Turkish Uzmar Shipyard has held a steel-cutting ceremony for Türkiye’s first dual-fuel tugboat, being built for BOTAŞ (Petroleum Pipeline Corporation), the state-owned crude oil and natural gas pipelines and trading company.
The shipyard will build two Voith tractor-type propeller tugboats that will be able to run on liquified natural gas (LNG) and diesel.
BOTAS has 55 years of experience in the sector and currently has 14 tugboats in its fleet.
The tugboats will have a length of 39 meters and a width of 15 meters. They will serve at BOTAŞ ports with a speed of 12 knots. They will have a minimum pulling power of 80 tons, and main engines with a total power of 6,000 kW, in addition to Voith propeller system and Fi-Fi1 fire extinguishing capacity.
BOTAS also plans to further rejuvenate the tugboat fleet with sustainability and fleet efficiency in mind.