German ocean carrier Hapag-Lloyd officially welcomed into its fleet the 23,600 TEU container ship Berlin Express, the first vessel of the company’s new Hamburg Express class.
Naming patron Elke Büdenbender, German jurist, and, since 1995, the wife of Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the current President of Germany, performed the ceremonial christening of the ship. The event took place at the Container Terminal Burchardkai (Athabaskakai) in the Port of Hamburg.
According to Hapag-Lloyd, the Hamburg Express class will mark the beginning of a new era for the company and its fleet. In total, a dozen large container ships will be put into service by 2025.
Together, these vessels will make an important contribution to Hapag-Lloyd’s efforts to operate its entire fleet in a climate-neutral manner by 2045. Thanks to their cutting-edge dual-fuel technology, they will also be able to operate using non-fossil fuels, such as bio-methane and e-methane, and thereby generate hardly any CO2 emissions.
In addition, advanced components – such as an optimised hull and a highly efficient propeller – will help the vessels to reduce fuel consumption and thereby greenhouse gas emissions.
In particular, Berlin Express was built at the Hanwha Ocean shipyard in South Korea. With a length of almost 400 metres and a capacity of 23,600 TEUs, it is the largest cargo ship ever to sail under the German flag.
The new ship will operate regularly on the FE3 service, which sails between Ningbo and Hamburg, via Xiamen, Kaohsiung, Yantian, Hong Kong, Singapore and Rotterdam.
Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd, commented, “The highly efficient ships will allow us to reduce our emissions immediately and to a very significant degree. At the same time, they are an important building block in our strategy to gradually push ahead with decarbonisation.”
