Damen InvaSave ballast water treatment system wins the Innovation in Port Equipment award

The Damen InvaSave ballast water treatment (BWT) system has won the Innovation in Port Equipment award at the inaugural IHS DPC Dredging and Port Construction Innovation Awards. These took place on the evening of the 10th of November in the Marriott Hotel in Mayfair, London. Damen InvaSave competed with four other finalists in its category to take the award, the company said in its press release.

The judges’ decision was based on the fact that: “InvaSave’ addresses a long neglected problem, where Damen saw a clear niche in the market.  Ballast Water Treatment Systems will be mandatory from next year, but not all vessels will be ready - so having a portside unit that virtually any vessel can plug into, or having one on board, is a perfect, innovative solution!”

Matthijs Schuiten, Product Manager within Damen Green Solutions BV, received the award on behalf of Damen. “We are delighted to have won this prestigous award,” he said after the ceremony. “The timing could not be better with the IMO Water Ballast Management Convention now coming into force in September 2017. We believe that the Damen InvaSave will have an important role to play in the battle against invasive marine organisms and the damage they can do in waters that do not have the natural mechanisms to cope with them.”

The Damen InvaSave is designed to provide ports with a solution for incoming vessels that either do not have their own onboard BWT systems or have suffered some sort of system failure. With InvaSave technology, the ballast water only needs treating at the point of discharge, in contrast to most fixed onboard installations that also need to treat at intake. The InvaSave system can be supplied as a self-sufficient unit within a container. This can then be mounted on a barge or other platform so as to move around the harbour. Multiple units can be mounted in parallel to increase capacity.

The DPC Innovation Awards have been created to recognise and celebrate outstanding innovation and technological contributions made by the dredging and port construction industry. The winners in the 13 product categories were chosen by a panel of expert judges.

Damen Shipyards Group
Damen Shipyards Group operates 32 shipbuilding and repair yards, employing 9,000 people worldwide. Damen has delivered more than 6,000 vessels in more than 100 countries and delivers some 180 vessels annually to customers worldwide. Based on its unique, standardised ship-design concept Damen is able to guarantee consistent quality.

Damen’s focus on standardisation, modular construction and keeping vessels in stock leads to short delivery times, low ‘total cost of ownership’, high resale values and reliable performance. Furthermore, Damen vessels are based on thorough R&D and proven technology.

Damen offers a wide range of products, including tugs, workboats, naval and patrol vessels, high speed craft, cargo vessels, dredgers, vessels for the offshore industry, ferries, pontoons and superyachts.

For nearly all vessel types Damen offers a broad range of services, including maintenance, spare parts delivery, training and the transfer of (shipbuilding) know-how. Damen also offers a variety of marine components, such as nozzles, rudders, anchors, anchor chains and steel works.

In addition to ship design and shipbuilding, Damen Shiprepair & Conversion has a worldwide network of 16 repair and conversion yards with dry docks ranging up to 420 x 80 metres. Conversion projects range from adapting vessels to today’s requirements and regulations to the complete conversion of large offshore structures. DSC completes around 1,500 repair and maintenance jobs annually.