Evergreen Marine has taken delivery of the fuel-efficient Thalassa Hellas, the first in a series of ten 13,806-TEU container ships it ordered from Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) of South Korea.
The delivery of the newbuild marks Evergreen’s entry into the ultra-large box ship category. The Taiwan-based ship operator is chartering the mega vessels for 10 years to Lemos-Enesel, a Greek ship owner concentrated on the dry bulk and tank markets that is entering the container sector for the first time.
In July 2012, Evergreen teamed up with Enesel, a non-operating ship owner, in ordering the 10 box ships in a bid to cut fuel costs and take advantage of low newbuilding rates.
The Thalassa Hellas will be deployed on the Evergreen and Hanjin Shipping’s joint Far East-Europe service CEM/ANN, replacing the 9,200-TEU Ever Legion, which is to be fielded on the the CES loop.
The CEM loop will eventually upgrade its fleet of 9,000-TEU ships with the 13,800-TEU models.
The Thalassa Hellas, which measures 368 meters long and 51 meters wide, will use 10 percent less fuel compared to similar types of existing container ships. Evergreen will reportedly save about US$1 billion in fuel costs over a 10-year period.
The newbuild will follow this port rotation on its first sailing set for this month: Qingdao, Shanghai, Ningbo, Yantian, Tanjung Pelepas, Colombo, Rotterdam, Felixstowe, Hamburg, Zeebrugge, Colombo, Tanjung Pelepas, Hong Kong, and back to Qingdao.
The Thalassa Hellas was christened last week at the HHI shipyard together with its sister ship Thalassa Patris, which is set for delivery at the end of November. The rest of the vessels will be delivered between January and September 2014.
Photo: Peter Kaminski
