Autonomous Ferries for Short Range Island Commuter Water Transport

A high percentage of Danish population lives in coastal areas. Constructing bridges over these water channels is expensive and may hinder marine traffic. Therefore, in the coastal cities, island and urban ferries are essential for the quality of live.

The development within the domain of autonomy has to a great extend been dominated by innovation anchored technological and slightly less on the needs – a push rather than a technological pull.

The project ”Autonomous Ferries for Short Range Island Commuter Water Transport” will turn the innovation drivers up-side-down and ask the question – what is it good for? and what are the challenges we still need to solve?

”We have gone very far on the technological level, and therefore we need to assess what barriers that are still present within the technical field, the competence levels for the seafarers and the legislative environment. The path towards autonomous ferries does not need to be very far, but we need to shed light on how autonomous ferries can create a positive difference for the society.” Kjeld Dittmann, Chairman for ShippingLab.

Task partners

DTU Electrical Engineering

SIMAC

TUCO Marine

Danish Maritime Authority

Færgesekretariatet