24 DECEMBER 2017 • FOGHORN SPECIALREPORT I n April 2016, the world was introduced to Sea Hunter, a new vessel for the U.S. Navy. This vessel, a trimaran, was developed by engineers at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for the purpose of detecting diesel electric submarines using a host of highly advanced technology. Here’s what’s so remarkable about Sea Hunter…it was designed to be autonomous. Technically, Sea Hunter is an Anti-Submarine Warfare Continuous Trail Unmanned Vessel or ACTUV. Essentially, it is a very large drone that is capable of operating with minimal human support in the water. According to reports, it is 132 feet long, weighs 135 tons, and has a range of up to 10,000 miles. Autonomous vehicles have been in the news for a while. Silicon Valley giants Tesla, Lyft, Uber and Google have been busy for some time creating—and perfecting—the world’s first self-driving automobiles. But, don’t count out Detroit’s automotive goliaths. Ford recently announced that it expects to have self-driving cars on the road in 2021. Chevrolet’s plans are even more ambitious. Starting as soon as 2018, Chevy’s all-electric car, the Bolt, will be cruising the streets of Manhattan sans drivers. Surely the commercial marine industry can’t be far behind? Right on cue, PVA Associate member, ABS of Houston, TX, has joined a part- nership within the shipping industry to “advance autonomous shipping.” “Increased digitization, advanced technologies and new levels of connec- tivity are changing the way the maritime industry operates,” says ABS Greater China Division President Eric Kleess. “In the coming years, we will see sig- Are Autonomous Vessels the Future of the Passenger Vessel Industry? By Karen Rainbolt, FOGHORN Managing Editor nificant changes in the way ships are designed and built, with a strong drive to develop autonomous vessels espe- cially in China. As a key member of this alliance,ABS is aligned closely with industry to support safer and more sus- tainable maritime operations. ” Dubbed the Unmanned Cargo Ship Development Alliance, the group is working on a framework for a design that will integrate features of indepen- dent decision-making, autonomous navigation, environmental perception and remote control. Another PVA Associate member, Rolls-Royce has signed an agreement with Google to “develop further its in- telligent awareness systems which are making existing vessels safer and are essential to making autonomous ships a reality.” The agreement, announced in early October, believed to be the first in the marine sector, was signed at the Google Cloud Summit in Sweden. It allows Rolls-Royce to use Google’s Cloud Machine Learning Engine to further train the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) based object classifica- tion system for detecting, identifying and tracking the objects a vessel can encounter at sea.  Karno Tenovuo, Rolls-Royce, SVP Artist impression of new zero emission, full-electric, autonomous ferry concept. Source Kongsberg.