- container ship order book doubled up in 2021
- a record high 3.3m TEU has been ordered, indicating that shipowners are going big on investing in new capacity
- out of the 168 ordered container ships, 117 will be delivered with a scrubber fitted directly from the shipyard
Freight rates are record high, record amounts of cargo are shipped across the Pacific Ocean, as well as globally, and the previous yearly record for new container ship orders has just been broken (measured incapacity) in less than eight months says an article on Bimco.
Splurge on new tonnage
As a result of very healthy shipowner bottom lines and carriers experiencing a lack of tonnage, 619 container ships are now on order for future delivery. Of those, 381 have been ordered in 2021 alone, and never has 3.44m TEU been ordered in such a short time span. Still, it’s not a record for the total order book, as 6.8m TEU were on order by the end of July 2008, compared to 5.3m TEU by late August.
‘Going big’
“Today the container ship order book holds 5.3m TEU of shipping capacity which is scheduled to be added to the fleet from 2023 and onwards. Entering 2021, the order book stood just at 2.5m TEU. Since then, a record high 3.3m TEU has been ordered, indicating that shipowners are going big on investing in new capacity,” says Peter Sand, BIMCO’s Chief Shipping Analyst.
Scrubber-fitted ships
“Size still matters, but it is no longer the only thing that matters. Your ships must be ready to fit emerging trade lanes, and many of the new ships on order will be scrubber-fitted,” Sand says.
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Source: BIMCO
