Concern for the synthesis of the overall design process for marine structures, and its integration with production, maintenance, repair, service and decommissioning. Particular attention shall be given to the roles and requirements of computer-based design and production, and to the utilization of information technology
Trends like more and more powerful and refined structural optimization algorithms or the diffusion and growth of Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) tools have been confirmed and consolidated in this report. Next to them there is the growth of new mainstreams like adoption of Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) tools as tools supporting both design and PLM capabilities.
Different from 2018 ISSC Committee IV.2 report, the present Committee does not present a dedicated chapter to offshore structures. Instead of that, the present approach is to insert dedicated paragraphs inside every Chapter. This choice is based on the fact that the design methods for ships and offshore structures are often coincident.
Chapter 2 presents an updating on the state-of-the-art of design methods, enhancing how the classic concept of the design spiral is on the way to be superseded by a new, more integrated, holistic design concept. This integrates all the classic steps of the ship design into a unique parallel process, which involves at the same time more design tools/methods achieving a superior design in less time. In this respect, the large-scale R&D European Union-funded project HOLISHIP (HOLIstic optimisation of SHIP design and operation for life cycle), launched in 2016, is a common reference, influencing more or less every section of this Report.
Chapter 3 presents how design tools are developing with special focus, again, in the integration in different tools (structure, hydrodynamic, propulsion, etc.) in which capabilities are brought together by dedicated software packages instead of having a monolithic software capable to do everything.
One of the strongest trends today in design methods are the optimization tools, which have been developed in universities and are being applied in industry. The topic is presented in Chapter 4, showing how approaches like Genetic Algorithms are becoming very popular.
Lifecycle Data Management has always been a central and important point of the ISSC IV.2 Committee Report and this is still valid, particularly because of the increased computing and data analysis capabilities which are available today. Chapter 5 presents this topic, also considering new trends like the use of VR and AR as tools to follow the ship’s lifecycle from early design to disposal, thus modelling also its “aging”.
Following the suggestion of the previous official discusser of the 2018 ISSC Committee IV.2 report, Chapter 6 is dedicated to the analysis of what is the state-of-art against the state-of-practice, thus covering the gap between the research work and the practical applications.
Finally, a strong accent has been put on the emerging trends by mean of a dedicated chapter, identifying megatrends of the future (autonomous ships, zero emissions, new material) and which new design methods will be boosted by them.
