Norden inks order for six Supramaxes with DACKS

Danish shipping company Norden has placed a newbuilding order for six Supramax dry cargo vessels with Dalian COSCO KHI Ship Engineering (DACKS), a joint venture between COSCO Shipping and Kawasaki Heavy Industries.

The 64,000 dwt vessels are slated for delivery in the next two to three years.

“Placing this newbuilding order is an integrated part of our asset trading strategy, whereby we can add dry cargo capacity with future delivery, which we think will be interesting both from a freight and asset value perspective. This is also supported by the current low orderbook which will see very few deliveries between now and the delivery of these vessels,” Head of Asset Management, Henrik Lykkegaard Madsen, said.

The newbuildings will join the portfolio of Norden-owned and leased dry cargo and product tankers managed by the Assets & Logistics business unit.

Having made sizeable reductions in the owned dry cargo fleet during 2022, Norden only owned around 6 dry cargo vessels at the end of the first quarter of this year. During 2023, the company has gradually added more exposure towards the dry cargo market, effective from 2024 onwards.

The newbuilds will have a fuel-efficient design and will be able to run on both traditional marine oil and biofuel.

Norden considers biofuel a critical transition fuel on the company’s journey to reduce emissions and offer greener shipping solutions.

The advantage of biofuel over other low-carbon fuels, according to Norden, is that it can be used onboard vessels without any type of modification to the current engine design, thereby minimising risk for shipowners who are ready to take the step into using biofuel.

The company has been testing biofuels since 2018 and has since fuelled both its owned and chartered ships, with various types of biofuel blends.

Earlier this year, Norden teamed up with compatriot Spar Shipping in a project that saw the bunkering of approximately 1100 tonnes of biofuel at Dutch biofuels provider GoodFuels in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, used on two voyages bound for Asia and Africa respectively.

This bunkering represents a continuation of the collaboration between Norden and GoodFuels. In October, GoodFuels joined hands with global certification organisation Control Union and France’s IDS Group to test the effectiveness of an isotopic tracer for marine biofuels, and the pilot testing was conducted during delivery of 500 tonnes of biofuel to the Norden-owned tanker Nord Gardenia.