Carnival Corporation’s Newest Ship, AIDAnova from AIDA Cruises, Makes Maiden Call in the Canary Islands as World’s First Cruise Vessel Powered by LNG, reports MarketWatch.
Green Cruise Ship
World’s largest leisure travel company in Germany Carnival Corporation & plc, celebrates the start of its operation of the Santa Cruz de Tenerife terminal with the arrival of AIDAnova.
AIDAnova is the first of its new class of next-generation “green” cruise ship. This can be powered at sea and in port by liquefied natural gas (LNG) and refuels with the cleanest burning fossil fuel through the partnership with Shell.
The announcement
Carnival Corporation recently announced an agreement with the Port Authority of Santa Cruz de Tenerife to be the first concession-holder to operate the Canary Islands’ and Mid Atlantic’s newest cruise terminal.
First guests on board
Directly following the arrival of AIDAnova on the afternoon of Dec. 18, AIDA Cruises’ president, Felix Eichhorn, welcomed Fernando Clavijo Batlle, president of the Canary Islands, and Pedro Suàrez López de Vergara, president of the Port Authority of Santa Cruz de Tenerife as one of the first guests on board to participate in the cruise industry’s traditional plaque exchange, marking a ship’s first visit to a port.
New Vacation Experiences
“We are looking forward to a successful premiere season in the Canary Islands,” said Eichhorn.
“AIDAnova is a milestone for our company and the entire cruise industry by offering entirely new vacation experiences. With our new ship, we will contribute to further economic growth of the local tourism and maritime industry. With an extraordinary variety of individual vacation options on board and ashore, we are providing new and exciting reasons for people to enjoy a cruise vacation, one of the vacation industry’s fastest-growing sectors. Furthermore, with our pioneering LNG technology, we start a new era of even more environmentally friendly cruising.”
The first supply
The first LNG supply for AIDAnova at the port took place upon its arrival, made possible by a supply agreement signed in 2016 between Carnival Corporation and Shell Western LNG B.V. (Shell) to contribute to a robust and reliable LNG fuel supply chain.
“We at Carnival Corporation are strongly committed to leading the way in the implementation of innovations to help protect the environment and support the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and we are proud to be on the forefront of advancing LNG as a fuel source for the cruise industry,” said Tom Strang, senior vice president of maritime affairs for Carnival Corporation.
Environment-friendly
“One of the keys to establishing LNG as an industry standard for powering cruise ships is building an extensive, safe and reliable infrastructure for the fuel across the globe, and we look forward to working closely with Shell to support that effort. The first LNG supply of AIDAnova here in the Canary Islands, only achieved with the active support of the local port authorities, is the start of building a strong foundation for the future of LNG fuel supply for cruise ships across the globe.”
In total, following AIDAnova, Carnival Corporation has an additional 10 next-generation “green” cruise ships on order that will be powered by LNG in port and at sea, with expected delivery dates between 2019 and 2025, leading the cruise industry’s use of LNG to power cruise ships.
“We are proud to be supplying LNG for the world’s first LNG-powered cruise ship,” said Tahir Faruqui, general manager, Shell global downstream LNG.
Suàrez said, “The policy of environmental respect is one of our pillars and the arrival of next-generation ‘green’ cruise ships powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG) is among the priorities of our roadmap for the next years.”
Economic Impact
“The arrival of Carnival Corporation and its cruise lines to the port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife is the materialization of a momentous advancement to bring the city to the port,” said Suàrez.
“The tourist development of Santa Cruz will be possible during the next years thanks to the activity of her port. In this sense, thanks in part to Carnival Corporation ships, the cruise market generated an economic impact to the Port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and the city of Santa Cruz of €24 million ($27.1 million) in the 2018 cruise season, an increase of €6m from the 2017 cruise season.”
Welcoming 617,987 cruise passengers in 2017, Santa Cruz de Tenerife is one of the busiest cruise ports in the Canary Islands, the seven-island Spanish archipelago off the coast of Africa and Spain, and the first to attract investment by a major cruise company.
Innovation awards
With a long history of innovation and providing guests with extraordinary vacation experiences, Carnival Corporation has received thousands of industry awards – including recognition by the Consumer Technology Association™ as a CES® 2019 Innovation Awards Honoree for OceanMedallion™.
A revolutionary wearable device that contains a proprietary blend of communication technologies, OceanMedallion enables the world’s first interactive guest experience platform transforming vacation travel on a large scale into a highly personalized level of customized service. The prestigious CES Innovation Awards honor outstanding design and engineering in consumer technology products.
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Source: Market Watch
