AIDA Cruises has been awarded the “Blue Angel”, German federal government’s ecolabel, for AIDAnova’s environmentally friendly ship design.
“We are very honored to receive this recognition of our long-standing commitment to protecting the marine environment and reducing emissions. Together with the Meyer Werft shipyard in Papenburg we built AIDAnova, the world’s first cruise ship, which is operated entirely with low-emission liquid gas (LNG), but we also convinced the jury with many other technical innovations. By 2023 we will be putting two more of these innovative cruise ships into service,” said AIDA President Felix Eichhorn at the award ceremony attended by representatives of the Federal Environmental Agency (UBA) and the Blue Angel jury in Rostock.
Dr. Ralf-Rainer Braun, chairman of the jury “ecolabels” said, “This ecolabel is something special: It covers a large number of requirements that must be fulfilled when a new ship is built. In their sum, they stand for a significant contribution to environmental protection. We hope that this award for AIDA Cruises is a positive message for more environmental protection throughout the whole shipping industry.”
Thanks to the use of LNG, as on board AIDAnova, emissions of particulate matter and sulfur oxides are almost completely eliminated; nitrogen oxide and CO2 emissions are sustainably reduced.
AIDA Cruises is also driving innovation in many other areas to make an active contribution to the energy transition.
Since 2017, AIDAsol is the only ship to be powered with green shoreside energy in the cruise port Hamburg-Altona. Already by the end of 2020, twelve out of fourteen AIDA ships will be ready to use shore power from renewable energy sources where available. The company is ready to start test operations with AIDA ships at the shores power units planned for 2020 in Kiel und Rostock.
Parallel to this, AIDA Cruises is exploring the use of fuel cells, batteries and liquefied gas from renewable sources in cruising. The company plans to test the first fuel cell on board an AIDA ship as early as 2021.
By 2023, ninety-four percent of all AIDA guests will be travelling on ships fully operated with low-emission liquefied natural gas or, where possible, green shore power at port.