the total value amounting to $1.25 billion. The owner of the order.
The total value of Masky’s 20 large orders is about $ 4 billion.
The decline in natural gas prices, coupled with insufficient methanol production capacity and high costs, is driving major shipping giants to refresh their interest in LNG fuel. Previously, another shipping giant, Hapag-Lloyd, announced a large-scale order for LNG -dualfuel container ships at Chinese shipyards.
In early November, Hapag-Lloyd announced on its official website that it had signed two contracts with two Chinese shipyards to construct a total of 24 container ships, with a total investment of approximately $4 billion.
This order is also shared by two major private Chinese shipbuilders, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding and New Times Shipbuilding.
Yangzijiang Shipbuilding is responsible for constructing 12 ships, each with a capacity of 16,800 TEU, to expand the existing fleet. New Times Shipbuilding will build 12 ships, each with a capacity of 9,200 TEU, to replace older ships in Hapag-Lloyd’s fleet.
These new ships will be equipped with energy-efficient LNG dual-fuel engines capable of using biomethane as fuel, with provisions for ammonia fuel. They are expected to be delivered between 2027 and 2029, adding 312,000 TEU capacity to Hapag-Lloyd.