New mathematical methods driving the energy transition in the maritime transport sector

Physical and statistical models for use in ship design

Multiple factors contribute to the loss of energy by cargo ships out at sea, including the complexity of the ships themselves and the materials used in their construction, plus the difficulty of predicting how they will behave at sea and how they will cope with meteorological phenomena (currently responsible for a standard deviation of between 15 and 50% of energy use depending on the severity of conditions), as well as hazards specific to the marine environment. There are also uncertainties inherent to the methods of propulsion that will be used in the future, including wind and hydrogen.

Headed up by Olivier Le Maître, director of research at the CNRS and member of PLATON (a joint project team involving the CNRS, Inria and the École Polytechnique), MATritime is seeking to develop a holistic model of all of the relevant uncertainties (environmental, characterisation, building modelling, etc.), beginning with the design process and continuing throughout a boat’s entire lifespan. Drawing on advanced digital simulation technology combining physical and statistical models, the laboratory will devise digital methods capable of being applied at different steps along the journey to carbon neutrality:

• in the short term, optimising the components used in existing ships
• in the medium term, the robust design of conventional ships
• long-term, the robust design of ships employing new methods of propulsion

Running parallel to this, the project will also explore the creation of digital twins of ships, incorporating data measured at sea in order to optimise models used to predict ship performance, the overarching objective being to support the digitalisation of the maritime industry while preparing future tools for operational problems (e.g. optimising routes, maintenance operations, and so on). By bringing together researchers in mathematics with naval architects, MATritime is hoping that this multidisciplinarity will enable them to contribute towards making the maritime industry greener, more sustainable and more robust.

© Inria / B. Fourrier

_{From left to right in the photo : Melchior Faure, Development officer for CNRS joint laboratories / Dominique Rossin, Director of Teaching and Research École polytechnique / Renaud Bañuls, Founder and CEO, Bañulsdesign / Jean-Yves Berthou, Director of Inria's Saclay center and Deputy Director General of Inria's site policy /  Dominique Dunon-Bluteau, Director of Scientific Operations ANR}  

Based at the École Polytechnique’s Centre for Applied Mathematics, the project team Platon is a joint undertaking involving the CNRS, the École Polytechnique and Inria. Created in 2020, Platon is comprised of 3 permanent researchers and around a dozen PhD students and postdoctoral researchers carrying out research on dealing with uncertainty in scientific computing for use in engineering and simulation. Their expertise ranges from modelling uncertainty and decision-making to sensitivity analysis, model calibration and the relevant aspects of algorithms and high-performance computing. Platon has a number of partnerships in both the industrial (ArianeGroup, 3DS, Essilor, Framatome, Bañulsdesign) and public spheres (ONERA, DLR, CEA, BRGM, VKI, ESA), while its permanent researchers have a strong network of academic collaborations with universities such as Stanford, Duke, KAUST, MIT, Politecnico Milano, UCL and Zurich.

Bañulsdesign is a VSB founded by Renaud Bañuls in 2009 which specialises in naval architecture for sailboats, with a particular emphasis on racing sailboats (winner of the 33rd America’s Cup with the BMW Oracle team, designed the Sodebo Ultim 3 32-metre long Ultim trimaran and optimised the French Olympic catamaran for the Tokyo games). Over the past few years Bañulsdesign has also provided its expertise in the maritime industry to leading firms such as BV Solutions and CMA CGM, helping them to optimise their ships and their routes. Bañulsdesign was also behind the creation of “Share the Ocean”, a consortium set up to help prevent collisions with marine megafauna, alongside the observatory PELAGIS (La Rochelle University / CNRS).

Find out more

• Article in the newspaper Le Monde  "COP27 : le fret maritime est l’un des plus grands émetteurs de CO2, et il tarde à changer de cap"
• The ANR’s LabCom programme