Decision support for emission reduction technology appraisals in ship acquisition

Abstract

Appraising emission reduction technologies in ship acquisition has become gradually more important due to regulatory requirements and technology development aimed at mitigating environmental impacts from maritime transportation. This is particularly important for actors involved in ferry concessions on Norwegian public road crossings, as this segment has been used as an arena to pilot alternative marine fuels, power systems and other emission reduction technologies. In evaluating these solutions, concession authorities, owners and other decision makers are required to simultaneously consider several conflicting criteria to identify preferable courses of action. This thesis seeks to contribute to a holistic approach for structuring, modeling and evaluating these decisions in a value focused manner. By combining systems engineering principles, multi-criteria decision making methods and stochastic modeling techniques, it suggests new approaches for comprehensive evaluation of investment options in ship acquisition. Case studies of Norwegian public road crossings are used to demonstrate these approaches. The main contributions of the thesis are - Expansion and application of systems engineering methodology for problem structuring - Identification and systemization of stakeholders, values, concerns and uncertainties pertinent to ship acquisition decision problems involving emission reduction solutions - Review of methods and techniques for multi-criteria appraisals in ship acquisition - Development and application of a multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) method that addresses uncertainties in the selection of ship acquisition emission reduction technology - Development and application of a composite approach that evaluates both uncertainties and multi-actor opinions in the selection of ship acquisition emission reduction technology