How we deal with the seemingly endless tide of discarded plastics within our environment and in particular our oceans is an immediate challenge. Several teams of current Ship Science students participated in a competition organised by the Western joint branch of ImarEST and RINA. The challenge was to find a design solution that could cost-effectively collect and remove macro plastic from the ocean. University of Southampton teams were placed first and second. Diogo Figuiera Nunes, Alex Pardoe and Tom Kenwright proposed Oceanum Nova. A concept design for a fleet of catamarans that would act as mobile platforms for plastic removal. The USP of their design was the fact that it brought together many different designs that have already been tried and tested and were therefore confident that they would work.
We face many maritime engineering challenges with regard to dealing with the legacy of past generations as well as the challenges of how we reduce future ship emissions. Modules such as a our SESS6074 Marine Safety: risk, environment and law equip students for the wider challenges of the future.
Our Master of Engineering degree has been updated to reflect the future challenges we all face in engineering in the maritime environment. We now have six pahways reflecting the challenges of decarbonisation, increased autonomy and digitalisation.:
(i)Advanced Computational Engineering
(ii) Marine Engineering and Autonomy
(iii) Naval Architecture
(iv) International Naval Architecture
(v) Ocean Energy and Offshore Engineering
(vi) Yacht and High Performance Craft
In future posts we will explore something of the exciting aspects of each pathway at Southampton.