Paul Benecki

Staff Writer

Paul Benecki is a graduate of Cornell University's chemistry program. He worked in industry for several years before shipping out on freighters and tugs on the U.S. West Coast, then with the University of Washington's research vessel, the Thomas G. Thompson. He studied navigation and bridge resource management at the Pacific Maritime Institute, and is currently a staff writer and news editor at The Maritime Executive Magazine.

Competing for Data

By Paul Benecki 2019-06-19 16:22:00

As connectivity at sea becomes more common, opportunities for new applications and business models are proliferating. Nor-Shipping 2019 showcased an increasingly competitive market for ship data services, with half a dozen vendors offering comprehensive platforms for transmission, storage and analysis. Many of these firms are from adjacent spaces, and their new services are bundled in ways that overlap traditional industry lines. It appears that previous forecasts for single-vendor, all-inclusive data services - VSAT packaged with e-navigation, cybersecurity, IoT, cloud services, vessel performance management and remote monitoring - are coming...

IMO 2020 Transition Takes Center Stage at Nor-Shipping

By Paul Benecki 2019-06-07 06:23:42

The IMO 2020 sulfur rule was at the top of the list of concerns for shipowners at the Nor-Shipping 2019 conference, Norway's biennial gathering for the industry. Every owner knows that the requirement is coming, but not everyone wants to go first. At a DNV GL panel on Monday, experts from shipping, bunkering and insurance discussed the challenges for owners going into 2020. Early adopters of compliant bunkers face several risks. First and foremost, their competitors do not have to bear...

How Will Officers Interact with Autonomous Systems?

By Paul Benecki 2019-06-07 05:30:36

The autonomous container feeder Yara Birkeland is set to begin operations in 2020, and most technologists predict that vessel autonomy will begin rolling out in limited applications within the next five to ten years. As the technical obstacles gradually fall away, the biggest remaining questions may be social: regulatory structures, legal precedents, P&I cover, and - perhaps less discussed - the question of how mariners will interact with autonomous systems. For the near future, the bridges of autonomous vessels will still be manned, just...

Nalini Gupta, Head of Costa Cruise India

Market Insight: What Indian Cruisers Want

By Paul Benecki 2019-06-06 18:37:34

India's cruise market is growing - so is the nation's cruise wedding industry. Nalini Gupta, Head of Costa Cruise India, discusses the key trends: What is driving Indians' interest in cruise weddings? While cruise holidays are part of the bucket list of many Indian travelers, Indian wedding planners and couples have discovered that weddings on board a cruise can be one of the most hassle free, unique and cost-effective options. Keeping in line with the trend, in 2017, we celebrated...

Selling Point

By Paul Benecki 2019-04-19 13:15:01

Environmental compliance is important for every shipowner's bottom line. A proven track record can attract good customers and new revenue. A lapse can result in detentions, fines and bad publicity. Upfront investment in quality treatment equipment can bring peace of mind, and with the most innovative solutions it can even be a selling point. New Rules for Ballast Water When a ship takes on ballast in one region...

"Fix Me!"

By Paul Benecki 2019-01-18 18:01:53

Vessel operators pay close attention to their hull and machinery, but what if the ship could talk to them directly about its condition? That’s basically the goal of condition monitoring, or condition-based maintenance, which in effect “tell” the shipowner when and where repairs are needed. At the most basic level, condition monitoring (CM) simply means tracking key indicators of equipment health and looking for changes that could predict trouble. Lube oil analysis is a time-tested example:...

Overland Express

By Paul Benecki 2018-12-20 20:15:52

Trucking dominates the business of moving boxes to and from container ports and has a big advantage: A truck can go virtually anywhere there’s a road. However, its flexibility comes with a price. Truck drayage is the least fuel-efficient method to move a container. Over long distances, it’s usually the most expensive. When combined with other modes of transportation in an intermodal network, on the other hand, it can be very cost-effective. In the most common form of intermodal transport,...

IN THE KNOW Podcast 6: USMMA at 75

By Paul Benecki 2018-10-03 21:50:00

In this edition of the Maritime Executive Magazine podcast series, we spoke with Capt. Jim Tobin, the head of the USMMA Alumni Association and Foundation, and with Ivy Barton Suter, an alumnus of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and an advocate for its flagship "Sea Year" program. The academy's leadership and its student body have implemented many changes in the wake of the 2016 Sea Year standown, and the Alumni Foundation has played a key role in that process -...

Does Europe Have Enough Shipbreaking Capacity?

By Paul Benecki 2018-09-25 19:47:47

Under the EU Ship Recycling Regulation (SRR), vessels flagged in EU countries will have to be scrapped at EU-approved yards beginning next January. All 20 yards on the current approved list are within the EU, and members of industry have expressed skepticism about whether they have the capacity. In a report released Monday, advocacy coalition NGO Shipbreaking Platform pushed back, asserting that European ship recyclers already have enough room. NGO Shipbreaking Platform calculates the maximum capacity of the current EU-listed yards at 1.15...

Digital Twins

By Paul Benecki 2018-08-17 15:08:53

Individual shipowners may not always have the resources to invest in their own research and development. With intense competitive pressures, rising bunker prices and new compliance costs, their focus is on the bottom line. But R&D comes naturally to class societies, which have engineering expertise at the core of their business model and are leading the way in developing new data-driven opportunities for shipping. While the top class societies' much-discussed “digitalization” initiatives may sound futuristic or abstract, they are all...