China’s Marine Equipment Domain Reaped a Lot in 2023

Li Qin

In 2023, the demand of the international shipbuilding market continued to climb, the order structure kept upgrading, and the active new shipbuilding market injected a steady stream of new momentum for the development of the marine equipment realm.

In 2023, the scale of the marine equipment market was further expanded, and the supply exceeded the demand. New orders from marine equipment enterprises increased significantly, and the production plan of most key marine equipment enterprises is scheduled to 2026 or even 2027.In order to complete the order task on schedule, many enterprises have increased their production capacities.At the same time, with the gradual recovery of the price of new ships, the price of marine equipment products is making corresponding rising, and the operating conditions of marine equipment enterprises continue to improve. Statistics from CANSI show that from January to November 2023,China's 74 key monitored shipbuilding enterprises completed 461.06 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 20.8%. Among them, the output value of marine equipment was 37.86 billion yuan, up 18.9% YOY.

In addition to the significant improvement in the business situation,China's marine equipment market presented bright spots in the product breakthrough and structure upgrading in 2023. In particular, it is worth mentioning that in 2023, the completed volume of low-speed engines of CSSC reached 403 units, exceeding 10 million horsepower for the first time, and accounted for about 40% of the global market share, which is of symbolic significance in the development history of CSSC and even of China's shipbuilding industry.

Stars in the new ship market,such as PCTC, large LNG carriers,VLCS and alternative fuel ships have fairly high requirements for marine equipment products, which are largely high technology and high value-added equipment, and these equipment orders are increasingy incorporated by Chinese marine equipment manufacturers, whose order structure upgrade is evident.

In 2023,energy-saving,environmentally friendly and efficient marine equipment launched by China's marine equipment enterprises was concentrated in the fields of marine engines, large crankshaft forgings,marine boilers, propulsion devices and other fields. In terms of marine engines, in 2023, Chinese marine engine manufacturers realized batch delivery of X92DF series LNG dualfuel marine engines; successfully delivered the first 7X82-2.0-HPSCR main engine in the world, equipped with the self-developed high pressure exhaust gas aftertreatment device to meet the emission requirements of the IMO Tier III; independently developed the methanol dual-fuel engine, and the M320DM-PFI methanol dual-fuel engine is slated to complete the special test bench run of methanol injection system in 2024.

Apart from the methanol fuel engine, the research and development of ammonia, hydrogen, fuel cell and other power systems and supporting products is also a hot spot in the market. China's marine equipment enterprises invested in the R&D of ammonia / diesel dual fuel tug special project, and established the ＂Marine Clean Fuel Application Tech Innovation Consortium＂ with many domestic and foreign enterprises,research institutes and universities; the first ammonia / diesel double-direct injection two-stroke engine principle prototype obtained the classification society’s AiP certificate; the 500 kW hydrogen fuel cell monitoring system and safety system (electrical equipment)obtained the marine product certificate issued by the classification society;the independently developed marine ammonia fuel supply system found the real ship application, and won the world's first large ammonia fuel powered ship order.

Furthermore, the development of some key marine equipment products in China made significant progress in 2023: China's first independently designed and built＂Nanhai Endeavour＂ FPSO (floating production storage and offloading unit) SRHP successfully passed the acceptance; the first domestically built LNG tappet crane completed the predelivery test; Shanghai Heavy Casting and Forging under Shanghai Electric Group delivered the first set of homemade X92 large marine low speed crankshaft forgings, successfully realizing the localization of crankshaft forgings of large marine diesel engines with cylinder diameter above 700 mm;the first set of S60 bead welded piston head developed by Anqing CSSC Diesel Engine Co., Ltd. was delivered smoothly; CSSC Jiujiang launched the world's first set of ship methanol dualfuel boiler new product; the 1 MW wave power generation platform developed by Jiangsu Zhengtian Heavy Industry Co., Ltd. has been successfully applied to China's first megawatt floating wave power generation device ＂Nankun＂, and put into trial operation, the system fills the gap in the Chinee platform mooring anchor capstan sector.

The marine equipment industry plays a vital role in realizing the safety and controllability of China's shipbuilding industry chain and promoting the high-quality development of the industry. To break the monopoly of foreign enterprises in ship highend equipment and core parts R&D and manufacturing, Chinese marine equipment manufacturers have constantly improved system integration supply capacity of equipment and parts,expanded the industrial chain breadth,made the equipment ＂integrated package＂ bigger, and extended from equipment manufacturing to equipment design and equipment project management.

In 2023, the packaging supply methods of China's marine equipment enterprises were more and more diversified. Some were ship design and equipment system integration,some were equipment packaging and project management, some provided a complete set of ＂turnkey＂ services around products, and more were equipment packaging and supply. For example, competitive products of the power system of CSSC Silent Electric System (Wuxi) Technology Co Ltd’s new energy ships were increasingly abundant, starting from the initial ship power system core and key equipment S-Drive frequency conversion electric control equipment, launched S-Container container type mobile power supply, S-Pack battery pack,S-BMS battery management system,S-PCS remote co ntrol system, S-Link remote monitoring system, taking more and more market share in the ship power propulsion domain.

In terms of ＂turnkey＂ project,Headway Tech launched two low carbon shipping solutions -- marine methanol fuel supply system (LFSS)and carbon capture and reuse system,and conducted win-win cooperation with CIMC SOE and SDARI, from methanol and ammonia among other new fuel conversion design schemes,joint maintenance of customers,shipyard modification engineering,equipment installation and debugging,after-sales services and multiple dimensions, providing perfect low carbon shipping solutions, and creating a win-win situation.

Industry experts said that at present, building a safe and stable industrial chain and supply chain has become the key to enhance the competitiveness of China's shipbuilding and ocean engineering equipment industries. With both opportunities and challenges being presented, on the one hand, Chinese marine equipment enterprises should strengthen the building of scientific and technological innovation system, product quality system, marketing system and so on, improve product quality and reliability, accelerate the research and development and promotion of lowcarbon and zero-carbon fuel engine and other products, constantly improve the product spectrum, enhance the brand competitiveness, firmly control of the domestic market. On the other hand, they will further give full play to the leading role of large enterprises,build an industrial development ecology in which large, small and mediumsized enterprises are interdependent and mutually promoted, simultaneously strengthen local supporting facilities and international coordination systems,promote integrated and innovative development of the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain and large, small and medium-sized enterprises, thus promoting elevating competitiveness of China's marine equipment industry.