In this episode, Senior Project Manager Konstantinos Vouroutzis and Sustainability Engineer Tim Badalotti join host Brad Cox to explore the latest findings from the seventh edition of the ABS Outlook series, Beyond the Horizon: Vision Meets Reality.

As lead authors, Vouroutzis and Badalotti, discuss the maritime industry’s ambitious emission goals and the market realities that challenge these targets. They highlight key checkpoints on the horizon, emphasizing the role of alternative fuels, energy efficiency technologies and sustainability financing in achieving goals.

Download the full Outlook here.

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Key Points

• There is a tension between high sustainability ambitions and market realities.
• Total maritime emissions are increasing despite improvements in carbon intensity per unit of work.
• Green fuels like ammonia and hydrogen are still in early developmental stages.
• Energy efficiency technologies are crucial for decoupling emissions from growing seaborne trade.
• Regulatory compliance costs are expected to rise significantly in the coming years.
• LNG remains a key transitional fuel for the maritime industry.
• Fragmentation in the shipping industry presents challenges for integration and efficiency.

GUESTS

Konstantinos Vouroutzis is a seasoned Naval Architect and manager with over 20 years of experience in the maritime and offshore industries. He possesses a diverse skill set including expertise in management, project management, decarbonization, performance and energy efficiency of ships, green shipping, naval architecture, structural design and analysis, as well as regulatory compliance. He is a registered European Engineer (EUR ING) and Chartered Engineer (CEng, MRINA). In 2023, he joined ABS as a Senior Project Manager – Global Sustainability, where he leads strategic sustainability projects and key initiatives, while being an integral part of the department’s Leadership Team. He also serves as ABS’s representative in the Working Group of the Maritime Technologies Forum (MTF). Prior to joining ABS, he held various roles in other Classification Societies and ship design firms, demonstrating a diverse and extensive professional background.

Tim Badalotti is Principal Engineer at the ABS Global Sustainability Center in Japan. His primary responsibility is to assist Japanese clients in decarbonizing their fleets by offering technical and regulatory guidance, helping ensure that these efforts remain economically viable. With a background in Aerospace Engineering, Tim was previously a researcher on Mathematical Models for Fluid Dynamics before joining the industry. He is passionate about infrastructure design, modeling and optimization. His career spans multiple sectors, including railway and shipping. He used to be in charge of high-speed train design for the European market at a major Japanese conglomerate before transitioning to the shipping classification sector, where he has been developing new technologies, rules, and guidelines aimed at improving ship safety and decarbonizing operations, all the while collaborating with private and public stakeholders, mainly in Japan and Europe.