Innovative shipbuilding can lead the entire domestic economy into a breakthrough
The forecasted needs of only the main internal customers are about 1200 ships and technical equipment, which are to be built by 2030. Most of them will be spent on updating and replenishing the river fleet. Shipbuilding can become the engine of the domestic economy and contribute to its qualitative change.
Already 20 years after the Crimean War, in 1876, thanks to the talent of Rear Admiral A. A. Popov and the skill of Russian shipbuilders, the most powerful battleship "Peter the Great" was built, and then the world's first armored cruiser "General-Admiral" with a displacement of 5300 tons. Thirty years later, the Austrian economist Josef Schumpeter will summarize this experience of economic development and introduce the concept of innovation, defining innovation as an implemented innovation that gives a real economic or social effect.
Fleet after Crimea
The Crimean War of 1854-1856, its lessons forced the maritime powers to convert their fleets from sailing to steam. The Russian government is also solving this problem. Talented administrators and young talented sailors - A. A. Popov, I. F. Likhachev, V. A. Rimsky-Korsakov, S. S. Lisovsky, who later became famous admirals, are involved in the rearmament of the fleet. The construction of battleships begins. A steam propeller fleet is being created.
"Over the next three years, the growth in the volume of civil shipbuilding should be 23 percent"
The first Russian battleship, the Pervenets battery, was ordered in 1861 in England. But after a couple of years, the same ones were being built in St. Petersburg. A whole series is being created: two armored batteries, ten monitors, a two-turret boat.
Simultaneously with military shipbuilding, a commercial civilian direction is also developing on a new design and technological base. Over the decade after the end of the Crimean War, the Russian ship industry has been radically rebuilt, entering the age of steam and iron, scientific and engineering thought, and a qualitatively different work of shipyards. This activity required a pooling of efforts, an exchange of ideas. An intellectual centripetal force was born, which led to a new form of cooperation - the Russian Technical Society, which included the most talented and passionate representatives of the maritime and shipbuilding business. As a result of the activities of these devotees, fundamentally new models were created, advanced technologies and forms of organization of production were introduced, and previously unknown fields of engineering and factory professions were born.
Based on Schumpeter's strict definition, we note that the Russian technical society is based on direct innovation activity, which, as the economy grew, the specialization of industries deepened, and cooperation developed, remained the core of all domestic scientific and engineering organizations that grew out of this historical root.
NTO shipbuilders named after Krylov, having emerged as the IV department of the Russian Technical Society, throughout all 150 years of its existence, has sought to implement this fundamental trend. And in the pre-revolutionary years, and in the Soviet period, and today, the main task was to promote innovation.
Fairway of the domestic economy
The demand for modern ships and special equipment in industries related to marine and water activities is constantly growing. Water transport and fishing fleet are in need of cardinal renovation. The forecast until 2030 is about 1200 units of ships and technical equipment.
Shipbuilding is especially important for the development of offshore hydrocarbon deposits, including the production of exploration and production platforms (more than 30), support vessels, technical and service equipment (over 150), gas carriers, including ice class (more than 20 units).
Vessels, mostly unique, are required to revive the Northern Sea Route:
atomic icebreaker-leader with a capacity of 110 MW - 1;
universal 60-MW nuclear icebreakers - 5;
linear diesel icebreakers 25 MW and 18 MW - 12;
auxiliary and port icebreakers 4–7 MW - 8;
floating nuclear power plants for the northern regions - 7 units.
The time is ripe for the modernization of the sea transport fleet, involving the construction of up to 230 tankers, including those with a deadweight of more than 70 thousand tons, bulk carriers, timber carriers, universal and multipurpose vessels.
The river fleet of Russia faces a large-scale task of cardinal renewal, for which it is necessary to launch up to 750 river and mixed (river-sea) navigation vessels, as well as a technical fleet, for supervision and other state needs.
The domestic fishing industry is in need of more than two hundred large and small specialized vessels.
25 offshore research platforms are required by oceanographers and representatives of other branches of knowledge.
In the next three years alone, the growth in the volume of civil shipbuilding, including R&D, should reach 23 percent and exceed 59 billion rubles in monetary terms.
Only the innovative economy of the industry can cope with such tasks. For its development, the state plans to implement the following directions:
1. Creation of a scientific and technical reserve, providing for investments in fundamental and exploratory research, taking into account the priorities of technological directions and updating the experimental base.
2. Development of engineering based on the design of products at a given cost, competitiveness, serial production and the use of domestic intellectual property.
3. Import substitution based on the development of new industries and the localization of existing ones.
4. Increasing production capacities while planning their development, taking into account long-term utilization and economic efficiency.
5. Personnel improvement, providing for the training of highly qualified specialists, the attraction and retention of young people, the optimization of the structure.
Reified theories
One of the most important problems in creating a domestic Arctic fleet and marine equipment for the development of offshore fields in high latitudes is new shipbuilding materials. The solution of the problems facing in this area requires the use of the latest achievements, in particular, nanotechnology. The production of sheet steels with nanostructure elements has become a great success for scientists and industrialists. The know-how was used in the construction of the unique Prirazlomnaya and Arkticheskaya drilling platforms. In addition to ensuring high properties (weldability, frost resistance, plasticity, etc.), these works open up the possibility of unifying the chemical composition of steels and, consequently, reducing their cost.
The practice of operating Arctic vessels sets new tasks to improve the efficiency and safety of their work in high latitudes, in ice. The ongoing research allows us to offer unconventional solutions. So, to ensure ice strength and reliability of transport ships in conditions of year-round navigation, domestic science creates active means of protecting the hull. It is provided with new information technology approaches to solving problems of this class, including interactive control during operation. Along with traditional mathematical methods, the achievements of artificial intelligence are applied. An important role is played by information processing technologies in a multiprocessor environment, which allows an intelligent system to understand the complex processes of interaction between a ship and the outside world, simulate its actions and learn from its own experience. These and other know-hows contribute to the creation of marine technology with new consumer qualities, which brings Russia to the forefront of the Arctic shipbuilding, providing the industry with high competitiveness in this niche of the world market.
An example of large-scale technological innovations, supported by the potential of the NTO shipbuilders named after Krylov, is the construction of domestic gas carriers. The technical issues of preparing such production in Russia have been successfully resolved.
An important area was the introduction of organizational and managerial innovations:
improving the design, engineering training and management of the construction of ships and vessels based on the use of information technology;
information support for after-sales service of weapons and military equipment, ships and other products of the industry;
training of personnel in the areas of information technology for the tasks of designing ships and vessels, preparation of production and management.
The most promising undertakings receive targeted support from the Krylov Committee for the Search and Approval of Innovative Projects, which functions as part of the NTO. In 2014 and 2015, nine such projects were considered. Two of them are already being introduced into industrial production. The rest are in various stages of development by potential investors.
