The Instalco company, Mesab has been engaged by Royal Caribbean Group and Carnival Corporation & PLC for comprehensive technical installations on five cruise ships. At the same time, other installation projects that had been put on hold during the pandemic will be resumed.

The work involves installation of flue gas treatment plants on the Queen Victoria, Celebrity Equinox and Celebrity Reflection vessels, along with comprehensive technical updates on the Celebrity Eclips and Celebrity Solstice vessels. The total order value is approximately SEK 200 million.

“This is a clear signal to the market that the cruise industry in making a strong recovery. The work was ordered by the client to ensure that the vessels meet the current international environmental requirements on emission control,” says Niklas Rylin, CEO at Mesab.

Mesab will deliver an overall solution for each of the vessels, which includes a feasibility study, design and installation of complete systems. Work is already underway and expected to be completed during the second quarter of 2022. Most of the installation work will be done during normal operations when ships are in the Caribbean, along the west coast of the USA, in France and the UK.

These new projects and the rising demand for these types of services in the USA have enabled Mesab to grow the business and allocate more resources there. For example, Mesab’s founder, Anders Sjöström, and US Branch Manager, Feliza Mulcan, are currently in the US to meet the need and deliver quality to the customers.

“The logistics are always challenging in our projects, since the ships are cruising with passengers and they typically don’t stay more than one day at any particular location. Many of the steps are critical, requiring careful preparations and skilled project managers & assemblers,” says Niklas Rylin.

One example of the type of complexity they encounter in these types of projects was installation of a scrubber on both the Equinox and Reflection vessels during a port visit to Miami. Each scrubber is 12 meters tall, with a diameter of 3 meters. They had to be loaded in sections through the ship side on deck 5. The sections then needed to be transported through the ship for assembly in the funnel.

The project on the Queen Victoria is being carried out in collaboration with two other Instalco companies. HP Welding is responsible for delivery of hull bushings in high-grade steel and NCE (Nordpipe Composite Engineering) is responsible for delivery of the fibreglass reinforced plastic (GAP) components.