Reasons of the Covertainer Concept
There are three main reasons for the Covertainer concept:
- Container system's tare and size issue
There are approximately 20 million containers worldwide, with around 200 million container movements per year. This means that, on average, a container makes about 10 trips a year to carry its cargo. Although container sizes have remained the same since the 1900s, neither supply nor demand is what it used to be. In short, the current container sizes can no longer meet the need. However, this growth cannot happen with steel due to the tare weight. - The only remaining option is: structures like rubber, which have a low tare weight, are elastic, and are suitable for heavy-duty work.
Autonomous ships and the washing problem
If a dishwasher at home sometimes can’t fully clean dishes, how could a ship that performs tank washing be autonomous?
Ships that do tank and hold cleaning will lose their competitive advantage to autonomous container ships.
Therefore, moving to a no-washing transportation model is inevitable.
The ecological sustainability of tank washing
Tank washing and empty trips not only increase carbon emissions but also have negative effects on the seas. Every year, approximately 250,000 tons of pure chemical washing water from tank washing processes mix into the sea (approximately the size of three large tankers).
This is both an economic loss and an environmental disaster. As the number of ships increases, the cargo carried also increases, thus the number of tank washing operations rises.
Chapter 17 of the IBC Code lists nearly 1,000 different cargoes, and their washing water is discharged into the sea.
Some of these are:
Phenol
- Acrylonitrile (A.C.N.)
- Styrene monomer
- Sulfuric acid