Energy Performance and Manoeuvring Modelling of Inland Waterway Vessels

Licentiate thesis, 2023

Inland waterway transport has significant potential to reduce greenhouse emissions and road congestion safely and sustainably. To construct competitive, intelligent waterborne transport networks, the use of advanced vessels with clean energy and a high degree of automation or autonomy is an ideal solution for next-generation transport. However, to promote the production and implementation of these autonomous inland vessels, numerous issues must be considered from both the technical and legislative perspectives. A comprehensive analysis of ship design, perception, path planning, motion control, and potential social-technical, economic, and legal issues is required.

This thesis addresses a critical issue for future autonomous vessels: energy-efficient path planning. It includes the development of an energy performance prediction model, a manoeuvring model, and an integrated voyage planning tool for energy optimisation. Research on ship resistance, propulsion, and manoeuvring has been conducted actively in recent decades. However, most methods have been developed for sea-going vessels, whose hull form and navigational conditions are distinct from those of inland ships. Only a few studies analyse the inland waterway’s hydrodynamic impact, especially in restricted waterways. However, these model tests or numerical simulations usually focus on a specific issue or ship type, and holistic models for general application to these inland vessels are lacking. Therefore, this thesis aims to develop generic models that capture ship energy consumption and manoeuvring performance, specifically for inland vessels.

The thesis presents the development of an integrated ship energy system model. The model is based on a ship performance model, ShipCLEAN, with significant modifications in ship resistance prediction and propeller modelling on shallow water to capture the characteristics of inland waterway vessels (IWVs). A verification study shows that the proposed model has very good accuracy in terms of resistance and power prediction in varying water depths based solely on empirical methods. A new manoeuvring model based on the MMG model is proposed, including shallow water correction and additional bank effects on confined waterways. Turning circle tests on a pusher–barge system indicate that the proposed model can capture the vessel’s steering behaviour. Then, a rudder controller is developed to analyse the rudder capacity in course keeping on confined channels with shallow water, river currents, and bank effects.

The proposed models generate fast and accurate predictions on energy consumption and dynamic motions of IWVs, with good applicability for integration into energy-efficient path planning with route algorithms and optimisation techniques.