November 8, 2017 -Japanese line Mitsui OSK Lines (MOL) is taking an active role in pushing the frontiers of artificial intelligence (AI) in the maritime industry.
MOL president and ceo Junichiro Ikeda announced that it would be participating in a project with Fujitsu Laboratories and Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology (TUMST) to verify the accuracy of technology to estimate vessel performance at sea by applying Fujitsu’s artificial intelligence (AI) technology, “FUJITSU Human Centric AI Zinrai.”
This project is a part of MOL’s initiative to assess the effectiveness of AI technology, and aims to reduce fuel consumption and vessels’ environmental impact by verifying the accuracy of the technology, using Fujitsu’s AI Technology to estimate vessel performance at sea.
For its part, MOL provided actual voyage data collected from its operational fleet to Fujitsu Laboratories, which, along with TUMST, verified the data by using their jointly developed machine learning method.
MOL provided some 30 items of actual voyage data such as speed, fuel consumption, main engine rpm, wind direction and wind speed, among others, for a two-month period from October to December 2015, MOL said.
The project sought to measure the correlation of each item of operational data using Fujitsu’s unique AI technology and high-dimensional statistics analysis technology, and through this, develop technology that would be able to estimate vessel performance.
By using high-dimensional statistical analysis the research team was able to estimate vessel speed with about a 1.4% margin, and fuel consumption with an allowance of about 0.8%.
This project, as a part of the “ISHIN NEXT - MOL SMART SHIP PROJECT", assesses the effectiveness of AI technology and aims to enhance operating safety and reduce environmental impact through reduction of fuel consumption.
Source: Seatrade Maritime News
