The Department of Marine Technology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Aker Yards, Rolls Royce Marine, and DNV have partnered to build an international competence center for research and education on the topic “sustainable design of ships for the future.” The university currently has 5 PhD and 2 postdoctoral fellowships available in the research program that is funded by the three companies and the Norwegian Research Council.

NTNU’s official description of the program states that it will cover the following:

• Innovative ship design - the capability to turn end user needs and wants into designs which exceed the end customer’s expectations to performance, specifically related to areas such as environmental performance and onboard work environment.
• Production friendliness - deployment of state of the art production technologies and methods to enhance quality and cost-effectiveness in an increasingly distributed, collaborative ship production process.
• Design effectiveness - the deployment of state of the art design technology and processes to enhance the design process itself.
• Enhanced risk and opportunity management in conceptual design decision making.

The research subjects will include both theoretical and applied methods focusing on the following subjects:

• New and improved methods for analysis and optimization in conceptual design, with emphasis on the early assessment of sustainability, producibility, cost, operability and risk.
• Methods and models for ship conceptual design optimization within the context of a fleet and/or transport system, with emphasis on utilization, robustness and lifecycle environmental impact.
• Product platforms, work processes and best engineering practices in design, engineering and production, focusing on parametric and configuration-based design methods and modularization.
• Methods to identify key design drivers and simplified design representations from large, complex design models, with focus on assessing performance differentials (what-if) rather than absolute performance levels.
• Methods for the efficient exploitation of data embedded in existing databases and other knowledge sources to support design decisions and verification.