Maritime interests in the EU policy-making: Structures,practices, and governability of collective action

Throughout Europe, a number of maritime interests have re-targeted their lobbying structures and strategies aiming to influence the development of the maritime related European Union (EU) policies. The paper examines these maritime interests’ mobilisation in the making of the Common EU Maritime Transport Policy (CMTP). First, it provides a review of the role of these interest groups and the implications of the observed collective interests’ representation. Then, with the contribution a data-set of replies to a questionnaire distributed to all the interest groups that are involved in EU maritime affairs, the paper analyses the variety of interest groups representing the maritime sector in EU affairs. The focus is on the structures (i.e. membership numbers and types, location, internal structures, budget) and the lobbying practices of the 37 identified EU level maritime related organisations. The paper also presents an evaluation of the most positive and most negative parameters of the ‘EU environment’ and the ‘economic environment’ that assist, or undermine, the governability cohesiveness of this collective action. This study provides information on whether and under what conditions maritime interests are able to form comprehensive EU-level organisations capable of representing their members and their interests in the EU policy making process     

Experimental study on the nonlinear pressure acting on a high-speed vessel in regular waves

It is well known that the hydrodynamic responses of a high-speed vessel traveling in regular head waves of even moderate wave height can show significant nonlinear behavior, and so linear statistical techniques become insufficient for predicting the statistics of responses in irregular waves. On the other hand, it has been shown that an approximate third-order Volterra model is applicable to handling the statistics of some nonlinear seakeeping problems, such as motions and vertical hull girder loads. In the present study, the focus is on the nonlinear behavior of the pressure responses of the hull surface, especially on the pressures acting on alternately wet and dry areas near the waterline and on the bow zone with high deadrise angles that may be subject to slight impact and water pile-up effects. To clarify the validity of applying Volterra modeling to this problem, a series of experiments in regular and irregular head waves were carried out, and approximate third-order and fifth-order Volterra models with the proposed algorithm for finding frequency response functions (FRFs) were applied as a means of validation. In the present article, the first part of the validation was performed using experimental data in regular waves. It was confirmed that the third-order Volterra model has adequate accuracy to simulate deterministically the variation of pressure responses in regular waves of different wave steepness up to a wave amplitude to wavelength ratio of 0.01 even for the highly nonlinear pressures acting on the above-mentioned areas of the hull surface.     

An approach to estimating the hull girder response of a ship due to springing

This article describes an estimation method for the hull girder response of a ship due to springing. The linear and nonlinear springing effects on the hull girder are evaluated. Previous studies on the springing response focused mainly on the symmetric response, or vertical response. In this article, however, the springing analysis is extended to asymmetric responses, or horizontal and torsional responses. The Timoshenko beam model was used to calculate the hull girder response and the quadratic strip method was employed to calculate hydrodynamic forces and moments on the hull. To remove irregular frequencies, a rigid lid was adopted on the hull free surface level and hydrodynamic coefficients were interpolated for asymptotic values. Applications to two ships for the symmetric and asymmetric responses were carried out and the effect of springing responses is also discussed.     

Application of H∞ control in rudder/flap vector robust control of a ship＇s course

Given the uncertainty of parameters and the random nature of disturbances that effect a ships course, a robust course controller should be designed on the basis of rudder/flap vector control. This paper analyzes system uncertainty, and the choice of weighting functions is also discussed. When sea waves operate on a ship, the energy-concentrating frequency varies with the angle of encounter. For different angles of encounter, different weighting functions are designed. For the pole of a nominal model existing in an imaginary axis, the bilinear-transform method is used. The ＂2-Riccati＂ equation is adopted to solve the H∞ controller. A system simulation is given, and the results show that, compared with a PID controller, this system has higher course precision and more robust performance. This research has significant engineering value.     

Structural safety assessment of a pontoon-type VLFS considering damage to the breakwater

 A structural safety assessment of a pontoon-type very large floating structure (VLFS) surrounded by a gravity-type breakwater was carried out for extreme wave conditions by considering the damage to the breakwater. Bending and shear collapses are considered to be a failure mode of the floating structure, while overturning damages the breakwater. The probability of the breakwater overturning, and the transmitted wave height before and after damage to the breakwater, are evaluated using design formulae for port and harbor facilities in Japan. The ultimate bending and shear strengths of the floating structure are calculated by the idealized structural unit method (ISUM) and FEM, respectively. The calculated failure probability for the floating structure is compared with the specified target safety level. It was found that the floating structure under consideration is most likely to fail by bending in transverse waves, and that the corresponding failure probability satisfies the target level. Received: September 12, 2002 / Accepted: October 4, 2002 Acknowledgment. The authors are grateful to Dr. Shigeo Ohmatsu, National Maritime Research Institute, Japan, for allowing us to use the program of hydroelastic response analysis. Address correspondence to: M. Fujikubo (e-mail: fujikubo@naoe.hiroshima-u.ac.jp) Updated from the Japanese original, which won the 2002 SNAJ prize (J Soc Arthit Jpn 2002;190:337–345)     

Research on the coefficient of sound absorption in turbid water

China’s coastal waters are turbid and the properties of the seabed are complex. This negatively impacts the performance of underwater detection equipment. The properties of sound absorption in turbid water are not well understood. In this paper, the coefficient of sound absorption in turbid water was measured by the reverberation technique. All work was done in a reverberation barrel made of seamless aluminum. First, pure water was poured into the reverberation barrel and its reverberation time measured. Next, various concentrations of turbid water were poured into the barrel and their reverberation time measured. After all data had been gathered, the coefficient of sound absorption in turbid water of different concentrations was calculated. From this we determined a law of sound absorption in turbid water as summarized in the paper.     

How remote is remote pilotage?

“Today, the idea of allowing aircraft pilots to operate as they see fit, without any control from the land, is unthinkable. Will the same things apply to ships in twenty to thirty years’ time?”Current maritime pilotage regimes are clearly seen in some quarters as too restrictive and old fashioned. Change is “in the air” and VTS, pilotage, and the relationship between them cannot be immune to it. Subject to the attainment of the appropriate standards by both ships and their crews there is no practical reason why more flexible Vessel Traffic Management cannot be introduced. The required technology is largely available and, with the introduction of AIS, the required dynamic data can be available. Technical problems foreseen are believed capable of solution. The more significant obstacles to implementation are, therefore, largely political, commercial, organisational, and cultural. These issues are discussed in this paper taking into account the viewpoints of major stakeholders.     

结构动力学基于摄动法的高阶非线性随机有限元方法研究(英文)

Several algorithms were proposed relating to the development of a framework of the perturbation-based stochastic finite element method (PSFEM) for large variation nonlinear dynamic problems. For this purpose, algorithms and a framework related to SFEM based on the stochastic virtual work principle were studied. To prove the validity and practicality of the algorithms and framework, numerical examples for nonlinear dynamic problems with large variations were calculated and compared with the Monte-Carlo Simulation method. This comparison shows that the proposed approaches are accurate and effective for the nonlinear dynamic analysis of structures with random parameters.