92 INTERVIEW P&O Ferries’ Stewart Hayes explains to Lindsay James why reliability, retrofitting and industry-wide collaboration will define the pace of the sector’s transition to lower-emission operations The reality of ferry decarbonisation Ferries operate like no other class of vessel. While a typical cargo ship might make one port call a day, a ferry can make eight – and for P&O Ferries’ fleet director Stewart Hayes, that single fact underpins almost every challenge the sector faces on its journey towards decarbonisation. “The infrastructure and technologies needed to support decarbonisation are not yet developing at the pace or scale required,” he says. Shoreside infrastructure investment has been slow, next-generation green fuels remain at varying stages of development and new power delivery and propulsion systems, while promising, are still largely untested at scale. Layered on top of that is an increasingly fragmented regulatory picture, with different countries pursuing their own frameworks. “Working collaboratively across industry, government and infrastructure providers will be key to creating the conditions needed for the transition to lower-carbon ferry operations,” says Hayes. That need for collaboration shapes how Hayes believes operators should prioritise investment. The starting point, he says, is always reliability. “Any new technology must demonstrate that it can perform consistently in a demanding operational environment before it is introduced into service.” Beyond that, the right investment often comes down to the age and design of the vessel in question. Many emerging propulsion technologies are difficult to retrofit onto older tonnage, but make strong sense for newbuilds designed around them from the outset. For existing fleets, Hayes points to a more incremental approach: working with naval architects and equipment manufacturers to refine hull and propeller design, onboard energy demand and engine performance, alongside smaller systems that quietly add up. “Individually, these improvements may be small, but together they can deliver a significant impact,” he says. That philosophy is playing out across P&O Ferries’ own fleet. “Our priority has been improving efficiency and maintaining the reliable service our customers depend on, whilst ensuring that decarbonisation remains at the heart of our work,” says Hayes. The company has taken a broad approach, applying lessons learned in one P&O Ferries is making incremental improvements to the ferries in its fleet to help decarbonise operations
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