Rolls-Royce's Seagoing "Aquarium" Transports Tons of Live Fish to UK Markets

There’s certainly no substitute to eating fresh, unfrozen fish immediately after catch, particularly if it’s tuna and you happen to have some wasabi sauce on board, but for those of you who have to go to the market to get your fish, well, your options are what they are.

Faroese salmon fishery, Bakkafrost has chosen to try and maximize the freshness of their product by choosing the live-fish route. Instead of flash-freezing the salmon harvested from their fish farms, they have decided to build a 75.8 meter Live Fish Carrier at the Tersan Shipyard in Turkey. This new ship will carry upwards of 450 tons of live fish in giant on-board “aquariums” to onshore processing facilities.

Carrying the fish live from the farms to the onshore processing facility is an absolutely critical factor for Bakkafrost. As anyone who has ever left fresh fish in their fridge too long, they definitely have expiration dates, so keeping the fish alive and happy for as long as possible, while minimizing the time between processing and the dinner plate is important.

Vessel designer Rolls-Royce notes that the fish will be kept in three holds with a closed circuit pump and filtering system and a high capacity system for de-licing will also be installed. Rolls-Royce will provide the NVC 386 vessel design and integrated equipment package including a diesel-electric propulsion system and two Bergen C6 engines for a total consideration of approximately £5.8 million.

In October the Norwegian ship owner SÃ¸lvtrans took delivery of a live fish carrier from the Zamakona shipyard in Spain and has a second vessel under construction, which makes this the third live fish carrier order for Rolls-Royce.